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- [00:04]
A
When you are pioneering anything or introducing new ideas to the culture, you get criticized.
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B
You do? Yeah. Did you hear about that?
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A
I didn't find the one. I found someone I respected, and we made it the one. In the sort of longing kind of view of love, people understand each other as if by magic. Nothing in itself is addictive on the one hand. On the other hand, everything could be addictive. If there is, there's an emptiness in that person that needs to be filled. I now know that nobody changes until
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B
they change their energy. And when you change your energy, you change your life. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow. This is the Goop Podcast, bringing together thought leaders, culture changers, creatives, founders and CEOs, scientists, doctors, healers and seekers here to start conversations. Because simply asking questions and listening has the power to change the way we see the world. Here we go. This week, we're sharing a gem from the Goop Podcast archives. Welcome to the Goop Podcast. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow. Today's guest is someone whose name you may recognize, but what you may not know is the depth and humanity of her story and the grace with which she's continued to live, create, and heal. In the years since her wrongful conviction in Italy, in the time since she's reclaimed her voice writing books, producing podcasts, and now, with her new Hulu series, co produced with Monica Lewinsky, she's inviting us to explore what it means to live in the aftermath of public shaming and trauma. Please welcome Amanda Knox. So this show, Monica comes to you and says, I want to do a drama of your story. And how did you kind of take ownership of that, such that it would be an empowering and healing narrative.
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A
In the years that have gone by because of such this big, scandalous story, a lot of people have reached out to me to say the same thing. You know, we want to do your story. It's crazy. And for the longest time, I said no for two reasons. One, none of them were saying, we want you to executive produce a story about yourself. They just want life rights. They're like, please trust us to tell your story. But also, I'm a storyteller in my own right. I'm a creative person. My voice has value, and maybe I have some vision to share as well. But more than that, it was the fact that for a very long time, I felt really uncomfortable with the idea of telling my story in a dramatized way because it didn't feel like my story. First of all, it's also the story about how a girl went to Italy and got murdered. And people have always tried to compare us and sort of like, pit us against each other in this horrific way when we're both victims of the same circumstances. And I just didn't like the idea of telling a story or being a part of somebody telling a story about, again, two girls go to Italy and only one of them survives. The end just felt wrong because I didn't do anything. Meredith didn't do anything. You know, we just went to Italy and then all of these bad things were done to us. And so it didn't feel like my story. Like, what am I, just a victim? Like, no, I don't like it. I just didn't like it. It felt voyeuristic and wrong. And it wasn't until I started myself in my real life taking. Taking action, and the decision to reach out to my prosecutor, to talk to him, the decision to go back to Italy to confront him in person, that was me. That did not have to happen, but that was me taking the reins back in my own life and, like, decisively becoming the protagonist of my own life again. And so that was a story for me. And so when Monica approached me and said, hey, I. I was like, you know what? I think I am at this point now, because I'm not just sort of a victim of circumstance now. I'm making a choice now. I'm taking a risk, and I don't know what's going to happen, because at the moment that she reached out to me, I still hadn't met him in person yet. I just reached out to him. And so over the course of creating this show was also me doing the thing that we depict in this show, which is going back and meeting him and confronting him.
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B
You know, there's always an aspect when someone is known for a story like this, and it's then given you this incredible platform and you're doing all this amazing work from it. Like, I just want to acknowledge that it's difficult, you know, to be asked to traverse back through this stuff and as I said, like, platform for you to do so much good, but yet still, like, talking about it. I don't know if it's re traumatizing to have to talk about this stuff.
- [04:58]
A
Yeah, I hear where you're coming from with that. But, like, the way that this worked out for me was from the very beginning, it felt like no one cared what the truth was and no one cared what I had to say. And it's interesting that you're right that in A very big way. My voice and my story is being platformed right now. And it's surreal to me because even after the courts eventually vindicated me and freed me, I very much felt buried underneath this story that was made up by other people. And the messaging that I received was, okay, so you're not the villain that we made you out to be, but the thing you really need to do is shut up and disappear. Like, okay, you came from nothing. You blipped on our radar. We're still sort of holding it against you. Be buried. And I fought so hard for so long just to be heard and to be in a position now where I really am feeling supported and recognized. I do not take that lightly.
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B
But you had to fight tooth and nail for that.
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A
Oh, yeah. I wouldn't be here if it weren't for people going out of their way to tell me that my voice does matter. And it, like, starts with my husband, who's also executive producer on this show. But, like, back when he met me, I was in hiding. I didn't go to book readings because I was afraid I would get recognized. Like, I lived for years not going to public places, or if I did, I just, like, kept my head low, and I didn't talk to anybody, and I didn't make friends because I just didn't feel like I belonged to humanity anymore. I felt ostracized. I felt exiled.
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B
Do you feel like you sort of had embodied this shame that was given to you that wasn't yours?
- [06:56]
A
Certainly, yeah. I mean, again, like, all of this happened when I was very young, right. And I was processing trauma on top of trauma. Right. It all begins with two young women from different parts of the world who come together in this beautiful little town in the green heart of Italy, and only one of them survives. Boom. One huge trauma.
