SEATTLE, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- The man whose murder conviction was tossed says he has spoken with U.S. student Amanda Knox, waiting to see if she is re-convicted in the death of her roommate.
Ryan Ferguson, who spent 10 years in prison for a Columbia, Mo., murder he didn't commit, said Knox expressed hope that "justice would prevail" when a jury in Florence, Italy, issues its verdict this week concerning the 2007 death of British exchange student Meredith Kercher, who was Knox's roommate when the two were students studying in Perugia, ABC News reported Monday.
Ferguson, 29, who was released from prison in 2013 after a Missouri state appeals court panel overturned his murder conviction in the death of a Columbia newspaper sports writer, told ABC News in an email he spoke with Knox this week.
"She seems to be doing incredibly well considering the circumstances," Ferguson said. "The Italian courts continue to play games with her life which is sadly no different than what happens here on a daily basis."
Related
"Having said that, she is very positive and we all believe that justice will prevail and the facts that have proven her innocence will set her free," he said.
Knox, 26, who spent four years in an Italian prison, returned to the United States in 2011 after her 2009 murder conviction was thrown out by an Italian appeals court. However, Italy's top court ordered another trial for Knox, who is being tried in absentia, and Raffaele Sollecito, her boyfriend at the time Kercher was killed. She and Sollecito have maintained their innocence.
Knox, of Seattle, has refused to return to Italy for the trial, saying she feared she would be convicted again.
Since returning to the United States, Knox has become friends with Ferguson, ABC News said.
"I can identify with Amanda on many levels as I know firsthand what it is like to have the world turn against you based on a series of lies," Ferguson posted on his Facebook page Jan. 19.
Ferguson said the two became friends after he read Knox's book, "Waiting to be Heard," while he was in prison. Knox became a "Free Ryan" supporter, ABC News said.
A third person, Rudy Guede of Ivory Coast, was convicted in a fast-track trial and is serving a 16-year sentence in Kercher's murder.
