Hayden Panettiere will play Amanda Knox for Lifetime flick

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Following a role in fictional slasher flick ‘Scream 4,’ Hayden Panettiere will next star in a real-life horror story.

The young blond, left, has been cast as Amanda Knox, right, the American college student convicted of murdering her roommate while studying abroad in Italy, in an original movie for Lifetime Television.

‘The Amanda Knox Story’ will hit the cable station in mid-2011, directed by Robert Dornhelm, who has headed biopics on the likes of Anne Frank and Rudy Giuliani.

The Knox case was a cable news sensation in the U.S., beginning November 2007 in the university town of Perugia, Italy, when Knox’s roommate Meredith Kercher was found dead, choked and stabbed with signs of sexual assault prior to her demise.

The resulting trial scandalized the town and inspired a wave of American pundit support for Knox, who became tabloid fodder for her oft-bizarre courtroom behavior. (International media described ...

... her as remorseless and emotionally disconnected from the tragedy.) Knox maintained she was innocent. In December 2009, Knox was convicted and sentenced to 26 years in prison. Appeals were filed in April 2010.

Will you watch ‘The Amanda Knox Story’? Sound off in the comments section below.

-- Matt Donnelly
Twitter.com/MattDonnelly

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