The Forgotten One in Meredith Kercher Case is Her Killer Rudy Guede

It has been reported that Stephanie Kercher has sent out a message asking if people would be willing to use this picture of her sister Meredith as their profile picture on social media sites during this time to help balance the news coverage so that Meredith is not forgotten.

The truth is Meredith Kercher has not been forgotten. In fact her name has remained in the news for the past 4 years for very unfortunate reasons. If the murder investigation had been handled properly, her killer, Rudy Guede, would have been in custody very early on and the world may  have never heard of Meredith Kercher. Meredith  has received a great deal of attention in the news, for a long period of time, because Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito were wrongfully convicted for her murder.

Wrongful convictions cause insufferable damage to all involved. The additional suffering the Kerchers have been forced to endure is not the fault of Amanda and Raffaele. They along with the Kerchers have been wrongly punished do to the negligence of the authorities in Perugia, Italy.

On October 3, 2011, Judge Hellmann spoke loud and clear when he declared that Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito are innocent. They had absolutely nothing to do with Meredith Kercher's murder. In the case of the murder (and the sexual assault, transporting the knife, and theft), Amanda and Raffaele were acquitted "for not having committed the act." With regard to the charge of staging a burglary, Amanda and Raffaele were acquitted "because the act does not exist." Hellmann's court ruled that the burglary was not staged. The nightmare for Amanda and Raffaele has finally ended. This is a major news story and it is expected that the coverage would be enormous. This coverage is in no way disrespectful to Meredith Kercher.

The only person that has been forgotten in this case is Rudy Guede. His name has been almost completely ignored by the media. The media acts as if Guede doesn’t even exist. Rudy Guede attacked and killed Meredith Kercher. Guede has been convicted for the crime and his conviction has been confirmed (finalized) by the Italian Supreme Court. Why is he being ignored?

Unlike Amanda and Raffaele, Guede was arrested after the evidence collected at the crime scene was analyzed and that evidence points right to him—no one else, just him. There was no rush to judgment when it came to arresting Rudy Guede. Investigators found Guede’s hand print on a pillow case found under the victim’s body. The fingerprints led them to their suspect. When police came looking for Guede, he had already fled to Germany. Thankfully, old fashioned police work nabbed Guede; he was stopped in Germany trying to board a train without a ticket and was immediately extradited back to Italy.

The evidence of Guede's guilt is irrefutable and should have been more than sufficient to secure a life sentence for Guede. Guede even admitted he was in Meredith’s room at the time of the attack. His DNA, along with Meredith’s blood, was found on Meredith's purse. His shoeprints, set in Meredith’s blood, were found in the bedroom and in the hallway leading out the front door. As mentioned above, his handprint, in Meredith’s blood, was found on a pillowcase underneath her body. Most importantly, Guede’s DNA was found inside Meredith’s body.

Guede also had a history of break-ins similar to that seen at the cottage. One week prior to the murder of Meredith Kercher, Rudy Guede was caught breaking into a nursery school by the school's owner, Maria Del Prato, when she arrived unexpectedly during off hours with two repairmen. Del Prato along with the repairmen kept Guede at the nursery and called the police.

When police searched Guede's backpack they found a laptop and cell phone that had recently been stolen from a Perugian law office. The break-in at the law office was very similar to the break-in at the cottage as Guede entered through an elevated window broken with a rock in both occasions. In the nursery school break-in, Guede was found in the possession of a large knife said to be stolen from the school’s kitchen. He was also  in possession of a woman’s gold watch which tied him to another break-in occurring 4 days earlier. Guede's break-in at the nursery no doubt made him a suspect in a previous burglary of the nursery in which cash had been stolen.

In the month prior to Meredith Kercher's murder, Guede had gone on a crime spree. This activity was no secret to the police yet they never managed to properly investigate Guede and never took him into custody. Why? The sad reality is, if the police had done their job properly Meredith Kercher would still be alive today and Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito would have never been wrongfully convicted. They failed once again to take Guede into custody in a timely fashion after the murder leading to the pursuit of two innocent people.

In the case of Meredith Kercher, nothing can ever make it right. Her life was stolen from her in an act of senseless violence. Her family will forever be left with the sorrow of her loss and no real closure will ever come. I realize this is a blunt assessment but it is based on the reality of knowing how strong a parent's love is for their children.

I cannot imagine the pain felt by Meredith’s family to have this ordeal dragged out for as long as it has. I am hopeful that the Kerchers will eventually find answers to their questions about Meredith's death by taking a closer look at Rudy Guede.