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B
And you're how old when this happened?
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A
I was 20 years old. And then five days later, I'm still, like, in shock. I haven't even gotten past, you know, the first stage of grief, which is, like, denial and shock. And then I'm thrown into a prison cell and accused of having masterminded a death orgy. And then I'm surviving years of prison, which itself is a traumatic experience. So, like, it's just been trauma on top of trauma that it's taken me years to sort of unravel. What is this? And so when I first came home, you know, I'm looking to the world for guidance on how I'm supposed to process this traumatic experience and what the world was telling Me was, you're not a victim. Shut up and disappear. And so, of course, like any, like, raw grief, feelings that I have for the life that I could have lived or for my own pain that I've gone through, I'm just experiencing rejection after rejection, and I felt buried.
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B
Can we go back to the beginning for a minute? I just want to understand. So you grew up in Washington somewhere?
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A
Yeah, yeah, Seattle, Washington.
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B
You grew up in Seattle. You're on your junior year abroad, which my daughter is now just starting her senior year. You move into this apartment. So you're sort of like, full of optimism and excitement. You're moving into your cottage and you have a roommate. You were establishing your life there. You were starting classes. How long into your junior year abroad did this happen?
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A
So I was there in Perugia for five weeks, I believe. So I was still, like, getting settled, you know, I was still figuring out how to say, where is the bibliotheca? I have to say, like, everything up to the tremendous, horrible tragedy that happened was beautiful. Like, I was meeting lots of other students. I was, you know, going out and drinking wine and having pizza and going and seeing live music. And there was the flea market and there was the chocolate festival. And I'm living with these three beautiful young women, one of whom is a foreign exchange student like me, and the other two are Italians. And so I'm just feeling really, like, welcomed and homed and embraced, and it's a beautiful experience. And then I meet my boyfriend, you know, Rafaele, at this classical music concert. So everything is going the way that you would hope your study abroad experience would go. The mentality that I was in when I came home to discover this crime scene was, like, it was a special, long weekend. So, I mean, I don't know if you've been in town or in the area around that time of year, but, like, it's a special celebration. People do a long weekend to celebrate the days following Halloween because there are really traditional holidays in Italy. And so everyone made plans to go either visit their families or to go out of town. And Raffaele, my new boyfriend of a week, had made this plan that we would go to Gubbio, which is nearby, and, like, enjoy truffles. He was just trying to be this, like, very gracious host to me. And so my plan that morning was to just go home, take a shower, get dressed into something pretty because I'm on this, like, romantic adventure and go off to Gubbio. And instead I find a crime scene
- [10:40]
B
that in and of itself is Traumatic to find a crime scene. What is the first thing you thought when you saw that?
- [10:45]
A
Well, the fortunate thing. Fortunate, unfortunate. Say the crime scene is like ground zero. I did not see ground zero with my own eyes. I saw the outer ring of it, right? So I came home and found things amiss in my house, right? Like, the front door was open. There was a little bit of speckling of blood in my bathroom. As I was coming home again, Like, I'm thinking, I'm going off on this romantic trip. I just need to get changed, get my stuff, blah, blah, blah. I come home and I think, that's weird. Why is the front door open? There's no one here. But then I think, well, maybe someone forgot to lock the door. You're not thinking worst case scenario? I'm just thinking, oh, that's weird. The front door's open, and I go in the bathroom. Like, oh, that's weird. Why is there blood drops? And I initially thought I had just recently pierced my ears. And I was like, are my ears bleeding? Like, but no. Okay, weird. Well, I guess we're all girls here. Occasionally stuff like that comes up. So, whatever, it's fine. So I take a shower, I get changed. There are two bathrooms in our apartment. And I go into the second bathroom to blow dry my hair. That's where the blow dryer is. And I notice that someone has left feces in the toilet. And that was the first moment that I got chills because I was like, that wasn't explainable to me. That was, a stranger has been in the house. And I immediately was like, oh, no. And I went back to Rafaele, and I was like, what do I do? And he was like, well, hold on. You don't know. Like, call your roommates. Like, see if something is going on. And so I try calling them, and I can't get ahold of two of them. Meredith and Laura. I finally get a hold of Philomena. I tell her, you know, this is weird. Were you at the house last night? Do you know what's going on? And she says, no, but that is weird. Let's meet back out the house and check it out. And she's farther away than me, so I get there first. Me and Raffaele go back into the house together, and we poke around more thoroughly. Like, when I initially went to the house, I just went into my space. I went into my bedroom. I went to my bathroom and then just blew dry my hair in the second bathroom. But this time, I start looking in my other roommate's rooms. So I go to Laura's room. Perfect, untouched, as if nothing happened. I go into Philomena's room and it's ransacked. The window is broken, clearly there's been a break in. And immediately I tell my boyfriend, can you please call the cops? Because I don't even know how to call the cops in Italy. So he's on the phone and I then go to Meredith's room to try to see if anything's wrong in there. And I can't open her door. It's been locked. Which is weird because sure, Meredith has locked her door in the past a couple times, but it was always when she was inside the room, not when she was gone. And she is not answering when I am banging on her door. And I immediately think something is wrong. I don't know what is wrong, but something is wrong. So I asked Rafaele to try to break down the door. He tries kicking it down. He can't do it. So we decide to wait for the police to arrive and they do. But they're not the police that we called. They are police who arrive, who are completely separate entities. So as you know, in Italy there are two completely separate entities of police. There's the carabineri and there's the policia postale. Raffaele called the carabinieri, that's actually the same police that his sister works for, the carabinieri. And so he called them and explained the situation and they had some people coming. But in the meantime, this other police entity, the policia postale, had discovered these cell phones and they show up.
