Amanda Knox working as freelance reporter for local newspaper

Amanda Knox, who is currently appealing against her conviction for the murder of British student Meredith Kercher, is working as a freelance reporter for a local newspaper.

Knox, 27, was reconvicted in January of the murder of her former housemate, who was found dead at a house in Perugia, Italy in 2007.

Knox has been working at the West Seattle Herald for the last few months, according to the paper's website editor Patrick Robinson.

Mr Robinson said Knox, who he described as a "very bright, very capable, highly qualified writer", was approached to "give her the opportunity of a normal life”.

She used a pen name to begin with, but switched to using her real name after she "got her feet wet", Robinson told the Daily Beast.

Among her work is a preview of a local high school's production of Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

He insisted that her notorious past had nothing to with the decision to hire her.

“It doesn’t matter what people say or think - the truth is that she’s a West Seattle resident, she grew up here.

"Why not give her the opportunity to be an actual human being versus a celebrity?"

Knox and her Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito were found guilty of Ms Kercher's murder in 2009, but were acquitted in 2011.

An Italian court reinstated the guilty verdicts on January 31, and sentenced Knox to more than 28 years in prison.

Knox, who has consistently maintained her innocence, remains in the US while the case is appealed.