Lots of people know Amanda Knox’s story by now. She was an American studying the Italian language in the town of Perugia in Italy in 2007. Her roommate was found murdered and Knox and her then-boyfriend were arrested and convicted of the crime by Italian courts. When she appealed her case, Knox’s conviction was overturned and she was allowed to return to her home in Seattle after two years of imprisonment.
While Knox was going through her trial and in prison, the Italian newspapers trumpeted her guilt loudly, calling her “Foxy Knoxy” and insinuating that she and her boyfriend murdered her roommate during a sex game gone wrong. The Italian media painted her as a cheap and easy American, and this public perception of her was embraced by media outlets all over the world. There was nothing to prevent the American media from doing the same, especially the tabloids. Knox had some holes in her story that would have been all too easy to blow out of proportion and she could have been torn apart by the media. But one man helped to reshape the public opinion of Knox.
Three days after Amanda Knox was arrested, her family hired David Marriott to be Knox’s publicist. According to this article, Marriott reshaped the public opinion of Knox, turning her from a sex-crazed party girl into a young woman wrongfully imprisoned, afraid and alone. Thanks to Marriott, when Knox was finally freed she was embraced instead of reviled. Knox’s father Curt is quoted as saying that hiring Marriott “was one of the smartest things we ever did.” Now that Knox is free, Marriott is working with her and her family to secure interviews, book rights, and all of the other benefits of publicity.
As a PR student, this story holds a lot of interest for me. I look at Amanda Knox and then I look at someone like Casey Anthony and I wonder how things would be different if Anthony’s family had hired a publicist for her. We deal in public perception and it is fascinating to observe how the public attitude can be changed through the use of PR tactics. It was Marriott’s job to make Amanda Knox appear innocent and he did it to the best of his ability, though he later said “The British and Italian tabloids created this horrible person, and I felt it was our responsibility to tell the truth.” If Marriott hadn’t been hired, I believe it is safe to assume that Knox’s appeal may have turned out differently. Marriott was instrumental in giving the media the information about Knox’s innocence that they may not have received otherwise. He got Knox’s parents to give interviews about their little girl, putting a human element into an open-and-shut court case. He helped to rally her supporters and never gave up on her, even when she was found guilty.
David Marriott was a good publicist, and he did his job to the fullest.
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