Perugia, Italy
Knox appeals: Italian lawyers called Amanda Knox a “she-devil” and a Nazi in court this week as the American college student fought to overturn her conviction in the 2007 murder of her British roommate, Meredith Kercher. Head prosecutor Giuliano Mignini—who was convicted last year of abuse of office and dereliction of duty in connection with an unrelated case he prosecuted—compared Knox to Nazi propagandist Josef Goebbels. Defense lawyers countered by saying that because there was no reliable physical evidence tying Knox to the murder, prosecutors had concocted a false persona of Knox as a diabolical sex fiend when she was actually an ordinary American student studying abroad. A forensics review in July found that the DNA evidence used to convict Knox and her Italian boyfriend had been contaminated. A verdict in the appeal is expected next week.
Almoçageme, Portugal
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American fugitive caught: An American killer on the run for more than 40 years was arrested this week in Portugal. George Wright, 68, escaped in 1970 from a New Jersey prison, where he was serving time for killing a gas station owner during a robbery. After his escape, he and several other members of the Black Liberation Army, a black-power group, hijacked a plane and flew to Algeria, where they claimed asylum and joined Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver. The other hijackers were eventually arrested in France, but Wright remained at large until this week, when a U.S. fugitive task force matched his prints to a card in Portugal’s ID registry. Wright was found living in a lovely coastal village with his Portuguese wife and two adult children.
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