Prosecutor Giuliano Mignini said that acquitting Knox would mean forever losing a chance at justice. "We know what an acquittal means - a swift escape abroad," he told the appeals court. "Escape we could no longer remedy."
Knox and her former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito were convicted of sexually assaulting and murdering Knox's British roommate, Meredith Kercher, on the night of Nov. 1, 2007, when they were all students in Perugia. Knox was sentenced to 26 years in prison; Sollecito to 25. Both deny wrongdoing and have appealed the lower court's verdict in December 2009.
Today, the prosecutors tried to focus the jury's attention on Kercher and her family's pain, against a backdrop of what they described as media fascination with the photogenic Knox.
Prosecutor Giancarlo Costagliola urged the jurors to try and "feel a little bit like the parents of Meredith Kercher." Another prosecutor, Giuliano Mignini, said he will never forget Kercher's wide open eyes when he inspected the crime scene. He then juxtaposed gruesome photos from the murder with a snapshot of the defendants kissing shortly after Kercher's body was found.
"The victim has sunk into an absolute and shameful oblivion, made more intolerable by the media's morbid exaltation of the two people sitting on the defendant's bench," Mignini said. He urged jurors not to be deceived by the defendants' clean-cut appearances, saying "there's a dark side in all of us."
Prosecutors argue that the 21-year-old Kercher was the victim of a drug-fueled sex assault.
On Friday, the prosecutors reviewed their case in great detail. They talked about the bloody footprints found in the house that are compatible with those of the defendants. They also mentioned the cell phone activity and witness testimony that appear to contradict the defendant's alibi that they spent the night at Sollecito's house and stayed there until about 10 a.m. the day after the murder and a staged burglary at the house of the murder aimed at sidetracking the investigation.
The prosecutors also tried to downplay the results of an independent review of DNA evidence, which said much of the genetic evidence used to convict Knox and Sollecito was faulty. They also said it was possibly contaminated due to errors in evidence-collecting. Prosecutors insisted the review was sketchy and superficial and telling the court there was more to their case.
The computer student from the southern coastal town of Giovinazzo in Puglia has been depicted by prosecutors as a naive young man bewitched and led astray by Knox.
His lawyers argue he was a convenient suspect because he happened to be dating Knox at the time.
His chances of freedom were boosted by a forensics review that said traces of Sollecito's DNA found on Kercher's bra clasp were unreliable and could have been contaminated since they were collected weeks after the murder was committed.
"I am hopeful that the court has heard well the arguments presented in the appeals trial and has realised that there isn't any evidence against my son and Amanda," said the older Sollecito.
His son has been cast as a "very strange follower" of the American, he said. Kercher, a student of Leeds University in northern England, was on a year abroad studying in Perugia when she was killed in November 2007.
Sollecito, whose once shaggy hair is now cropped short, usually sits in court chewing gum or listening impassively while cameras frantically click away at Knox sitting a few places away.
The focus has been on salacious details related to Knox's sex life, but Sollecito won his share of infamy when a photo posted on the Internet showed him wrapped in bandages holding a meat cleaver and a bottle of bleach. He has also been described as a knife collector.
Film of him kissing Knox, now 24, after the murder and shopping for lingerie with her have been held up as evidence of the couple's callous attitude towards the gruesome crime.
The Italian's supporters see him differently. One website that accepts donations for Sollecito's defence features pictures of a cherubic young boy at his baptism and birthday parties, and accounts from friends describing him as a loving, caring person.
Sollecito's father said he refused to speculate on why attention has focused on Knox rather than his son.
"All I know is that this is a very serious issue, because you have two kids that I believe are innocent who have spent four years in prison," said the father.
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