Amanda Knox is a “demonic she-devil”, said a lawyer in the appeal trial.

Amanda Knox, the convicted murderer of British student Meredith Kercher, was yesterday described in court as a “diabolical, Satanic, demonic she-devil”.

The assault on 24-year-old Amanda Knox’s character came from a lawyer representing the man that she initially accused of Meredith Kercher’s murder.

Amanda Knox, who was jailed for 26 years in December 2009, is challenging her conviction and the attack on her character was part of the prosecution’s summing up at her appeal.

 

In November 2007, Meredith Kercher, from South London, was found semi-naked and with her throat cut in the house in Perugia she shared with Amanda Knox.

American Amanda Knox and her Italian boyfriend at the time, Raffaele Sollecito -who was given 25 years – insist they are innocent.

Initially Amanda Knox blamed the murder on bar owner Patrick Lumumba, 39, who was arrested in front of his wife and baby. She had accused him following a night of police questioning.

Amanda Knox told police that she “remembered Patrick killing Meredith” and that she had stayed in the kitchen covering her “ears to drown out the screams”.

Congolese-born Patrick Lumumba, who remained in custody for two weeks, is entitled to sue Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito for slander under Italian law because her statement landed him in jail.

Lulumba’s lawyer Carlo Pacelli launched a furious tirade against Amanda Knox.

“She falsely blamed Lumumba when she knew he was innocent,” the lawyer said.

“She put him in jail for two weeks away from his loved ones and family.

“After poor Meredith the second victim in all this is Patrick Lumumba – Amanda destroyed him as a man, husband, father. She muddied his character.”

Carlo Pacelli then told the court that Amanda Knox appeared to be charming, intelligent, and “angel faced because she has spent four years in jail”.

The lawyer added: “She is the daughter everyone wants, so you need to know what she was like four years ago.

“She was a diabolical, Satanic, demonic she-devil. She was muddy on the outside and dirty on the inside. She has two souls, the clean one – you see her before you – and the other.

“She is borderline. She likes alcohol, drugs and she likes hot, wild sex.”

Amanda Knox’s father, Curt and stepfather Chris Mellas shook their heads as Carlo Pacelli’s description was translated for them while Amanda Knox herself looked intently at the judge and jury.

After the hearing Curt Knox said:

“It was so over the top of what I believe would be necessary as a lawyer, he just assaulted her verbally and that’s wrong, flat wrong.”

Earlier Carlo Pacelli had described to the court how Meredith Kercher’s British friends had told the original trial that there had been tension between the two women because of Amanda Knox’s failure to keep the bathroom clean.

The lawyer recalled how Meredith Kercher had told friends she felt “uncomfortable” at the fact Amanda Knox brought strangers back to the house they shared and that she left a sex toy and condoms visible in the bathroom.

At one point judge Claudio Pratillo Hellman asked lawyer to stop going over old ground but Carlo Pacelli insisted he had to go into the details to “describe Amanda’s character”.

Amanda Knox has insisted that she and Meredith Kercher were friends.

Amanda Knox and Raffaelle Sollecito have based their appeal on an independent court report that has cast doubt on the original police forensic evidence.

Meredith Kercher from Coulsdon, Surrey, was in Perugia as part of her Leeds University course and had only been in Italy for two months before she died.

A third defendant, drug dealer Rudy Guede, an immigrant from the Ivory Coast, is serving 16 years for murder and sexual violence.

The court is expected to retire this week and a verdict is expected early next month.