Knox back in court: will change of judge help?

After three years in jail, during which time she has been variously described as a she-devil and an innocent abroad, Amanda Knox was led into court in Perugia this morning (above) for the start of an appeal hearing into her conviction for murder.

The 23-year-old Seattle student and her former Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito have been in jail since November 6, 2007 - four days after Meredith Kercher was discovered half-naked in a pool of blood in the house she and Knox shared in Perugia, where both were exchange students.

Last December, Knox and Sollecito were found guilty of murder after the prosecution successfully painted a picture of an orgy of sex and drugs which ended with Knox slitting her friend's throat with a kitchen knife.

Knox's lawyers were unable to persuade the court that she and Sollecito were not even present on the night Meredith was killed. Now the lawyers are pinning their hopes of a reprieve on three factors:

First, that they can persuade the judge and jury that the DNA evidence used to convict Knox was suspect and that there was no motive for hert to attack or kill her friend;

Second, that new witnesses will be allowed to be called in an effort to prove that Knox and Sollecito were not at the house;

Third, that the recent decision to replace the original judge due to hear the appeal with a new man, Claudio Pratillo Hellmann, will work in their favour.

Italian judicial authorities have said that the decision late last month to bring in Judge Hellmann instead of Judge Sergio Matteini Chiari was "an administrative issue".

But Knox's supporters are aware that Hellmann has a reputation for making radical judgments.

In 2000, he was one of a three-man court that famously overturned the conviction of the supposed wife murderer, Massimo Pisano. He spent seven and a half years in jail, losing appeal after appeal, until Hellman and his fellow judges freed him.

Judge Hellmann, sitting with a magistrate and six-person jury, will be urged by Knox's lawyers to see that the murder verdict was based on mere hypotheses.

The lawyers  will argue that the police investigation rested on an assumption that Knox and Sollecito were guilty, and that the court made the same mistake.

Today's hearing was expected to deal mainly with procedural matters and to be adjourned to the second week of December.

The court is unlikely to reach a conclusion before the new year. If this appeal fails, Italian law allows Knox and Sollecito one last chance, when only technical arguments may be considered. ·