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B
And how did they know to show up to the house?
- [14:24]
A
Because one of the SIM cards belonged to Filomena Romanelli, one of our roommates. So they're saying we're looking for Filomena Romanelli. They're not saying we're looking for Meredith, they're looking for Filomena. And I was like, well, that doesn't make any sense because I just talked to Philomena on the phone. I don't understand why her phone would be missing. And so I'm like, but we called you about a break in. I don't know anything about any phones. But like there's been a break in. And they're like, what are you talking about? We're like, what are you talking about? We just talked to you on the phone. There's this like confusion from the get go.
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B
You're doing this in Italian.
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A
Yes, and thankfully Raffaele was there to help explain. But I'm attempting to talk to people I am not at all fluent in Italian and I'm trying to communicate, trying to understand, and it's complete and utter chaos. Finally, they come into the house, they check things out. Philomena comes home. She has her boyfriend with her, and her boyfriend was the one who eventually broke in Meredith's store. And they discover her body. I did not see it because I was still busy talking to the police officers and, you know, trying to, like, respond and navigate the situation. But, like, she saw into her room, saw Ground Zero, where my friend, my roommate, fought for her life and was sexually assaulted and stabbed to death and flipped out. And then everyone starts screaming in Italian, and I have no idea what the fuck is going on. So we're just, like, rushed out of the house and I'm, like, picking up words here and there, and Philomena's hysterical. One of my other roommates is not there. We can't get a hold of Meredith. I hear there's a foot and blood in her room. And I'm like, what do you mean, a foot? Like a disembodied foot. What happened? What is going on? It isn't until hours later that I actually get all of the information about, yes, there is a body. Yes, it is Meredith. Yes, she was stabbed to death. I don't know this. Like, I'm getting bits and pieces for hours. And I think one of the things that's misunderstood, that this series that we've produced really tries to, like, correct for is, like, it's really easy, in retrospect to look back on people and see footage of them and just assume that they have all the information and then judge them based upon your assumption that they have all the information. But, like, at that moment when I'm standing outside of my house and my boyfriend is trying to comfort me and I'm trying to figure out what even anyone is saying. I didn't know what was going on. And so when I'm judged for kissing my boyfriend, he kissed me to comfort me. I'm just, like, in shock. You can even see the footage. Like, it's been out there. Like, I'm just sort of staring like a deer in headlights into space. And he's just like, hey, look at me. And then he gives me a kiss. Just. That was seen as proof of my guilt. It is nuts. So something that we're really trying to, like, show in this series is these tragedies that happen. You know, you're just going on your life thinking you have the best thing going on, and then this huge thing happens. To you. And you don't know what you don't know. You don't know how to react. I was 20 years old and in a foreign country, trying to piece together and never having had anything remotely to the level of like, gravity of the situation, nothing bad had ever happened to me in my life. And then this happened. And then in the days that I'm trying to process this sudden loss and shock and in my life I'm also being interrogated by police officers.
- [18:19]
B
Sometimes I think people arrive at narratives, true or false, and then they do everything they can to find every shred of evidence to support their narrative. So do you feel that they wanted to establish that narrative? Like, I don't understand because it seems like the evidence was so tenuous and wrong. I guess my question is, what was the evidence that they started to follow that could have led them to assume your guilt?
- [18:52]
A
That haunted question of like, why did the cops take one look at a 20 year old kid with no motive and no precedent and think, there's my rapist and murderer. Why would you pursue that case? And it haunted me for years. Why me? And that's a big reason why I went back to Italy to confront my prosecutor, which is, you know, the framing narrative of this series. But one of the things that we were really invested in when we were producing this was, well, what was it like to be in the shoes of the investigators really, really early on?
- [19:29]
B
That's what I wanted to ask you was is this like fundamentally a part of healing to get into the shoes of the persecutor prosecutor? Did you start to understand their perspective and was this important to you in terms of your healing?
- [19:48]
A
Yes, because I never believed, ever, even while I was sitting in a prison cell, that there was just some evil prosecutor out there who was cackling away in his office about putting an innocent girl in jail. You know, I never believed that that was the case.
- [20:03]
B
I saw that you had said that and I just thought to be able to embrace that kind of humanity and complexity. Because really what that's saying is you're separating victimhood from your soul, yourself, your identity. Right, sure. Yeah. At 20 years old, what was that like to arrive at that? That he wasn't evil, that he was mistaken?
