Rafaelle Sollecito has always insisted that he and Amanda Knox were together the night that 21-year-old Meredith Kercher was brutally stabbed to death in Italy's Perugia.
"Ultimately Amanda was a stranger"
However now, seven years later, he has revealed that he is "not sure" whether he was with his ex-girlfriend the night Meredith was found stabbed to death in the cottage she shared with Knox.
Knox says she received a text, while at Sollecito's house, from her boss, telling her not to come to her job at a nightclub that night.
But phone records have shown the text was received on the road between hers and Sollecito's house.
READ: AMANDA KNOX DENIES SHE FOUGHT WITH MEREDITH KERCHER OVER MONEY ON NIGHT OF MURDER
Sollecito's phone and computer records show that he was at home that evening.
He said in Rome today: "I have always believed in the innocence of Amanda. But I have to react to the accusations of the court and to the text message.
"Either the court has made their umpteenth mistake or she lied to me."
He added: "I was in love with her and we had some very happy moments, but ultimately Amanda was a stranger.
"There are anomalies in her version of events. Against me there is nothing."
READ: EVERYTHING WE KNOW ABOUT AMANDA KNOX
"And in my case, I really did nothing wrong, and I don't want to pay for someone else's peculiar behaviour."
Lawyers speaking for the Italian said that when he had previously described being with Knox that day he “always meant he spent the night with Amanda”.
“But for the entire first part of the evening, they were not together. It’s this first part of the evening that’s new [to his defence],” his lawyer Giulia Bongiorno was reported as saying.
Sollecito nonetheless stressed that he is still convinced that Knox is also innocent. She is not in Italy, having remained in Seattle to avoid jail.
WATCH: AMANDA KNOX 'FACE OF AN ANGEL' MOVIE TRAILER IS RELEASED
Earlier this year the Florence court issued a 337-page document saying it was Knox who delivered the fatal knife blow to her 21-year-old roommate Kercher, adding that her wounds indicate multiple aggressors.
In its explanation the appeal court said that a third person convicted of the murder, Rudy Hermann Guede, did not act alone, and cited the nature of the victim's wounds, as well as finger imprints on her body indicating she had been restrained.**
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Guede was convicted in a separate trial of sexually assaulting and stabbing Ms Kercher. His 16-year sentence - reduced on appeal from 30 years - was upheld in 2010 by Italy's highest court, which also said he had not acted alone.