48 Hours: American Girl, Italian Murder

Produced by Douglas Longhini, James Stolz, Josh Gelman Sara Ely Hulse, Sabina Castelfranco and Chris Young

The Perugia murder trial of American student Amanda Knox has come to an end, Knox has been found guilty on all counts.

Knox was on trial for the Nov. 2007 murder of her roommate, British student Meredith Kercher, who was found in her bedroom, semi-naked with her throat slashed. Within days, Knox, who was enrolled for six months of study at the University for Foreigners in Perugia, Italy, became a suspect in what prosecutor Giuliano Mignini described as a drug-induced sex orgy gone wrong.

After a 14-hour police interrogation, Knox told authorities that she and a local bar owner went to the apartment that night and the bar owner had sex with Kercher then murdered her. Her story later proved untrue. She claimed in court that she made the false confession out of fear after Italian authorities threatened her and even got physical with her.

Knox's story has spread around the world. And while Meredith Kercher's death was a violent tragedy, skepticism has surrounded the case against Amanda Knox, the conclusion of which will likely continue to spark debate about what really happened. Correspondent Peter Van Sant examines the case from the crime to the conclusion.

After a sleepless night, the distraught family of convicted murderer Amanda Knox had their first chance to console her inside her prison home where she may spend the next quarter century of her life.

"Amanda, like the rest of us, is extremely disappointed. Upset about the decision. We are all in shock… We told her she was going to get out of here," Amanda's mother, Edda Mellas, told reporters. "It's just going to take us longer…"

While the Knox family believes a horrible injustice has been done, the family of 21-year-old Meredith Kercher, the victim in this case, is relieved.

"It's not ever going to be the same without Mez," her sister, Stephanie Kercher tells reporters. "She's still a very a big part of our lives and she always will be."

Amanda's father, Curt Knox, is thinking of Meredith as well.

"Wherever Meredith is, I believe that she knows that Amanda and Raffaele had nothing to do with it," he says tearing up.

But on Dec. 5, 2009, after an 11-month trial and almost 11 hours of jury deliberations, they convicted Amanda and her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, for the murder of Meredith Kercher.

"The court declares Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito guilty of the crimes they are accused of."

"You know, when I saw Amanda kind of start lowering her heard and start slumping - then I knew it was bad. And frankly, I just went into anger mode," said Curt Knox.

Outside the courthouse, a small cheer went through the crowd as the verdicts were announced. Amanda was sentenced to 26 years in prison and Raffaele to 25.

"I went into shock. I was uncontrollably shaking and crying and had to sit down," Amanda's little sister, Deanna said. "All we could do when she was leaving was yell across the room, 'We love you Amanda.'"

British journalist Nick Pisa was in the courtroom.

"I think as the full impact of the verdict dawned on her, she began to sob uncontrollably," Pisa explains. "She was then led away and in the annex adjacent to the court we heard her shriek out, 'No!'"

"We heard her wail as she went out the door. It was not good," says Curt Knox.

The Knox family feels the Italian system of justice is flawed. Juries are never sequestered during trial. In this case, allowing them total access to sensational tabloid stories that painted Amanda as a satanic killer.

"Literally, we're all fighting mad," says Curt Knox.

Amanda's troubles began innocently enough on the morning of Nov. 2, 2007, when police found two cells phones that belonged to Meredith and brought the phones back to the house Meredith and Amanda shared.

"They found Raffaele and Amanda there in a worried and disturbed state," Pisa explains.

Amanda says she had been trying unsuccessfully to reach Meredith all morning and was worried.

"Meredith's bedroom door is locked," Pisa continues. "And the door is broken down and inside is Meredith's lifeless body."

Meredith, 21, is found lying in a pool of blood.

"There were 47 separate wounds - not 47 knife wounds, but 47 bruises, scratches, cuts, injuries on Meredith's body," Pisa explains. "There was evidence, definitely, that she was, quite literally, fighting for her life."

The murder shocked the medieval hill town of Perugia, which is a center for foreign students. Pisa says that Meredith could not have been a more innocent victim.

"She'd fallen in love with Italy. So that's basically why this girl from South London, the youngest of four children, decided to come and study in Perugia," he explains.

On Nov. 1, the night of the murder, Amanda was supposed to work at a bar called Le Chic, but her boss, Patrick Lumumba, told her not to come in. Amanda says she spent the night with her boyfriend, Raffaele, at his apartment. Meredith went to a friend's for dinner.

