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PERUGIA, Italy -- An Italian jury has found former University of Washington student Amanda Knox guilty in the 2007 killing of her British roommate Meredith Kercher.

The case created a media frenzy as reporters from across the globe converged in Perugia outside the courthouse, hungry for a verdict in the trial that lasted nearly a year.

LIVE VIDEO: Coverage Of Amanda Knox Verdict


LIVE VIDEO: Scene Outside Perugia Courthouse


Anticipation soared as the world watched and waited to find out the fate of the Seattle woman in one of the most widely publicized cases in the last two years.

During the trial, jurors heard a multitude of lurid details including claims that Knox, 22, her former boyfriend, 25-year-old Raffaele Sollecito and another man slit Meredith Kercher's throat in a sex game fueled by drugs and alcohol that turned violent.

The jury deliberated both murder and sexual assault charges against both Knox and Sollecito.

The prosecutors sought a life sentence for both, while both defendants denied wrongdoing.

Before the eight member jury started deliberations, Knox made one last appeal to the Italian court trying her for murder: She is not a killer.

Standing up, her voice breaking as she fought back tears, an emotional Knox told the court that she feels "vulnerable" and fears losing herself after two years in jail.

Earlier in the case, Ivory Coast citizen Rudy Hermann Guede, was convicted in the murder and sentenced to 30 years in prison for the part he played in Kercher's death.

During Knox and Sollecito's trial, the prosecution said that on Nov. 1, 2007, Knox and Kercher started arguing and Knox, Sollecito and Gudede brutally attacked and sexually assaulted the Briton. They were acting, according to the prosecution, under "the fumes of drugs and possibly alcohol."

Kercher's body was found in a pool of blood the next day at the apartment.

Her throat had been slit.

Knox's defense largely focused on the lack of evidence and what they say was the absence of a clear motive.

The lawyer for Kercher's family argued in his rebuttals that Kercher was killed because she knew her murderers and would be a threat to them if she survived.

Knox says Kercher was a friend whose death shocked her.

Both Knox and Sollecito have been jailed for nearly two years.

The jury, which included two judges, was not sequestered.