Waiting to Be Heard: A Memoir

by Amanda Knox

  The next thing I remember was waking up the morning of Friday November 2 around 10 am and I took a plastic bag to take back my dirty clothes to go back to my house. It was then that I arrived home alone that I found the door to my house was wide open and this all began. In regards to this “confession” that I made last night, I want to make clear that I’m very doubtful of the verity of my statements because they were made under the pressures of stress, shock and extreme exhaustion. Not only was I told I would be arrested and put in jail for 30 years, but I was also hit in the head when I didn’t remember a fact correctly. I understand that the police are under a lot of stress, so I understand the treatment I received.

  However, it was under this pressure and after many hours of confusion that my mind came up with these answers. In my mind I saw Patrik in flashes of blurred images. I saw him near the basketball court. I saw him at my front door. I saw myself cowering in the kitchen with my hands over my ears because in my head I could hear Meredith screaming. But I’ve said this many times so as to make myself clear: these things seem unreal to me, like a dream, and I am unsure if they are real things that happened or are just dreams my head has made to try to answer the questions in my head and the questions I am being asked.

  But the truth is, I am unsure about the truth and here’s why:

  1. The police have told me that they have hard evidence that places me at the house, my house, at the time of Meredith’s murder. I don’t know what proof they are talking about, but if this is true, it means I am very confused and my dreams must be real.

  2. My boyfriend has claimed that I have said things that I know are not true. I KNOW I told him I didn’t have to work that night. I remember that moment very clearly. I also NEVER asked him to lie for me. This is absolutely a lie. What I don’t understand is why Raffaele, who has always been so caring and gentle with me, would lie about this. What does he have to hide? I don’t think he killed Meredith, but I do think he is scared, like me. He walked into a situation that he has never had to be in, and perhaps he is trying to find a way out by disassociating himself with me.

  Honestly, I understand because this is a very scary situation. I also know that the police don’t believe things of me that I know I can explain, such as:

  1. I know the police are confused as to why it took me so long to call someone after I found the door to my house open and blood in the bathroom. The truth is, I wasn’t sure what to think, but I definitely didn’t think the worst, that someone was murdered. I thought a lot of things, mainly that perhaps someone got hurt and left quickly to take care of it. I also thought that maybe one of my roommates was having menstral problems and hadn’t cleaned up. Perhaps I was in shock, but at the time I didn’t know what to think and that’s the truth. That is why I talked to Raffaele about it in the morning, because I was worried and wanted advice.

  2. I also know that the fact that I can’t fully recall the events that I claim took place at Raffaele’s home during the time that Meredith was murdered is incriminating. And I stand by my statements that I made last night about events that could have taken place in my home with Patrik, but I want to make very clear that these events seem more unreal to me than what I said before, that I stayed at Raffaele’s house.

  3. I’m very confused at this time. My head is full of contrasting ideas and I know I can be frustrating to work with for this reason. But I also want to tell the truth as best I can. Everything I have said in regards to my involvement in Meredith’s death, even though it is contrasting, are the best truth that I have been able to think.

  I’m trying, I really am, because I’m scared for myself. I know I didn’t kill Meredith. That’s all I know for sure. In these flashbacks that I’m having, I see Patrik as the murderer, but the way the truth feels in my mind, there is no way for me to have known because I don’t remember FOR SURE if I was at my house that night. The questions that need answering, at least for how I’m thinking are:

  1. Why did Raffaele lie? (or for you) Did Raffaele lie?

  2. Why did I think of Patrik?

  3. Is the evidence proving my pressance at the time and place of the crime reliable? If so, what does this say about my memory? Is it reliable?

  4. Is there any other evidence condemning Patrik or any other person?

  5. Who is the REAL murder? This is particularly important because I don’t feel I can be used as condemning testimone in this instance.

  I have a clearer mind than I’ve had before, but I’m still missing parts, which I know is bad for me. But this is the truth and this is what I’m thinking at this time. Please don’t yell at me because it only makes me more confused, which doesn’t help anyone. I understand how serious this situation is, and as such, I want to give you this information as soon and as clearly as possible.

