The sister of Meredith Kercher has claimed the murdered student has been "completely forgotten" in the four years since she met her violent death in Italy.
Stephanie Kercher, 21, told Italian television that the focus has been entirely on her convicted killers Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito, with the memory of her sister going largely unobserved.
Her comments come as the Knox and Sollecito await the decision on their appeal, with the Kercher family travelling to Italy in anticipation of the result.
Stephanie Kercher told the Porta a Porta programme: “In these four years, Meredith has been completely forgotten. But we need to find justice for her, we need to find the truth for her.
“There’s not much of Meredith in the media. There aren’t photos of her in the media. The focus has completely moved away from Meredith to Amanda and Raffaele. And Meredith was so lovely – an intelligent, kind, caring person.”
She added: “I’m scared of forgetting what she looked like. I’m scared of forgetting how she was to cuddle or what her hands were like, or anything really.”
Ms Kercher was murdered in her bedroom by her then flatmate Knox and her former lover Sollecito after an apparent sex game went wrong. The 22-year-old, from Coulsdon, South London, was staying in Perugia while on an exchange trip from Leeds University.
A third person convicted of her murder, Rudy Guede, an immigrant from the Ivory Coast, was sentenced to 30 years in jail in a separate trial. This was reduced on appeal to 16 years.
Prosecutors will continue to sum up their case for appeal against the conviction of Knox and Sollecito, sentenced to 25 and 26 years in jail, with defence lawyers to present their case next week.
An independent review of the DNA evidence presented to the original trial cleared the way for the appeal, with a verdict expected in early October.
Edda Mellas, the mother of Meredith Kercher, told the BBC that her daughter and Sollecito were also victims in the case.
Knox, wearing a pink top, was in court yesterday to hear the closing arguments in her appeal and looked pale and nervous as she entered the courtroom.
Prosecutors said that “all clues converge toward the only possible result of finding the defendants guilty”.
State lawyer Giancarlo Costagliola urged the jury to bear in mind Ms Kercher’s family and denounced the “obsessive media campaign” that “makes everyone feel like the parents” of Knox and Sollecito.
“As you make your decision, I wish that you jurors feel a little bit like the parents of Meredith Kercher, a serious, studious girl whose life was taken by these two kids from good families,” he told a packed courtroom.
“There has been an almost obsessive media campaign from the press and television that has made all viewers feel a bit like the parents of Amanda and Raffaele, two youths from good families held in prison because of a dogged prosecution.”
The prosecution maintains Ms Kercher’s blood was on a knife handled by Knox that was identified as the murder weapon and that Sollecito’s DNA was found on Ms Kercher’s bra clasp.
The court heard that, even if the evidence on the knife and bra clasp was ignored, there was other evidence at play, from Knox falsely accusing a Congolese-born bar owner to suspect footprints, that pointed to her and Sollecito’s guilt.
Several photographs of the crime scene were shown to the court, including images of Ms Kercher’s bloodied body.
Prosecutors also showed a photo of Knox kissing Sollecito outside the house where the murder was committed, prompting her lawyer to object.
Since Knox’s conviction, the murderer has become the subject of several novels with her story being made into a film for US television, though legal moves by her family and Ms Kercher’s parents to stop the production have been made.
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