- [20:28]
A
I mean, again, fortunately, unfortunately, I think I'm a very empathetic person. Like, I remember really early on, even when the police were like really putting me through it before my final interrogation, which was an utter violation of human
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B
rights, which was coercion.
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A
Yes.
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B
Which led to this last thing.
- [20:47]
A
Yes. Okay. But like, even before I was, like, put through that, like, horrific violation of my human rights, I noticed that the cops weren't exactly being kind to me. Like, some of them were. There was a. Definitely a translator. You know, she would notice, for example, like, after I was questioned for hours and hours and hours, she would be like, hey, like, are you okay? Are you sleeping? None of the cops ever did that. They were never checking in. But, like, I also was trying to put myself in their shoes, and I was thinking, well, someone just murdered my friend, so of course they're not gonna be, like, focused on the niceties, like, they have a job to do. And so, like, if they're putting me through it, if they're just asking me the same questions over and over and over again, it's because they care about getting the person who hurt my friend. And so I did not hold it against them.
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B
That's incredible. I would have been, I think, totally out of my mind and unable to say anything except, like, you've got the wrong person.
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A
Well, but here's the thing. They never accused me of the crime. They just told me that I was their most important witness. It's so complex. Do you know the difference between interviews and interrogations in our legal system in America? Yeah. It's a reflection of what they have in Italy as well.
- [22:03]
B
I'm not sure.
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A
Okay.
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B
I would like to think so, given all the true crime that I watch. But I don't know.
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A
I think this is super key because I think people just in general don't know, and I didn't know that. There is a very legal distinction between how police officers are allowed to communicate with you when they are questioning you about a case. Right. There's something called an interview, and there's something called an interrogation. In an interrogation, you are being explicitly accused of a crime, and you have the right to an attorney, you have the right to remain silent. You have all of these rights. But everything leading up to that point is an interview where you have no rights and you're just being questioned. And there are no rules about how you are questioned. You can be questioned anywhere but by anyone without any kind of recording. And in my case, what the police say is that I at no point was ever interrogated, that I was always being interviewed right up to my arrest. And I think that that is one of the most troubling things that people should come away from from a criminal justice standpoint. Like, if you think that you're never going to, like, encounter this issue, I never did either. And bad things happen. Like, you know, car crashes, whatever, you might end up talking to the police one day. And if you do not know they're allowed to lie to you, that they're allowed to communicate with you. And without any kind of like oversight or recording or anything, you are going to find yourself in a very vulnerable position without realizing it up until the point you're arrested.
- [24:00]
B
And then it becomes an interrogation. And there are rules.
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A
Yes.
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B
So you're subjected to this for days? Hours.
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A
Yeah, days. I was giving sort of witness statements throughout the days leading, and he did this like calculation of how much time I was actually in the police office answering questions. And it was 53 hours over five days. So over 10 hours a day, I am just with the police answering their questions over and over and over again.
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B
What point in those 53 hours did you start to think, are they seeing me as a suspect in this?
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A
I didn't know I was a suspect until I was already days in prison and I was brought before a judge who then told me that I was being accused of murder. Even during my interrogation, they never explicitly accused me of having committed the crime. What they accused me of was covering for the murderer.
- [24:56]
B
And who did they suppose the murderer was?
- [24:59]
A
They didn't know at the time, but they said that they knew. They lied to me and they said that they knew that I was covering for him. And what they did was they suggested to me who it might be. They took my cell phone and they saw that I had exchanged messages with my boss. I was doing like part time job waitressing at this local pub. And they saw that I had received a text message from my boss the night of the murder where he said that it was a slow night and I didn't need to come into work. And I had responded back saying, okay, have a good night, see you later. But the police interpreted that message to mean that I had met with him that night, which would have contradicted the stories that I had been telling them that I was with my boyfriend that whole night. And so they said, we know you're a liar. We know you met with this person. We know, we know you witnessed this crime. What did he do?
- [25:49]
B
When your Netflix documentary came out, however many years ago, that was, that was
- [25:53]
A
2016, so a long time ago, a fair amount of time ago, you know,
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B
my heart broke for all of you, especially your parents. Like, I can't imagine to feel so powerless and to have you so far away and how much of a tax it must have been on them, financially, emotionally, everything in order for them to Come and to have you defended. And, you know, to your point, it's trauma on top of trauma. It's circles of trauma. It's your family, it's your friends. I always think, like, when something happens that's, like, emotionally overwhelming, it's sort of like a car crash. You know, you have, like, this shock. It's so hard to connect. Like, I feel out of body. So when the shock started to subside, did it. Or was it just ongoing because you were in prison and then you had to stand trial and then you were found guilty and it was a whole nightmare until you were released?
- [26:46]
A
Yeah. And thank you for mentioning that about my parents, because something that was really important for both me and Monica with this series was to show that.
- [26:57]
B
Yeah. So will you just talk about your co producer?
