Judges: Girl's death 'group participation'

PERUGIA, Italy, Dec. 20 (UPI) -- New evidence in the investigation of a college student's death shows more than one person was involved in what an Italian court called a "ferocious" assault.

A three-judge panel in Perugia, Italy, filed papers to keep Ivory Coast native Rudy Hermann Guede jailed on suspicion of murder in the death of Meredith Kercher, a British exchange student, ABC News reported Thursday. The papers indicated a neighbor heard screams followed by the sound of multiple footsteps.

U.S. student Amanda Knox and her boyfriend Raffale Sollecito also are being held.

Knox and Sollecito said they were not in the house when Kercher's throat was slit, but in the court document on Guede, the judges said evidence confirmed "the presence of more than one person in that house at the time Meredith was killed."

This is substantiation, the judges wrote, of "a group participation in the ferocious criminal act, that cannot be considered in passive terms for any of those present."

The judges earlier concluded that Knox and Sollecito participated in the slaying, but Guede's role still needed to be established. Guede is the only suspect admitting to being at the crime scene, but denies involvement in the death.