Amanda Knox Signs Book Deal

17 February 2012, 09:56 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50

Amanda Knox, the American cleared on appeal of the murder of Leeds University student Meredith Kercher in Italy, has signed a multi million pound book deal.

Publishers HarperCollins has got world rights to a memoir by Knox which could come out next year.

The publisher has not said how much it is paying for the memoir but some reports have suggested the Knox deal is worth four million US dollars (£2.5 million).

The news comes two days after it was announced that prosecutors have asked Italy's highest criminal court to reinstate the murder convictions of Knox and her former boyfriend for the murder.

They lodged the appeal more than four months after an appeal court threw out the convictions of 24 year old Knox, and 27 year old Raffaele Sollecito.

Prosecutor Giovanni Galati said he was "very convinced'' that Sollecito and Knox were responsible for stabbing to death 21-year-old Miss Kercher, who shared an apartment with Knox in Perugia.

The pair were found guilty in a lower court of killing Miss Kercher, originally from Coulsdon, Surrey, in what prosecutors described as a sex-fuelled attack, and sentenced to 26 years and 25 years respectively.

An appeals court rejected the conviction, freeing Knox to return home to the United States after serving four years in prison. A court-ordered DNA review in the appeal discredited evidence used to convict Knox and Sollecito in 2009.

The appeal court in October said the court hadn't proved they were in the house when Leeds University student Miss Kercher was killed in 2007.

Ivory Coast-born drifter Rudy Guede was convicted in a separate trial of sexually assaulting and stabbing Miss Kercher. 

His 16-year sentence, reduced on appeal from an initial 30 years, was upheld by Italy's highest court in 2010.