HispanicBusiness

Independent experts testified Saturday that DNA evidence used in the Italian murder trial of U.S. college student Amanda Knox is unreliable.

Carla Vecchiotti and Stefano Conti, both from La Sapienza University in Rome, were appointed by the court hearing Knox's appeal, The Daily Telegraph reported. In a 145-page report, they criticized police handling of evidence collected at the Perugia house Knox shared with the victim, British student Meredith Kercher.

Vecchiotti told the court Saturday little DNA was found on a kitchen knife believed to have been used to kill Kercher.

"There is a complete genetic profile, but it's not reliable," Vecchiotti said. "We don't know if Meredith's DNA was on it or not."

When she was arrested in 2007, Knox was a University of Washington student spending a year in Perugia. Prosecutors said Kercher, a student at the University of Leeds, was killed during a drug-fueled sex game by Knox, her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito and Rudy Guede, an immigrant from Ivory Coast.

Piero Angeloni, head of the police forensic service, in a letter read to the court, defended evidence collection in the case.