"The next thing we know is Meredith left her friend's apartment, she walked back to her house around 8:30, 9:00ish. And that's the last time we know she was alive," says Pisa.

Since Amanda and Raffaele were at the house when Meredith's body was discovered, the two immediately became important witnesses.

"She said they had a lot of questions for her because she was the first one that had come back to the house. And she wanted to help," Mellas says. "She wanted to try and remember anything."

Investigators asked the couple to come back to the house the following day.

"We saw these two youngsters embrace, caressing each other, kissing - whispering into each other's ears and the impression was of complicity," says Italian investigator and "48 Hours" consultant Paulo Sfriso, who describes the sight captured on video as unsettling.

"One's expectation would be for them to be in shock, in tears," Sfriso says. "Instead, they seem to be sharing a little secret between the two of them."

Then, four days after the murder, Prosecutor Giuliano Mignini brought Raffaele and Amanda in for questioning.

Early on in the investigation, Amanda described to an Italian judge what happened to her that night.

"I was very tired and I was also quiet stressed out. They kept asking me the same questions... At a certain point… the police began to be more aggressive with me."

Amanda repeatedly told police that she was with Raffaele in his apartment on the night of the murder.

"They called me a liar," she said. "Then they started pushing on me the idea that I must have seen something and forgotten about it."

Police confronted Amanda with a text message she had sent her boss, Patrick Lumumba, the night Meredith was killed. Her message: "See you later."

Police believed the message implied Amanda was planning to meet Lumumba back at her house.

"They kept saying, 'You sent this thing to Patrick. We know that you left the house. We know.'"

Amanda claims the aggressive questioning turned physical.

"I was hit in the back of the head by one of the police officers who said she was trying to make me - help me remember the truth."

Listen to Amanda's full statement | Read her statement

The truth that night, after 14 hours of interrogation, changed. Amanda signed a statement prepared by police: "I met Patrick…we went to my apartment. Patrick had sex with Meredith. I confusedly remember that he killed her."

Within hours, bar owner Patrick Lumumba, Raffaele Sollecito and Amanda Knox were arrested. But no one would have guessed then just how long it would take this legal nightmare to unfold - and how painful it would be. The night before the murder, Oct. 31, 2007, it was Halloween in Perugia, Italy. Meredith Kercher dressed as a vampire and went to Merlin's, a local bar.

Nathan Abraham worked at the bar and it was where he met Meredith.

"She was always the life of the party. Any time she smiled you just felt happy," he says. "She was your regular college student girl. She liked to hang out with her friends. She danced. She went out to movies."

So 36 hours later, when Meredith's nearly-naked body was discovered with her throat slashed, Abraham - and everyone in town - was shocked and more than a little frightened.

"The center was a ghost town," Abraham explains. "Nobody would go out. People were kind of scared… you didn't know who the murderer was."

When police arrested Amanda Knox, Raffaele Sollecito and Amanda's boss, Patrick Lumumba, everyone was stunned.

"The police were suggesting that there had been some sort of sexual activity in the house," says British journalist Nick Pisa.

Italian prosecutor Giuliano Mignini had an early theory that Meredith Kercher was murdered at the end of a drug-induced satanic orgy gone very, very wrong. In fact, at one point, investigators thought a bloody handprint on a wall at the crime scene was some sort of satanic symbol.

"Amanda and Raffaele were intrigued by sex and violence. They sort of hung themselves out to dry a little bit by their blogs, by their Web sites," says Pisa.

On her MySpace page, Amanda called herself "Foxy Knoxy" and bragged about having multiple sex partners. A picture of her on the site taken at a military museum became ammunition against her. On Raffaele's page, he expressed a fascination with serial killers.

"I know the police have been looking at these Web sites and taking apart everything that these two have said," Pisa says. "To a certain degree, they haven't done themselves any favors by putting this stuff on the Web for all to see."

But there was nothing incriminating in Patrick Lumumba's life. Abraham describes Lumumba as "[a] very gentle and nice guy. To me, he's the most famous guy in Perugia and everybody loves him."

So when Amanda named Lumumba as the killer during her interrogation, nobody other than the police could believe it.

"He has a beautiful wife, and a beautiful baby," says Abraham. And, it turned out, Lumumba had an airtight alibi.

