Amanda Knox Cop Defends DNA Evidence

A police chief has defended his forensic science team after they were branded incompetent by experts in the Amanda Knox appeal trial.

Piero Angeloni, head of the Italian Police Scientific Unit, rejected accusations his team had made more than 50 mistakes while gathering and examining evidence.

Knox, 24, is serving 26 years for the knife murder of British student Meredith Kercher .

Meredith, 21, was found semi naked and with her throat cut in her bedroom of the house she shared with her alleged killer.

Key to Knox's conviction was a 30cm kitchen knife, found at the apartment of her co-accused Raffaele Sollecito, 27.

Police claimed that Knox's DNA was found on the handle and that of Meredith on the blade.

However defence experts, professors Stefano Conti and Carla Vecchiotti, said they could find no traces of blood on the knife.

They added that the DNA from the blade was so small it should be considered ''inadmissable.''

They were also critical of how police had examined a clasp from Meredith's bra found at the scene and which had been ''lost'' for six weeks before being discovered.

Footage showed the officers picking up the clasp with dirty gloves, handing it to each other, then dropping it on the floor before picking it up without using tweezers.

It was then put in a plastic bag despite the fact that the recognised protocol for such items is to use paper bags.

Experts said that other breaches included face masks not being worn and hair not being in caps, while other persons unknown were also admitted into the bedroom.

In a letter to the court Mr Angeloni said:''My department adheres to all the recognised international protocols and carries out more than 25,000 crime scene investigations every year.

''Never has anyone questioned our methods before in such a way. All my staff are highly professional and are taught by experts over a four month course and they have a yearly audit.

''We use state of the art equipment and techniques. The staff are all highly qualified, university educated with degrees,'' adding: ''This is a very competent organisation.''

The two experts, from Rome's La Sapienza University, had been appointed by appeal judge Claudio Pratillo Hellman to examine the evidence after defence lawyer requests.

The expert evidence gives fresh hope to the families of Knox and Sollecito , serving 25 years for the murder, that the pair will be acquitted later in the autumn.

University of Leeds student Meredith from Coulsdon, Surrey, was discovered with her throat slit in November 2007, in the hilltop town of Perugia.

She had arrived there just two months earlier as part of a year abroad.

A third defendant, small-time drug dealer Rudy Guede, an immigrant from the Ivory Coast, was also jailed in connection with the brutal killing.

He was handed a 30-year sentence for murder and sexual violence following a fast-track trial in October 2008 which was later cut to 16 years.

Knox and Sollecito were found guilty in December 2009.