By Breaking Celebrity News Staff

In a story reminiscent of the Amanda Knox saga, an American studying in Italy has been arrested in connection with attempted murder, accused of stabbing his roommate 25 times after a booze- and drug-addled Halloween night out.

Officials say student Reid Alexander Schepis, 20, stabbed then-sleeping pal Fabio Malpeso, 19, after a long night of partying at the Rome club, Atlantic. Both of the men are from New Jersey, and students at John Cabot University, a private American university in Rome.

Schepis told investigators he experimented with drugs -- specifically, ecstasy -- for the first time the night of the incident, mixing it with booze. He said he cannot remember what happened on the night of the stabbing, as authorities say he walked into the room Malpeso was sleeping in, and stabbed him over and over with a kitchen knife.

Vincenzo Comi, who is representing Schepis,