- [27:00]
A
Yes. Okay. So Monica Lewinsky is an executive producer on this show. She was the one who came to me and said, let's make a show together. And of all the people that I could trust, here's this woman who has gone through her own incredible vilification and shaming in the public and attacked in such a personal, personal way and expected to be buried. Like, she has been forging this path forward to show that it is possible to survive that and it is possible to build yourself a platform and share your truth. So, like, when she came to me, I was thrilled to partner with her because she already had been a mentor for me in many ways. And, like, we both agreed from very early on that there were some things that this story could tell that we wanted to break out of the mold of, like, both true crime and biopic. Right. Like, the story isn't just about a bad thing that happened to a young girl in a foreign country. It is about the long tail of trauma. It is about those concentric circles of trauma. It's about trying to make meaning out of the bad things that happen to you so that your agency has been stolen from you in your own life. You feel like you can reclaim it. And you feel like you're the protagonist of your own life again instead of just somebody else's victim.
- [28:17]
B
You take the steering wheel back. Yeah.
- [28:19]
A
You make choices that are meaningful to you instead of being at the mercy of other people's choices, you know? So, like, it was really important for us to show that it wasn't just me who was traumatized. And they're again, sacrificing everything. Their whole lives became about saving me. And how are they then? In Italian we say metabolizare. How are they processing that in the Aftermath. And does it create tension? Does it create connection? And how do we navigate that? So that's something that was really important to us. But, yes, in those early days and, you know, those early weeks, like, a lot of people ask me if, like, I'm embarrassed by those early days. And, like, you know, I've been really judged for those early days and how I reacted. And, you know, was I doing yoga in the police station? Because I was sitting on these, like, hard chairs for hours on end, and then I would get up when they stopped questioning me, and I would, like, do some yoga stretches. And people like, aren't you embarrassed by that?
- [29:18]
B
Why?
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A
Well, because they say that I was being flippant. I'm not, like, sobbing in a corner like I should be. I'm, like, sitting. Sitting there doing yoga. I've been so judged for those early days, and I'm not embarrassed because I was just a kid, you know, I had no idea how to navigate.
- [29:35]
B
I warn a kid if I had to sit for 10 hours on a hard thing and I wasn't being allowed to leave, like, I would get up and stretch, especially if I didn't fucking do anything wrong.
- [29:45]
A
Well, I think that it's interesting how, in retrospect, we find fault in people, especially women. When we want to find fault in people, especially women, we find the most stupid things to, like, find fault in and to imbue with not just like a salacious narrative, but like a malicious narrative.
- [30:06]
B
Why? Why do we do that?
- [30:07]
A
That is the question, my friend. Why do we do that? I mean, I'm trying to figure it out. I don't have all the answers. You know, Monica is trying to figure this out. I'm trying to figure this out. And we're noticing a pattern. We're noticing the pattern that when a narrative takes hold, it is a boulder that is, like, falling down the hill and accumulating stuff on it as it goes along. And that's what this narrative about me felt like. How well do you know the case? Do you know that we know who committed the crime?
- [30:39]
B
Yes.
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A
Yes. Okay, great. Yeah. Well, some people don't know that. You'd be surprised the number of people who's free, right? Yes, he's free. And he's on trial again for stalking and sexually assaulting another young woman who thankfully survived this time. But here we are, and nobody knows about that because he was never the story. The truth of what happened to Meredith was never the story. It was always the scandal, the idea, this, like, pornographic fantasy about what could have happened to Meredith, if her roommate was the one who was guilty.
- [31:11]
B
Not only her roommate, but her sort of stuff. Snow White looking, beautiful American roommate.
- [31:18]
A
Yeah. It didn't hurt the narrative that both Meredith and I were young and beautiful and had our whole lives ahead of us.
- [31:26]
B
How do you think the pulchritude plays into these things? Like, I really find it fascinating that for some reason, if a beautiful woman is seen to have done something illegal, outrageous, even just rebellious, that the vitriol or the fascination, this sort of femme fatale narrative that will come around. Like, did you contemplate that? Do you think it would have been like this if you weren't as beautiful as you are?
