The family of Amanda Knox, convicted of murdering British student Meredith Kercher, has asked lawyers to begin an appeal after reviewing the Italian court’s motivation for the verdict.
The judges who convicted Knox and former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito in December issued the reasons behind the ruling this week.
They found no animosity towards Miss Kercher, from Coulsdon, south London.
Instead they saw the killing as a result of accidental circumstances in what had started as a sexual assault by another man, Rudy Hermann Guede, also convicted for the 2007 murder.
Knox’s family said in a statement night that “there is a lot of conjecture in these motivations”, and that “there is a substantial basis for the appeal”.
Knox was sentenced to 26 years in jail, Sollecito to 25.