"I am in my bar. I was in the bar," he tells Peter Van Sant. "When I close the bar I make it home."

With no physical evidence linking him to the crime scene, police had no choice but to release Lumumba. Amanda and Raffaele stayed in jail.

Police were still convinced three people had killed Meredith.

Pisa says police found a fingerprint, but it didn't match with Raffaele, with Amanda or with Lamumba; however, it did match 22-year-old Rudy Guede, a local thief known to carry a knife.

"People knew who Rudy was," says Abraham. "We found out he tried to rob one of our bartenders, where he went into his house, had a little scuffle with a knife. He was one of those people you kinda - you knew him, but you stayed a little far away from him."

On Nov. 2, the day after the murder, Guede took a train north. Two weeks later, police tracked him down in Germany. He was arrested and returned to Italy.

Guede's story was pretty incredible. He told police that on the night of the murder, Meredith invited him to her house. They had sex, but he didn't kill her.

"His story does seem rather fanciful, that he was in the bathroom, that he came out and he found Meredith had been stabbed, and that some guy was running out of the room," Pisa says.

But Guede told police he couldn't identify the killer. Nor did he say anything about Amanda or Raffaele being at the house that night.

"I think they have five instances where he specifically was asked about Amanda. And he said, 'Yea, I know who she is. She was not there.' He repeatedly said she was not there," says Amanda's mother, Edda Mellas.

But after repeated interrogations, Guede all of a sudden changed his story, pointing the finger at Amanda and Raffaele, saying the two of them killed Meredith in a dispute over money. Prosecutors still charged him with murder. Their theory: all three were involved.

Guede would go on trial first.

"The trial sparked a great deal of interest both in Italy, the U.K., and the United States, as you can imagine," Pisa tells Van Sant.

The first trial, with a judge, but no jury, lasted several weeks. Raffaele and Amanda were there every day. Near the end, there was a surprise. Amanda asked to address the court:

"I want to stress the fact that I am innocent. Meredith was my friend and I could never have hurt her. I'm not the person that the prosecutor says I am."

"Once Amanda had finished her statement to the court, Prosecutor Mignini simply stood up and said, 'We are seeing crocodile tears.' He then went on to speak for nearly five hours and painted a very graphic description of what he says happened that night," Pisa explains.

An Italian magazine published drawings based on Mignini's story, that a drug-fueled sex party turned into a bizarre satanic murder.

"The prosecutor said Raffaele and Rudy were holding Meredith down and then Amanda plunged a knife into her throat. And was the hand that led to the murder," Pisa explains.

In spite of the prosecutor's theory, Amanda and her family were still hoping that the judge will believe her, rule that Guede had acted alone and set her and Raffaele free.

"I'm hoping this particular judge will really be able to see the lack of evidence… and she'll be released," Curt Knox says.

Rudy Guede was found guilty and sentenced to 30 years. The judge did not dismiss the charges against Amanda and Raffaele. They would stand trial next. In January 2009, in a packed courtroom in Perugia, Italy, the trial of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito got under way.

"You have a girl who naively believes that the truth will set her free," says Chicago private investigator and "48 Hours" consultant Paul Ciolino.

In spite of crushing tabloid headlines making Amanda Knox the most hated woman in Italy, the prosecutor, Giuliano Mignini, was confident the trial would be fair.

"It seems to me that all the elements are there to permit the court to reach a verdict that conforms to reality," says Mignini.

But British journalist Nick Pisa, who has covered the Amanda Knox case from the beginning, believes the overwhelmingly negative pre-trial publicity has made a fair trial nearly impossible.

"I think to a certain degree, there's certainly a very high probability that this jury had made up their mind before the trial started," he says.

"Amanda, in her childlike innocence, believes with her whole heart, 'I didn't do anything, why am I here?'" says Ciolino.

Amanda Knox is here, the prosecutor tells jurors, because she, Raffaele Sollecito and now-convicted murder Rudy Guede together killed Meredith Kercher after she refused to take part in a brutal sex game.

"We are convinced that what we've done so far confirms our theory," says Mignini.

"Well, his belief has always been that it was Amanda who struck the fatal blow," Pisa says. "That it was Rudy and Raffaele who were holding down Meredith, who were holding her down whilst this sex game was going on."

