EXONERATED, BUT NOT FREED
Condemnation doesn’t stop once you’re found innocent
Every day for the past nine years I’ve been called a slut and murderer by total strangers. In prison, it was hate mail. Outside of prison, it’s social media and hate mail. “Teach me how to get away with murder.” “Psychopath.” “Whore.” One person promised, in a comment on my website, to kidnap me, rip out my teeth and fingernails, electrocute me, and carve Meredith Kercher’s name into my body.
Meredith was a kind and outgoing British student who was murdered by Rudy Guede. She was my roommate, and I was accused of her murder by a prosecutor whose insane theories and disregard for evidence landed me in prison for four years. Italy’s highest court exonerated me, finding “stunning flaws” in the investigation and “an absolute lack of biological traces” connecting me to the crime.
From the moment I walked out of prison, my family and I have focused on healing and rebuilding our lives. But the beast of media sensationalism wasn’t satisfied. Tabloids snapped pictures of my every move, speculated on everything I did, and spun everything I said out of context. Certain people made it their hobby to torment me and anyone close to me, so that we might never feel safe.
And despite all the objective evidence confirming my innocence, the predominant narrative and subsequent discussion about my case still revolved around the question, “Did she do it?”
SELF-DEFENSE Charlotte Gill, writing for The In
dependent, accuses me of capitalizing off Meredith’s tragic death. To her, my very presence is an affront. After years of wrongful imprisonment, I was released to an unceasing torrent of slut-shaming and slander. And Gill wants me to just disappear?
I didn’t get my old life back when I came home. Random classmates at university took pictures of me and posted them to the Internet alongside lewd and aggressive commentary. Every employer who openly hired me was attacked for doing so. I took up self-defense classes, and everywhere I lived, I had an escape plan just in case.
I’d like nothing more than to be simply Amanda Knox, family member, friend and writer, but I’ve had to accept I’m also that girl who was wrongfully convicted
of murder. It’s a realization that all exonerees must face — once an exoneree, always an exoneree. Many people empathize with the murder victim and the victim’s family, but they cannot imagine being snatched up, as I was, into a Kafkaesque nightmare.
This is a problem because wrongful convictions happen more often than people realize. My case was an international sensation that utterly dehumanized me, but that attention did put me in the unique position of being a rare exoneree whose voice is heard. I have the opportunity to shine light on the exoneree experience and the systematic errors that lead to wrongful convictions.
149 EXONERATIONS IN 2015
Since the first DNA exoneration took place, the Innocence Project has exonerated more than 345 people. There were 149 exonerations just last year. Our media coverage often represents exonerees as two-dimensional artifacts, the fallout from brutal tragedy, or else in breezy, feel-good news flashes about “justice prevailing.” But after prison, exonerees’ lives grind on, and they suffer the consequences of society’s misconceptions and short attention span.
Most exonerees re-enter society with little support and even fewer guarantees. Only 30 out of 50 states have compensation laws. Those who were forced by police to falsely confess may not be entitled to any compensation. Exonerees have a gaping hole in their résumé — the average number of years wrongfully served is 14. People who are young, poor and non-white are particularly vulnerable. And while most don’t get international media coverage, they are marked in their own communities. Some don’t even have family support.
It’s easier to believe that wrongful conviction is a distant anomaly, an unfortunate consequence triggered by questionable characters. The exoneree also confuses our sympathies. When a wrongful conviction is overturned, the justice it represented evaporates. We had “closure,” and now we have nothing. But what feels like a loss is actually a gain, because that “closure” was really injustice disguised as justice.
Every exoneration forces us to dredge up the original tragedy and accept the perceived perpetrator as a further victim.
I’m not a lawyer, investigator, researcher, or scientist. I was just a 20-year-old who loved languages and literature when I was locked away for a crime I didn’t commit. But I was fortunate. Intense media scrutiny drew experts and advocates to my defense. And because of their hard work, I now have an opportunity to voice my experience and humanity as an exoneree. Most exonerees never get that chance, so I mean to share it.
I will not disappear. I will advocate. I will bear witness.