  If there are still parts that don’t make sense, please ask me. I’m doing the best I can, just like you are. Please believe me at least in that, although I understand if you don’t. All I know is that I didn’t kill Meredith, and so I have nothing but lies to be afraid of.

  I finished writing and handed the pages to Ficarra. I didn’t remember the word for “explanation.” “This is a present for you”—“un regalo,” I said.

  She said, “What is it—my birthday?”

  I felt so much lighter. I knew that I was blameless, and I was sure that was obvious to everyone. We’d just had a misunderstanding. I’d cleared the record.

  I was on the police’s side, so I was sure they were on mine. I didn’t have a glimmer of understanding that I had just made my situation worse. I didn’t get that the police saw me as a brutal murderer who had admitted guilt and was now trying to squirm out of a hard-won confession.

  My memoriale changed nothing. As soon as I gave it to Ficarra, I was taken into the hall right outside the interrogation room, where a big crowd of cops gathered around me. I recognized Pubblico Ministero Giuliano Mignini, who I still believed was the mayor.

  An officer stood in front of me as straight as a gun barrel and read me my rights. It was in Italian, only some of which I understood. They handcuffed me. A third person held on to my upper arm. They said, “You’re under arrest. We’re taking you to prison.”

  As groggy and mixed-up as I was, those official words startled me. “You’re doing what?!” I asked, raising my voice, agitated. I couldn’t make sense of this news.

  I thought that they were keeping me to protect me. But why would they have to arrest me? And why did they have to take me to prison? I’d imagined that maybe “custody” meant I’d be given a room in the questura. That Mom could be there with me.

  It’s inconceivable to me now that I hardly reacted. It didn’t occur to me that I should again ask for a lawyer—or that I needed one. I assumed that once I’d signed my testimony, the moment for a lawyer had passed. I was completely preoccupied with distinguishing between real memories versus whatever I’d imagined. I was lost in my head, trying to remember everything Raffaele and I had done hour by hour, minute by minute, on the night of Meredith’s murder so that I could tell the police. I was still replaying my interrogation. I didn’t—or couldn’t—grasp how much trouble I was in.

  If they ever said that I was a murder suspect, I either didn’t hear it or didn’t understand it. I heard “it’s only for a few days,” “bureaucratic reasons,” and “it’s all under control.”

  “Okay,” I said reflexively. I’d fought hard for myself during the night, and I was totally passive now. I had nothing left.

  Still, what came next shocked me. After my arrest, I was taken downstairs to a room where, in front of a male doctor, female nurse, and a few female police officers, I was told to strip naked and spread my legs. I was embarrassed because of my nudity, my period—I felt frustrated and helpless. The doctor inspected the outer lips of my vagina and then separated them with his fingers to examine the inner. He measured and photographed my intimate parts. I couldn’t understand why they were doing this. I thought, Why is this happening? What’
s the purpose of this?

  The doctor and nurse weren’t rough with me, but it didn’t matter. Being on display, nude, in front of strangers while they discussed me was the most dehumanizing, degrading experience I had ever been through. I didn’t protest. I waited silently, feeling violated and angry. In my head I was screaming, Stop it! Stop it now!

  Next they checked my entire body for cuts and bruises, clawing through my hair to get to my scalp and inspecting the bottoms of my feet. A female police officer pointed out different places to examine and document. I thought, Why are they measuring the length of my arms and the breadth of my hands? What does it matter how big my feet are? Later, I realized they were trying to fit the crime to my dimensions. What would Meredith’s wounds be like if I’d been the one who stabbed her? Could I have stabbed her from my height? They took pictures of anything they thought would be significant.

  I pointed out the hickey Raffaele had given me. It had faded to a pinkish tinge on my throat, but I didn’t want to appear as if I were hiding anything from them. The police seemed totally uninterested and recorded it perfunctorily. But during my trial the prosecution used it as evidence to fit one of their ever-changing scenarios.