Mignini tells the court he had solid physical evidence and credible witnesses to support his case.

Pisa says there were more than 80 witnesses, including, "the flat mates in the house-police officers involved in the questioning, scientific officers."

He says some of the most damaging testimony focused on Amanda's behavior after the murder. "Amanda was seen in the police station doing the splits, doing cartwheels."

Several of Meredith Kercher's friends were also at the police station. And they would testify that Amanda's behavior seemed inappropriate and insensitive.

"The friends said that Amanda at one point sat on Raffaele's knee, was sticking her tongue out at him, was winking at him. She was kissing and cuddling him," Pisa says. "Whilst Meredith's friends, her British friends, are quite distraught, upset and in tears."

Mignini would tell the jury that Meredith had issues with Amanda, calling her promiscuous, loud and a slob. Amanda's mother, Edda Mellas, says Mignini is wrong- the two girls were friends.

"Amanda told me that her and Meredith would sit and just have long conversations," Mellas says. "You know, they had gone to the chocolate festival together."

And then there was that disturbing video tape, seen around the world, of Amanda and Raffaele kissing the morning after Meredith's murder.

And, says Pisa, "to see this very attractive young lady outside the house - in the eyes of many Italians, just added further to that image of a cold-hearted temptress who was quite willing to kill."

In court, the prosecution presents two crucial pieces of DNA evidence to the jury, starting with a knife, allegedly used to kill Meredith.

"It's a 30-centimeter kitchen knife, the sort of kitchen knife that you or I or anyone would have in their kitchen," explains Pisa.

Is it the murder weapon? Prosecutor Mignini says yes; that it was found at Raffaele's apartment.

There was no blood on the knife, but investigators say they did find DNA-Amanda's on the handle and Meredith's on the blade.

"In Great Britain or America, that evidence would have never seen a courtroom," says Ciolino.

"If Meredith Kercher's DNA is on the blade and Amanda's is on the handle, it sounds like the murder weapon. She handles it, she stabs and it leaves DNA on there," says Van Sant.

"That's not necessarily true, because there's always transference of evidence when you live with people," Ciolino explains. "Amanda's DNA is on a knife that she used that was in a kitchen drawer at Raffaele's apartment. That knife was never at the murder scene. The DNA that purportedly belongs to Meredith on that knife was tested out of existence by the Italians; it was never verified. We don't know, with any certainty, if that DNA that they claim was Meredith's was on that knife. We'll never know it."

And Private Investigator Ciolino says there's another problem with the knife. Police discovered two faint knife impressions on Meredith's bed. When the alleged murder knife is compared to those outlines, it doesn't match.

"That's the knife they want you to believe is the murder weapon, but it's not the murder weapon," he says. "It doesn't fit the outline on the sheets. If it was the murder weapon, it would fit the outline, if it was used in the murder."

Ciolino says if the knife doesn't fit, "You must acquit."

The prosecution says there's more. They say they have solid DNA evidence putting Raffaele in Meredith's room. Evidence found on a piece of Meredith's clothing.

A clasp ripped from Meredith's bra is discovered near her body in the bedroom. And on it, investigators say, is Raffaele's DNA.

"48 Hours" obtained videotapes shot by Italian police of Crime Scene Investigators in the house and asked forensic scientist Dr. Larry Kobilinsky of John Jay College to analyze their work. "It's very crucial that everything be done the right way. That's why we have procedures and protocols," he says.

Kobilinsky says basic procedures were not followed when it came to that bra clasp. Incredibly, it was left on the floor.

"Big mistake, should have been collected," he says.

The clasp sat on the floor for six weeks until investigators returned. Then, instead of immediately placing it in an evidence bag, the technicians passed the clasp back and forth.

"There could be a transfer of evidence, a transfer of DNA, for example, onto that item by any of those individuals," he says.

"Would you be comfortable, confident, if your life was on the line, that this evidence is reliable?" asks Van Sant.

"I would not want to have my life threatened - based upon an item of evidence that was collected six weeks after the event occurred where the chain of custody was broken and the reliability is in question," Kobilinsky replies.

Even if the DNA evidence is questionable, Prosecutor Mignini claims he has a star witness who will place Amanda, Raffaele and Rudy together the night of the murder.

On the night of the murder, Nara Capezzali says she heard a scream in the night, then the distinct sound of three people running from her apartment across the street from the crime scene.
"There were three different sounds. One went up, one went down. One went that way," she said.

