Suspect in British Student Murder: 'I Can Name Her Killer'

A suspect due to be extradited to Italy in connection with the murder of British student Meredith Kercher can identify her killer, his lawyer has said.

Rudy Hermann Guede, 20, is expected to be flown from Germany to Italy on Thursday after he was caught travelling on a tram without a ticket two weeks ago.

Police in Perugia investigating the death of Kercher, 21, know he had been at the scene because his bloodied fingerprint was found on a piece of toilet paper and a pillow.

"Rudy saw the killer and is capable of identifying him," said his lawyer Valter Biscotti, during an interview on Italian TV. "Rudy told me that he saw a man coming out of Meredith's bedroom, who was smaller than him.

"There was a struggle and he knows he was Italian. The man said to him in Italian: 'You're a black man, you will get the blame.'

"This person had a knife in his hand. Rudy tried to help Meredith but then he heard noises outside and fled.

"What we have to remember here is that Rudy is telling the truth, a difficult and uncomfortable truth but he is determined to come to Italy to tell the truth."

Mr Biscotti added: "Rudy's actions from the outside may seem unjustified but if you look inside you will see that he was in a very difficult situation.

"But he did get a towel and try and stop the blood from Meredith's wound before leaving the house."

Guede was meeting his father Roger in prison at Koblenz jail - their first meeting for four years.

Two other suspects, Meredith's housemate Amanda Knox and Knox's then boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito, are in custody in Italy in connection with the case.

Under Italian law, Knox and Sollecito could be held for up to a year and they have failed to persuade judges to free them on bail.

Lawyers for a third man, bar owner Diya Lumumba, have asked a prosecutor to clear him of suspicion because he maintains he was at his pub, not at the students' apartment, when Meredith was killed.

Earlier this week, Knox, 20, was reported to have changed her story, claiming Sollecito woke up in the middle of the night to attack her house-mate.

She accused Sollecito, 24, of sexually assaulting Miss Kercher, cutting her throat and then returning to plant the American's fingerprints on the knife used, the reports added.