An African immigrant was today convicted of the rape and murder of British exchange student Meredith Kercher, and two others, including an American student, were ordered to stand trial by an Italian judge.
Rudy Guede (21), born in the Ivory Coast, was sentenced to 30 years in prison in connection with the murder last November of 21-year-old Ms Kercher, whose semi-naked body was found in her apartment in the university city of Perugia in central Italy.
Prosecutors say Ms Kercher was fatally stabbed in the neck when the three suspects tried to involve her in an orgy. The case has riveted Italians and received wide cover in the British and American media.
Judge Paolo Micheli also ordered Kercher's flatmate, American exchange student Amanda Knox (21), and Knox's Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito (24), to stand trial on murder charges. Their trial will start on December 4th.
Guede, who can appeal the verdict, had agreed to a fast-track procedure with no jury, which allows suspects to receive a lesser sentence if they are convicted.
Prosecutors had sought life imprisonment for Guede, who fled Italy after the murder and was extradited back from Germany.
Ms Knox and Mr Sollecito have been held in jail since shortly after the murder and the judge said he would decide in a few days on their requests for house arrest.
Prosecutors say they found the murder weapon -- a knife with Ms Kercher and Ms Knox's DNA -- inside Mr Sollecito's apartment. They said fingerprints, footprints and DNA evidence implicated the suspects.
All three deny wrongdoing and the messy case has involved conflicting testimony and defence accusations of a botched investigation and contamination of evidence.
Ms Knox, a former student at University of Washington in Seattle, first said she heard Kercher's screams from another room in the apartment but later said she spent the night at Mr Sollecito's house.
"This is a terrible moment for me. I feel awful. I'm not a killer," Ms Knox was quoted saying in a note to her lawyer, according to Italy's
La Repubblicanewspaper.
Guede argued that he was in Ms Kercher's bathroom at the time of the murder but that someone else broke into the house and killed her.
Reuters