But was it really possible for Capezzali to have heard those footsteps? Ciolino wanted to see and hear for himself.

Capezzali's upstairs neighbor let Ciolino into her apartment to find out what he could hear for himself. "48 Hours" asked some neighborhood children to run down the street.

Standing near the closed window where Capezzali was believed to be standing the night of the murder, and as the children run down the street, Ciolino describes what he hears: "Right now I hear something. I heard something, but I couldn't tell if it was footsteps."

At the very least, the unscientific test raises questions about what Mignini's star witness could have heard that night.

"Nara has no credibility," Ciolino says. "She don't know what she heard or saw."

What's more, prosecutor Mignini's case rests on the assumption that Amanda, Raffaele and Rudy Guede had planned their sexual encounter with Meredith.

"We got everybody's phone records. They all have phones. All right, let's see how many times they called each other, setting up the sex game, the orgy, the night of sex and satanic rituals," Ciolino says. "Big zero. Nothing."

But in the end, this case came down to another star witness-Amanda Knox herself.In June 2009, all eyes were on the most infamous woman in Italy as she headed to court.

"Everyone wanted to see how Amanda would pit herself against the prosecutor," says British journalist Nick Pisa.

Responding to worldwide demand, the court allows limited access to the proceedings. Amanda sat center stage with her interpreter.

"I spent most of my time with Meredith, but we all went back to our house together," Amanda testifies. "Arriving in the police office, I didn't expect to be interrogated at all. When I got there, I was sitting on my own doing my homework when a couple of police officers came to sit with me. They began to ask me the same questions that they have been asking me all these days ever since it happened."

Amanda would testify for two days, sometimes in English and then in Italian, knowing that her freedom hung on every word.

"The interrogation process was very long and difficult," she says.

Prosecutor Mignini wasted no time going on the attack. "Did you use any hallucinogenic substances? In particular on the afternoon and evening of November first?"

"I smoked a joint with Raffaele that evening, yes," Amanda replies.

"She certainly came across very, very confident. Very self assured," says Pisa. "She just was knocking down everything the prosecutor had said."

But Mignini is relentless. He says Amanda hated Meredith and even stole money from her. And Mignini wondered, if Amanda is so innocent why confess that she was in the house when Meredith was murdered? Amanda says she was worn down by hours of frightening interrogation.

"For instance, who could I imagine could be the person who killed Meredith? And I said that I still didn't know. And so what they did is they brought me into another interrogation room. And then, from that point on, I was very, very scared because they were treating me so badly and I didn't understand why," she says with a sigh. "They told me that I was trying to protect someone. But I wasn't trying to protect anyone… But they continued to call me a stupid liar."

Amanda says the interrogation was supervised by Mignini himself. Switching to Italian, she then describes the most harrowing moment of her questioning, when an impatient police officer allegedly used physical force.

"And then there was this interpreter next to me who was saying to me either you are a very stupid liar or you are a person who doesn't remember what you did. So I was thinking, what did I forget? I have forgotten something. Remember, remember, remember. Boom on my head," she says, demonstrating how she was hit. "Remember. Mamma Mia. And then boom!"

Not long after those blows, a frightened Amanda signed a document-a confession she now says is false.

But Prosecutor Mignini doesn't believe Amanda's story of physical abuse. He tries to undermine her by asking a simple question: "Who hit you?"

"I didn't see who gave me the first slap because it came from behind. And then I turned around and I saw the woman and then another slap to my head."

But Amanda couldn't identify her attacker.

"Have you finished or do you want to keep going?" asks Mignini.

"I've answered, haven't I?" says Amanda.

Amanda Knox isn't the only American who's been interrogated by Mignini and his investigators.

"When I see Amanda Knox in prison I think, you know, that could be me," says Douglas Preston, a best-selling mystery writer.

Preston was hauled before Mignini and harshly questioned about a series of murders in Florence that Preston was writing a book about. The interrogation was brutal.

"About an hour into the interrogation, the questions became very pointed and they became very aggressive," he tells Peter Van Sant. "And finally, I said to Mignini, 'Wait a minute. Do you think that I have committed a crime?' And he said, 'Yes, I do.' And I said, 'Where is your evidence? Where did you get these theories?' He said, 'Mr. Preston, these are not theories. These are facts.'"

