In my opinion, these were two very naive young people caught in the crosshairs of the Italian legal system, still in a happy-go-lucky mode, and unable to take it at first the gravity of the charges laid against them.
Just as many naively assume the legal system seldom gets it wrong, Amanda probably naively assumed that the truth would sooner or later come out and she would be exonerated, yet she was repelled at the same time, and so she distanced herself from all these proceedings, trying to restore an atmosphere of normalcy. As she said herself, drastic things like this didn't ever happen in her life, so it was all a shock to her and she felt vulnerable and exposed, hence the natural need to turn to someone (who was in this case RS) for comfort and reassurance.
Effectively she was undergoing a culture shock, but didn't know it at the time. This happens to many young Americans abroad whose lives in America are typically quite different from their experiences outside America.
Her behavior was the product of all of this.
Just as many naively assume the legal system seldom gets it wrong, Amanda probably naively assumed that the truth would sooner or later come out and she would be exonerated, yet she was repelled at the same time, and so she distanced herself from all these proceedings, trying to restore an atmosphere of normalcy. As she said herself, drastic things like this didn't ever happen in her life, so it was all a shock to her and she felt vulnerable and exposed, hence the natural need to turn to someone (who was in this case RS) for comfort and reassurance.
Effectively she was undergoing a culture shock, but didn't know it at the time. This happens to many young Americans abroad whose lives in America are typically quite different from their experiences outside America.
Her behavior was the product of all of this.