  Raffaele. I didn’t know what to think of him. How could the person I’d felt so close to have abandoned me? Had he really said, “Amanda left that night” and “Amanda asked me to lie for her?” Or were the police just telling me that? I no longer knew whom I could trust. I felt betrayed and alone.

  More than anything, I wanted my mom. She would help me explain what had happened and get me out of this nightmarish experience. Where is she? How can I reach her? Is she waiting for me at the train station?

  I was finally allowed to get dressed. The police had brought me an airy skirt from the villa with my hiking boots. It seemed like such a ridiculous choice for November that I wadded it up in my purse and put back on Raffaele’s clothes, which I’d been wearing before.

  I asked to use the bathroom. A female police officer stood in front of the stall with the door open. Why is she standing here? I can’t relax enough to pee, even if she’s looking away. I guessed this unwanted guardian was somehow supposed to keep me safe.

  Eventually I put aside my inhibitions long enough to be able to pee. After that they closed the handcuffs back around my wrists. I think they’d left them intentionally loose, but I was so submissive I reported their breach. “Excuse me,” I said. “But I can slip my hand out.”

  They tightened them.

  Then they shoved a wool hat down over my eyes. “Duck your head,” Ficarra ordered. “Don’t look up.” She mumbled something about “journalists.”

  We were standing in a dark foyer. Everything was hushed. My head bent, I was looking at the floor when I suddenly recognized the backs of Raffaele’s feet ahead of me. I felt a clenching in my chest. I hadn’t seen him since we’d come inside the questura together. I had no idea where he’d come from—or why he was walking just steps ahead of me. I so badly wanted to say something, but I knew I shouldn’t make a sound.

  I just wanted this ordeal to end.

  I was consumed by worry for Patrick. I felt that time was running out for him if I didn’t remember for sure what had happened the night of Meredith’s murder. When I’d said, “It was Patrick,” in my interrogation, the police pushed me to tell them where he lived. As soon as I’d mentioned his neighborhood, several officers surrounding me raced out. I figured that they’d gone to question him. I didn’t know that it was too late, that they’d staged a middle-of-the-night raid on Patrick’s house and arrested him.

  Then the doors to the questura opened, and I was led outside. No one had told me that what I’d said had been made public. With my head down, it didn’t register that there were photographers snapping my picture. Nor could I know that the police would be holding a press conference at which they’d announce, “Caso chiuso”—“Case closed.” Or that, that evening, news sites would report Raffaele’s, Patrick’s, and my arrests for “a sexual encounter that went horrifically wrong.”

  When I look at the pictures of me now—standing in Raffaele’s oversize warm-up pants and fleece jacket, a gray wool hat pulled over my eyes—I recall how I followed their directions like a lost, pathetic child. I didn’t question, I didn’t object, I just put my head down when they told me to and trusted that this would all make sense soon. In that moment, I couldn’t see—and it didn’t have anything to do with the hat.

  I was half-carried, half-pushed from the building, with Ficarra and another person each holding me under an arm. They directed me into a police car, then got in on either side of me. “Duck your head to your knees during the ride,” one of the police officers ordered. “Do not try to sit up.”

  Sirens wailed.

  I’ve since read that the convoy of squad cars drove through Perugia, honking horns in triumph. I only know that we flew along the curving roads in a rush of sound, that we were moving so fast I thought I might get sick in the backseat, that the half-hour trip seemed without end. The officers kept their hands firmly on my back; my eye sockets pressed into my forearms across my knees. The hat pulled down, I was floating, as though I’d escaped from my own body.

  Finally our car pulled through the main gate of the Casa Circondariale Capanne di Perugia—not that I knew where we were—and came to a stop inside a dim, cavernous garage. As the doors rumbled closed, I was allowed to sit up. A uniformed prison guard came over, and I tried to catch his eye. I wanted someone, anyone, to look at me and see me for who I was—Amanda Knox, a terrified twenty-year-old girl. He looked through me.

