The media hype surrounding the murder here of a British exchange student has tarnished the image of this central Italian city, local groups complained on Wednesday.
According to five associations representing artisans, retailers, farmers, businessmen and industrialists, the image of this medieval city has been ''devastated and degraded'' by the national and international media coverage of the death of 22-year-old Meredith Kercher just over a month ago.
''The portrait painted of our city is totally wrong and in no way reflects the reality here,'' the groups said in a joint statement.
Perugia, they observed, ''is an attractive and hospitable city, with two important universities and a dynamic business community which produces excellence even on a national level''.
''It is an important center for the economy of the region of Umbria, attracting growing numbers of tourists. Perugia has a strong cultural heritage with a great architectural and artistic patrimony,'' they added.
For this reason, the groups said they could ''not accept such a devastating image given of the city'' by the media and were ready to ally with local institutions ''in any and all initiatives aimed at restoring a positive view of the city which is more aligned with the reality here, and not the devastating and degrading picture which has too often been presented by the media''.
Kercher was found November 2 with her throat slashed in the house she shared in Perugia with three other girls.
Police later arrested Kercher's 20-year-old American roommate Amanda Marie Knox, the roommate's 24-year-old Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito and Democratic Republic of Congo national Diya 'Patrick' Lumumba, 38, on suspicion of murder.
Lumumba, a long-time Perugia resident and pub operator, was released for lack of evidence last week.
His release coincided with the arrest of a fourth suspect in Germany, 21-year-old Ivory Coast national Rudy Hermann Guede, whose DNA had been found at the scene of the crime and on the victim.
A German court on Monday gave its green light to Guede's extradition to Italy and his is expected to arrive later this week.
Last week a preliminary hearings judge denied requests from Knox and Sollecito to be released on bail and ordered that they stay in custody pending their trial.
The motivations for the ruling were made public on Wednesday and gave an insight into the dynamics of the murder, the evidence against the suspects and a portrait of their personalities.
Based on the evidence gathered, the court concluded that Kercher was killed by two or more people, that she knew her killers, that she was held by force while being stabbed several times, once fatally.
Knox was defined as having a ''multi-level personality'' and being ''self-possessed, shrewd, cunning and, at the same time, naive''.
She was also said to have no inhibitions and subject to any impulse, ''even those which could lead to uncontrolled and violent behavior''.
Investigators said Sollecito was ''attracted to violence'' with a ''complex and in certain respects disturbing personality''.
His alibi was dismissed as ''highly unlikely'' because ''irrefutable tests'' on his computer showed that was not working on his thesis in the hours before and after the murder, as he maintains.
In related developments, Guede told his father in a meeting on Tuesday that he saw Meredith's murderer and that someone else was also there in the house.
According to the Ivory Coast national, the assailant was white and they scuffled before the the murderer fled, shouting to the other person that ''I found that black guy, they'll blame him!''.
''I was so frightened that I ran away,'' Guede told his father.
