To no one’s great surprise, 22-year-old Amanda Knox has been convicted of all charges against her, including murder. She has been sentenced to 26 years in prison and she’ll have to pay millions of dollars in damages to the victim’s family.

Why no surprise in this verdict? For any number of reasons.

For starters, the Italian justice system isn’t quite like ours. The jury is permitted to read news reporters and blog postings outside the trial. They did just that. They’re also allowed to find defendants guilty even with reasonable doubt. In Italy, you’re considered guilty until proven innocent.

Then there’s the facts brought forth by the Vanity Fair reporter on CNN.

The town and its prosecutor simply didn’t like Knox from the get-go. There was applause for the prosecution outside the courthouse when the verdict was announced. The town has drug problems and Knox allegedly smoked marijuana. It was apparently known that the locals didn’t like her.

The prosector, under investigation himself for obstruction of justice, brought up her sex life that he didn’t approve of during the trial. The same prosecutor previously threw a journalist in prison for months for alleging he acted improperly.

Finally, the atmosphere was actively made biased against her. Media outlets repeatedly played recordings of Knox buying panties with her boyfriend, which is apparently unacceptable to the local culture. Her confessions of “wild sex” was also used against her.

So, as I said, no surprise. God himself could’ve come down and asserted Knox is innocent. She still would’ve been found guilty.