- [31:56]
A
I don't think the case would have reached the level of exposure that it did. Were both Meredith and I not beautiful young women? And we were young enough that we were not fully developed people, which meant that we were very easy to project upon. It's not like we had a history of a career and an established sense of identity, especially in this place, because this didn't happen in my hometown. It didn't happen in Meredith's hometown, where we were surrounded by people who knew us. We were wild cards. And it was very easy for people to see what they wanted to see. And I think subconsciously, even people were both attracted and repulsed by me as a young, you know, naive woman. And it gets gross, right? Like, because in the early days, there's a police officer who very openly admitted that, like, one of the ways that they knew in their gut that I had something to do with the. The crime was because I smelled like sex. Which to me just suggests very strongly that there are a lot of men who were subconsciously producing a narrative based upon their own impulses instead of being able to clearly see the scenario for what it was. But to give the police the benefit of the doubt, which is something that I truly believe in, which was not given to me, but to give it back, you know, to pay it forward. What did the police come to? What was their context? Well, this is a small town where the worst crimes that happen are petty theft and petty drug dealing. Like, it's a college town. That's the kind of stuff that they're used to and they're worried about. And a music town, It's a music town. It's a chocolate town. Like, it's a tourist town. They're not dealing with murders every day. So for there to be not just a murder, like, in a dark alley somewhere, but, like, someone broke into our home and attacked my roommate when she was Getting ready for bed. That was a huge threat. It was very scary very immediately. And because there was the international student element, it became an international story very immediately. And so from the get go, the police and the prosecutor, who in Italy prosecutors lead, they direct the entire investigation, felt under pressure to deliver answers very, very quickly. And what did they see when they arrived at the crime scene? Well, they saw a couple of things. They saw two roommates, one of whom was crying hysterically and one of whom was a deer in headlights. And they noticed the difference. They noticed that there was a break in, but not a lot of things were stolen. And in fact, from the very beginning, they thought nothing was stolen. It turned out that, you know, Meredith's wallet and her phones and all of that had been stolen. But in the immediacy, they were like, weird. Nothing's been stolen. So we don't think this break in is real. They made a snap judgment that the break in was not real and then logically deduced everything from that snap judgment.
- [35:23]
B
What about the DNA in the toilet?
- [35:25]
A
Yeah, well, in the early days, they hadn't the DNA yet. Right. Again, you know, it would be great if we could have from day one known whose DNA was there, but they were still gathering that information and analyzing it. By the time they arrested me, by the time that they had already had in their mind an idea of what they believed happened. At which point, like you said, they start searching for proof of, consciously or unconsciously proof of what they already believe.
- [36:04]
B
Is it right that you're friends with him, friendly with him now?
- [36:08]
A
Yeah, I would say that we are certainly friendly, yeah. A lot of people are like, are you friends? And it's like, well, define friend. There is mutual respect. There is mutual trust and care in the sense that, like, I care how he feels.
- [36:27]
B
This is so interesting. I mean, because he then carries the shame of having done that to someone, right?
- [36:33]
A
He has his own ideas about what
- [36:36]
B
he did, but the facts are he imprisoned an innocent young woman and made a spectacular of somebody's life erroneously. So what was it like for you to sit across from him? I guess. Why was it important for you to do that? And what did he say to you?
- [36:56]
A
The first time I reached out to him was right before the pandemic. Of course, I didn't know the pandemic was gonna happen, but like, in my brain, I was thinking a lot about how the adversarial ness of this whole story sort of set us up for disaster. I was haunted by this why question. Why me? Why did he target me? Why did he make up this crazy stuff about me that is just, like, utterly unsubstantiated by anything? Like, it goes against all of the evidence. There was zero physical evidence of me at the crime scene. Like, why did he think that I was in there stabbing my friend to death when there's copious DNA of someone else? Why? I was really struggling with that in a bad way. Like, I was in pain and I didn't want to be in pain anymore. It wasn't enough for me to just think he's a bad guy because it's not true. It's more complicated than that. And I wanted to know why. I wanted to understand. And I thought that the only way I would ever understand is if I just asked him and if I could just sit in a room with him that's not a courtroom or not an interrogation room, maybe, just maybe, this person could see that I'm not the monster that he made me out to be. That's what I initially wanted to do. And so I reached out to him and asked to meet in person. And then the pandemic happened.
- [38:19]
B
What did you write to him and what did he write you back?
- [38:21]
A
I thought long and hard about how to do that, and I came up with a method that I actually tattooed on my arm. This is the method that I used to confront my prosecutor. The first step is this Venn diagram, which is find common ground. The second is a helmet, which represents the Steel Man. I'm sure you're familiar with saying you're attacking the straw man, which means you're attacking the weakest form of another person's argument. Attacking the steel man or acknowledging the steel man means that you are able to appreciate the strongest form of another person's argument. So that if you were to repeat it back to them, they would say, yes, that. That is what I believe. The third one is a heart, which means have compassion. So even if a person is wrong and believes some cuckoo bananas fricking thing, have compassion for the fact that they have a history and a context that led them to arrive at that conclusion. And the fourth is the delta symbol, which means change. So be willing to change yourself before you expect another person to change.
- [39:23]
B
And what came first, that process or the letter?
