Kercher lawyer: Knox presence at law panel "inappropriate"

Amanda Knox and her fiancee Christopher Robinson attend a conference during a Criminal Justice Festival at the University of Modena, Italy, Friday, June, 2019. Knox, a former American exchange student who became the focus of a sensational murder case, arrived in Italy Thursday for the first time since an appeals court acquitted her in 2011 in the slaying of her British roommate. (Elisabetta Baracchi/ANSA via AP)

Amanda Knox attends a cocktail for the opening of the Innocence Project conference, in Modena, Italy, Thursday, June 13, 2019. Knox has returned to Italy for the first time since she was convicted and imprisoned but ultimately acquitted, for the murder and sexual assault of her British roommate Meredith Kercher in the university town of Perugia in 2007. Knox is in Italy to attend a conference in Modena organized by the Italy Innocence Project, which seeks to help people who have been convicted for crimes they did not commit. In the background at left wearing a hat is her boyfriend Christopher Robinson. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

The lawyer of the family of slain British student Meredith Kercher has described Amanda Knox's invitation to the Italian Criminal Justice Festival as "inappropriate."

Knox, a former American exchange student who became the focus of a sensational murder case, arrived Thursday in Italy for the first time since an appeals court acquitted her in 2011 in the slaying of Kercher, her roommate.

Knox is on a panel discussion Saturday titled "Trial by media" in the northern city of Modena.

Lawyer Francesco Maresca told The Associated Press on Friday that "inviting her to a technical panel on justice was a mistake." He says "lawyers for both parts should have been involved."

Knox's 2011 acquittal was part of a long legal process that saw multiple flip-flop rulings before she was definitively acquitted in 2015 by Italy's highest court.