  The inner garage door rolled open, and we drove into the prison grounds. My stomach lurched. Concrete walls, ablaze with orange lights and topped with coiled razor wire, stretched up to the night sky in every direction. I felt smaller and more frightened than I’d ever been.

  We stopped in front of a single-story building in the center of the complex, where an empty squad car sat. Raffaele’s car? At a wave from our driver, we entered the building, Ficarra ahead of me, the other officer behind, each gripping one of my arms. Once inside, they let go. “This is where we leave you,” they said. One of them leaned in to give me a quick, awkward hug. “Everything’s going to be okay. The police will take care of you.”

  “Thank you,” I said. I gave her a last, beseeching look, hoping this meant that finally they knew we were on the same side.

  It didn’t.

  I spent the next 1,427 nights in prison for a crime I did not commit.

  Chapter 12

  Evening, November 6, 2007, Day Five

  One guard was trying to flex the thick sole of my hiking boot. The other was shaking her head no.

  Of all the things they took from me in my first few minutes as an inmate at Capanne Prison, this loss hit me the hardest. On my nineteenth birthday my stepdad, Chris, had given me his old GPS and taught me how to use it by driving me on a scavenger hunt. We ended up at an outdoor gear store, where I got to pick out my present: the boots I’d coveted for more than a year. I wore them hiking and mountain climbing and paired them with a skirt or dress when I wanted to make an offbeat fashion statement. The boots made me feel invincible—not dangerous, as the guards were implying. Did they think I’d kick someone with the hard, boxy toe? Or try to hang myself with the flimsy laces?

  “Do you have other shoes?” the tall, sturdy guard asked me. She had a chiseled jaw and hair that had been dyed reddish purple, like a plum. Her name was Lupa, but prisoners weren’t allowed to call guards anything but agente or assistente.

  “No, the police took my sneakers,” I said. “But they went to my house to get these. Why would they give them to me just to take them away three hours later?”

  The other guard, a short, fleshy blonde, continued pawing through my purse/book bag. I later learned the prisoners had nicknamed her Cinema because she spoke in slow motion. “You won’t be able to take any of this in with you,” she declared flatly.

  Everything I needed wa
s in that bag: my wallet, my passport, my journal.

  “What about my textbooks?” I asked, pleading. “I have school. I’ll be back in class in a few days. I don’t want to fall behind.”

  “When you leave you can request them from the storeroom,” Agente Lupa said.

  I couldn’t believe what was happening. The police told me they would keep me safe, and then they’d just dropped me off here and left. Why would they have done that? They had already confiscated my cell phone and sneakers, and now the prison guards were taking the things that I always kept with me, the things that identified me. Without money, a credit card, my driver’s license, my passport, I felt completely vulnerable.

  The next orders left me feeling even more defenseless. “Jacket, pants, shirt, socks,” Cinema demanded, holding out her hand.

  I turned my face away as I took off each piece of borrowed clothing. I handed over Raffaele’s sweatpants, his shirt and jacket, his white tube socks.

  The cold traveled up from the concrete floor and through my bare feet. I hugged myself for warmth, waiting—for what? What’s coming next? Surely they wouldn’t give me a uniform, since I was a special case. It wouldn’t make sense, since I’d be in prison so briefly.

  “Your panties and bra, please,” Lupa said. She was polite, even gentle, but it was still an order.

  I stood naked in front of strangers for the second time that day. Completely disgraced, I hunched over, shielding my breasts with one arm. I had no dignity left. My eyes filled with tears. Cinema ran her fingers around the elastic of the period-stained red underwear I’d bought with Raffaele at Bubble, when I thought it’d be only a couple of days before I’d buy more with my mom.

  Mom must be frantic. Is she still waiting at the train station? Wandering around Perugia looking for me? Has she called the police to help find me? Does she know I’m here?

  “Squat,” Lupa said.