- [39:27]
A
This process was something that I was trying to figure out. I mean, my entire adult life, I've been immersed in difficult conversations and I've been immersed in adversarial conversations where everyone sort of expected the worst of me and has viewed sort of cherry picked everything that I've said in the worst possible way. And so I've had to learn to like, navigate that and articulate myself very clearly and to make sure that as best as I humanly can, I am making my intentions not just, you know, what the things that I'm saying, but my intentions behind the things that I'm saying very clear. And I've also had to walk away from conversations because I knew that opening myself up, it doesn't just mean like, being a doormat and letting anyone just walk all over me and say whatever they want to me. I do have boundaries, so how do I open myself up and establish boundaries? And part of this is the process. And like, one of the best ways I have found of diffusing an adversarial environment is just spending some time acknowledging what we all have in common. So when I reached out to my prosecutor, here's a man that I don't know from any random person. All I've ever seen him is in the interrogation room and the courtroom where he has been bitten, hell bent on destroying my life and vilifying me. That's all I know about him. Except I also know that this case has been huge in the media and he also has been represented in the media. And I bet that he probably feels misrepresented in the media. So I start out the conversation by saying, Dear Dr. Giuliana Mignini, I don't know who you are. I have an idea of who you are. My idea of who you are is you're this very scary man, this very scary and powerful man who tried to ruin my life. I don't think that that's a fair idea of who you are. Just like, I don't think it was a fair idea of who I was. The way that you represented me in the court and, and the way that the media represented me out there in the world. I wanna know who you are. So could we please put aside, you're the prosecutor and I'm the defendant and just look each other in the eye and have a conversation as people. And at first he had no idea what to do with that. And to his credit, because it's not done, that kind of conversation between a prosecutor and defendant just doesn't happen. He actually was like, I don't even know if it's legal. And I was like, well, I promise you it's not illegal because it's never happened, so there's no law about it. But like, whatever. Even when I was talking to my other exoneree friends ahead of doing this, I was telling them That I was feeling this, like, deep instinct to reach out to him. And they were like, why? Why would you have a useless conversation with somebody who's clearly deranged and is not going to actually meet you halfway? And like, I didn't have an answer for that. I was like, well, fair point. Like a lot of my exoneree friends were like, prosecutors do not admit that they were wrong, but it just doesn't happen. They're not incentivized to do it. They have every reason not to, so why are you wasting your time? And I couldn't prove them wrong, but I still felt drawn to this human, maybe because I had felt so dehumanized and I wanted a human interaction.
- [42:58]
B
We come across people in our lives that are of great consequence. Sometimes we choose them they're a parent or we choose them, they're a partner. To have someone of such consequence in your life that was thrust in there, I mean, it's.
- [43:12]
A
And a complete stranger.
- [43:13]
B
And a complete stranger. Can I just say, like, it's incredibly sophisticated emotionally and intellectually and spiritually to want to do that and to think about the wholeness of a person and to find forgiveness through those channels. It's like pretty elevated stuff.
- [43:37]
A
I mean, I've had a lot of time to sit and think about it, I guess. I don't know, like, what else was I doing in there? Sit ups. You know, I'm a very curious person and I'm not satisfied with easy answers, which means that I have to be willing to do a very difficult thing in order to receive and hold the difficult answer.
- [43:58]
B
So what did he write you back?
- [43:59]
A
So we ended up corresponding for two years before and you know, in the show we like didn't have enough space to show like that two year correspondence. And so it sort of got very beautifully and thoughtfully collapsed into some very concise scenes. Especially the scene where I go back to Italy and I confront him in person. And we have that conversation finally, face to face, eye to eye. But I think, again, always trying to be guided by finding common ground and trying again to really appreciate where someone was coming from when they arrived at a certain set of beliefs. My prosecutor is from a different country and a different culture and a different generation. And he has been haunted. You know, he hunted a serial killer in Italy.
- [44:52]
B
Did he catch him?
- [44:53]
A
No, it's an unsolved crime in Italy, the Monster of Florence case. And he was hunting the serial killer and never got it. And part of the reason why he believes he was never able to solve the crime was because there was a conspiracy afoot that there was, like, political intrigue involved. And he's also someone who has spent his career fighting mafia and corruption. And so he has this innate sort of bent towards seeing the world through that lens. And I think that he approached this case. What happened to my roommate was horrific, and I think it triggered him to interpret reality in a certain way.
- [45:41]
B
We're full of things that we bring to a situation, and it can be so dangerous.
- [45:47]
A
We are not blank slates. Like, we have a lens through which we observe and understand reality. And I think he is someone who believes in himself and believes in his ability, and that's both a good thing and a thing to be careful of.
- [46:02]
B
Did he apologize to you?
- [46:05]
A
Well, I don't want to give away anything. I'm not going to give away anything. But what I will say is that we continue to correspond to this day. He was texting me earlier. I'll tell you how I came away. I entered into that conversation feeling like he was the one who had all the power and I was the one who was at his mercy. And I walked away feeling like it was the exact opposite. Not only was I unstoppable, I was also deeply responsible. I was now holding a person and their fragility in my hands. And I felt a deep need to care for that, because it's a scary thing when someone really, truly cares about what you think of them. And I did not expect that. I did not expect him to turn around and care so deeply about what I think of him.
- [47:01]
B
Well, imagine being in his shoes and having to sleep every night knowing what he knows, you know?
- [47:08]
A
Right. And, like, how much has he really, again, processed?
- [47:13]
B
Is it weird watching somebody play?
- [47:15]
A
You sure? Yes. Obviously, yes. But I think the more thing that I feel besides weirdness is how grateful I am, because I feel like for the longest time, the burden has been on me to represent myself and explain myself. And now I have someone I can share that with a little bit. And she's so graceful about it. She's so smart and so empathetic.
