Witness clears Amanda Knox in Italy murder trial

Perugia, Italy (AFP) - A man imprisoned with a co-accused Amanda Knox, an American convicted of murdering a British student in Italy, told an appeal hearing on Saturday, she and her boyfriend is innocent.

Knox and Raffaele Sollecito, her boyfriend at the time, were sentenced to 26 and 25 years in prison for the grisly 2007 murder in South London student Meredith Kercher, with whom Knox shared a house in Perugia.

Both now appeal their sentences.

Prosecutors said the crime was a drug-fueled sex game that turned violent.

Rudy Guede, was sentenced to 16 years in prison in a separate trial for his role in the murder, told the prison inmates that Mario Alessi "Amanda and Raffaele have nothing to do with the murder."

Alessi repeated his claim, already made a statement to the police, during the hearing on Saturday in this city in central Italy.

Alessi, a mason who is serving his sentence for killing a child, told the court that Guede had told him on the trial of his friends in the room at a time when they were both held in the same prison cell.

According to statements alleged Guede, 21 Kercher was killed by a friend of Guede when she resisted sexual assault.

"Rudy said he tried to help the young woman after her injured friend with a small knife with an ivory handle," Alessi told the court.

The friend then allegedly told Guede: "What do you do, we have to kill her if not we will end up in prison because of her?".

When questioned by prosecutors Guede Perugia denied ever having made such statements.

The young lovers were originally convicted in large part due to traces of DNA on the knife found Knox and Sollecito DNA on a bra clip.