<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" I never saw it coming. I was a lieutenant in the military police in Italy when my brother, Raffaele, was accused of an unthinkable crime. He was in college, in love with an American student named Amanda Knox, and living in the scenic hilltop city of Perugia, Italy. One night while he and Amanda shared a romantic dinner at his apartment, a woman was brutally stabbed to death across town. That woman was Amanda&amp;#039;s roommate, a British student named Meredith Kercher. The murderer left Meredith lying on the floor, her body covered with a bloody duvet. That was six years ago, on the first night of November in 2007. I was 30 years old, living in Rome, planning to become a mountie in the military police, known as the carabinieri. Italy has several levels of police. Members of the carabinieri are like soldiers, ready to serve the country abroad, if need be. I remember Raffaele calling me on the morning of November 2. He and Amanda were at her apartment, and things were amiss. A window was broken; Meredith&amp;#039;s room was locked. I told him to leave and call the police. The officers came and found Meredith lying dead in her room.  As children growing up on the southern coast of Italy, my brother and I were quite close, but we were also very different. My only sibling, he is seven years younger and an introspective, poetic soul. I was more outgoing and forthright and watched over him through the divorce of our parents and other childhood trials. I grew up to become a champion equestrian, winning an international jumping competition, then I entered the Italian Air Force, becoming one of the first women to do so. I studied archaeology, political science, and international law, completing two college degrees and a master&amp;#039;s. My brother, meanwhile, was finishing his degree in computer science when he met Amanda and fell in love. Although there was no evidence linking him and Amanda to the murder, they were arrested, along with Rudy Guede, a man whose DNA was found all over the crime scene. The three were accused of murdering Meredith during a sexual orgy gone wrong. It was pure fiction\u2014a wild story that captured the sordid imagination of the public. In Italy, the idea of proof beyond a reasonable doubt is less interesting than a sensational story. And it turned my life upside down. My bosses told me I could not talk to the press or make any public statements about my brother or the crime. This put me in a terrible position, caught between the family I love and the career I had worked so hard to achieve. Privately, I advised my brother, but publicly, I remained silent. My immediate family understood\u2014they respected my job\u2014but what they did not understand was my blunt assessment of my brother&amp;#039;s situation: I knew Raffaele was in deep trouble. The tabloids had grabbed hold of the case, spewing scandalous stories that described him as a thrill seeker, a sexual deviant enthralled with an evil American vixen. The public and the police had embraced the fiction. It&amp;#039;s hard to watch your brother enter a hell you cannot protect him from. He was sent to prison to await trial and thrown into solitary confinement for six months\u2014a cruel effort to pressure him to accuse Amanda of the crime. On those terrible nights, I would lie awake, thinking of him in his cell, trying to transport positive thoughts to him. He refused to blame Amanda, even though he knew that doing so could improve his own situation. He would be plagued for life if he accused an innocent person.  In the meantime, my bosses began trying to push me out. They said if I believed in my brother&amp;#039;s innocence, I was contradicting the police. They tried to send me off on a &amp;quot;stress&amp;quot; leave; they cut my assignments. My colleagues grew scornful. I could see them watching me, taking notes. One day, I was told to turn over my pistol. Then I had to retake the exams I had taken to enter the military. In the spring of 2009, I was fired, accused of not having &amp;quot;the right attitude to work as a carabinieri.&amp;quot; I became a physical trainer and tried to hold on to my apartment in Rome, but it was too expensive. I had to move back to my hometown. My prediction about my brother sadly came true. He and Amanda were convicted, along with Guede, and sentenced to decades in jail. Guede remains there today, while Raffaele and Amanda were finally set free on appeal in October 2011, some four years after the crime. They began to rebuild their lives. I worked on rebuilding my own life as well. I had lost my career, my home, and my faith in the country I had once served. But I had not lost my spirit. I returned to my passion of horse jumping, as horses are my first love\u2014I have been riding since I was 6 years old. When I&amp;#039;m on a horse, my mind is clear and I feel alive. My goal now is to find a sponsor and take my sport to the next level, competing on the professional circuit. This past spring, my family was stunned to learn that our legal nightmare would begin again with a new trial. In a diabolical twist, the Italian Supreme Court decided to overturn Raffaele&amp;#039;s and Amanda&amp;#039;s acquittals and retry the case. At press time, the trial is getting set to start. The prosecutors are more determined than ever to convict again. They have waged a war on our family\u2014and on the truth\u2014to save face. Our family has given everything to my brother&amp;#039;s defense. But we will soldier on. The sun rises every day, and we will keep moving forward with our lives. I hope my brother, my family, and I, as well as the other families involved, can soon find serenity after so much suffering and injustice. What keeps me going is my firm belief that you must keep striving. If you don&amp;#039;t do everything you have the capacity to do in life, it is not a life well lived. As told to Abigail Pesta Photo: Getty Images "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.cosmopolitan.com/entertainment/celebs/news/a5008/my-brothers-trial-ruined-my-life/>