- [47:42]
B
I see similarities. Like, I'm very curious, and I'm always trying to get to the more complicated, layered answer. And I'm always trying to orient around healing, you know, mine and others. And I do just want to briefly say, like, I feel extremely inspired by the tact that you took around this.
- [48:01]
A
And do you meditate, by the way?
- [48:04]
B
I do, yeah.
- [48:04]
A
Okay, cool. I use the Waking up app.
- [48:07]
B
What do you use?
- [48:07]
A
Do you just on your own?
- [48:08]
B
I do Tm that I put on.
- [48:10]
A
Oh, okay. Yeah, I've never tried that.
- [48:12]
B
This is perfect. I want to ask you about your healing mode.
- [48:14]
A
Thank you. Yeah. So I started using Sam Harris's meditation app.
- [48:18]
B
Is that what it is? Waking Up?
- [48:20]
A
Yeah, it's called Waking Up. And it's so good because it's this great gathering place of both just practice sessions, but also, like, lectures. And he invited me to do a series of lectures for the app. So if anyone is, like, more curious about, like, how I sort of feel, figured out that the healing part of this journey, I did, like, this whole big series for him called Resilience on the Waking up app. So I recommend that. But to, like, answer your question, I didn't discover meditation as a healing practice until after prison. And really, like, last six years that I've been meditating, which is not that long, considering this has been going on 18 years. I think I'm grounded in the sense that I do feel empathy for people, and I want to feel connected to humanity. And I feel like any obstacle, including hatred, that puts me at a distance from other human beings bothers me. I instinctually want to break it down. And the thing that has actually really helped me from meditation has been just sitting quietly with yourself, giving yourself the grace and time to just be quietly with yourself. I've noticed how okay I am. No matter what's happening, I am okay. And there's this beautiful, like, Zen paradox where you and your life are perfect just the way they are, and they could use improvement. And does that mean that, like, the world can't be a better place and that I don't have a thing that I have to, like, fight back against and do the right thing and make the world, you know, like, no, that doesn't mean anything. But, like, right now, I'm okay. If I stop, I'm okay. And that gives me a sense of confidence and peace instead of, like, a franticness. You know, do things. Be busy. Don't be urgent. Don't be scared. Just be effective. Be present and find your way, and you'll find your way in tune with the universe. And, you know, it's not always graceful. It's not always pretty. Like, it's not that I'm, like, super Zenned out all the time.
- [50:21]
B
Do you feel that you've metabolized the trauma?
- [50:25]
A
Well, here's the thing about trauma. It's not like it just goes away. You just carry it with you, and it becomes a way that you experience the world. But, like, it can either become a way that makes you feel diminished in the world, or it becomes a thing that propels you forward. To give just a very simple example, when I gave birth to my daughter, she just got and was screaming her head off, like you would. I knew she was in pain, and I was stricken by the fact that I couldn't take away her pain. And my mom was in the room with me, and I was just like, oh, my God. What I'm feeling right now for my daughter, who I'm just meeting for the first time, is exactly what my mom felt the entire time I was in prison. And just, whoa, how precious and how fragile is life? And, like, how amazing is it that I get to be a mom when not too long ago, I was sentenced to 26 years in prison and that opportunity was stolen from me. So, no, I'm not going to take any of this for granted. And also, I'm just as helpless as my mom was when it comes to the life of my daughter, who is going to experience her own traumas. And all I can do is help her understand that no matter what happens, she can be okay. And she's not just a helpless victim. She is someone who matters, who can have a say.
- [51:57]
B
What's incredible to me is that this insight that you had, you would not have had that insight had this not happened to you. This tattoo that's going to stay with me, you know, for the rest of my life, that would not be there had this not happened to you. You would not be this person. You would not be in this position of, first of all, having formulated and come to these understandings that you now possess, and you would not be in this position to impact so many people, me included, by the way, like, this has been incredibly profound for me. Would you go through it again? Do you believe that this is your path and this was part of your story, and that you had to go through something this horrible?
- [52:42]
A
I mean, it is my path because this is the path that was given me. And like, to your point, in a weird way, I am grateful to my prosecutor.
- [52:50]
B
You know, I once had someone say to me, your tormentor is your mentor. I mean, it's true. If you choose to frame it that way and see it that way and unearth and excavate the lessons and the hardest things that happen to us. There's so much there, and you can
- [53:07]
A
flip it on its head, because I feel like, in a way, I'm his mentor now.
- [53:11]
B
Certainly. This has been so incredible. Thank you so much for sharing your story. I'm really looking forward to watching it also because the story is so interesting, especially, you know, this story of forging forgiveness, forging healing, taking your power back. And congratulations on it.
- [53:32]
A
Thank you. I'm really proud of it.
- [53:39]
B
Thanks for tuning in. This has been a presentation of Cadence 13 Studios. I hope you'll listen, follow, rate and review all of our episodes, which are available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Odyssey or wherever you get your podcasts.