Preston's book, "The Monster of Florence," was going to challenge Mignini's theory that the murders were the work of a satanic cult.

"They almost broke me down," Preston explains. "I was at the point where I was terrified, my knees were shaking - I could barely walk and that was three hours and she's a 20-year-old girl."

Preston says he was threatened with arrest despite there being no real evidence against him. Allowed to leave after the interrogation, he fled the country.

Paul Ciolino says if this story sounds familiar, it should, because, he says, "this is what happened to Amanda Knox."

In yet another bizarre twist, Mignini has been allowed to prosecute Amanda's case despite being accused of various crimes himself on another case.

"He is under indictment for a series of serious crimes, including abuse of office, obstruction of justice, illegally wiretapping journalists," explains Preston.

Pisa says Mignini could face two years in jail.

A judgment on the case against Mignini has been put off until January.

In his closing argument, Mignini returned to his theory that Amanda killed in anger during that sex game gone terribly wrong.

"Amanda had the opportunity to get her revenge against that British girl who was 'too serious' and 'sober-minded,' Mignini tells the court.

Amanda is allowed to address the jury, and she challenges the heart of Mignini's case.

"The first thing is Meredith was my friend. And I didn't hate her. The idea of me wanting revenge on a person who has always been kind with me is just absurd," she tells jurors in Italian. "What has been said in the past few days is pure fantasy. It's not the truth. It's not the reality."

This was not Amanda's final word on the case. Visibly shaken, she would have one last opportunity to convince the jury she's an innocent woman. With everything to lose, Amanda Knox was determined as she tried to save her own life.

"I am scared of being defined as what I am not, and by acts that do not belong to me. I am scared of having the mask of an assassin forced onto my skin," she tells the court.

Amanda even thanked the prosecutor who wanted to jail her for life. Branded as cold and insensitive, she spoke straight to the jury, knowing that in Italy only a majority would be needed to determine her future.

"I feel more in contact with you, more vulnerable, but I have faith and am sure in my knowledge," she says.

Amanda's co-defendant, former boyfriend, Raffaele Solecito also addresses the jury.

"I am not a violent person, I never have been and never will be," he says.

He uses a directness that Amanda strangely never had.

"I did not kill Meredith and I was not in that house the night of the crime," he tells the jury. "Every day that goes by I hope that the real guilty one will confess. Now, this trial is finished at last. I ask you to give me my life back."

The stage was set. On Dec. 5, 2009, after midnight in Perugia, like some dark curtain call, the players had arrived to see what justice would look like. Amanda arrived by armored vehicle.

Then came that verdict: guilty of murder of Meredith Kercher and the defamation of Patrick Lumumba. Amanda is sentenced to 26 years and Raffaele to 25 years.

"No justice was served tonight, none. This was an international tragedy," says Ciolino.

As dawn broke over Perugia, it was clear the trial was over, but the drama was not.

"Ultimately, we are pleased with decision - pleased we've got a decision, but it's not a time of celebration at the end of the day," says Lyle Kercher, Meredith's' brother.

Meredith Kercher's family was stoic, but satisfied, as they recalled the daughter, the sister… the friendly, beautiful girl who will never see her 22nd birthday.

"Everyone… associates Meredith with a tragic event, but we would prefer not to remember her in that way. So we would like to concentrate on the 21 years we had with her," says John Kercher, Meredith's father.

But many insist the case was flawed; that Italian police did get the killer and his name is Rudy Guede.

"One person committed this crime, not three, not two. One," Ciolino says. "They got the guy. His DNA is inside the victim's body. His fingerprints are in her purse."

The harshness of the media left many wondering if the trial was about more than just murder.

"This is not about truth and justice," Ciolino says. "This is about getting an American and teaching America a lesson."

Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington says she plans to advocate for Amanda.

"I think what's most important, is that any American when they are abroad, they get access to a fair trial by an impartial jury, and I don't think that is what Amanda Knox got," Sen. Cantwell says. "We're going to be talking to the European Union and to the Italian government to emphasize this point and to Secretary Clinton."

"She will come home, but it will be a hell of a lot sooner than 26 years," Amanda's father, Curt says.

What's left are two families forever touched. There is no closure; only grief and emptiness and a struggle to somehow go on with life.

Finally, two roommates - two young women who will always be linked by a murder trial that will always be questioned.