The man found guilty of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing suffered a miscarriage of justice, his lawyers claimed yesterday as the appeal by the former Libyan secret agent against his conviction opened.
Abdel Basset al-Megrahi (49) was jailed for life a year ago for killing 270 people with a bomb that blew up New York-bound Pan Am Flight 103 and rained debris on Lockerbie village in Scotland.
"If there has been a miscarriage of justice, the proper course is to quash the conviction and for your lordships to consider whether a retrial is appropriate," Mr William Taylor told Scottish judges.
The venue, as for the nine-month trial, was a former US airbase in the Netherlands, pressed into service to overcome Libyan objections to a trial in Britain.
Megrahi's counsel zeroed in on two key areas - trial evidence by a Maltese shopowner who said he sold the Libyan the clothes used to swaddle the bomb, and the trial judges' acceptance that the unaccompanied suitcase was loaded in Malta on a flight to Frankfurt, from where it went to London Heathrow to join Pan Am 103.
"There exists significant evidence which was not heard at the trial," lawyers wrote in their grounds of appeal, citing evidence that a padlock was forced on a secure door near a Heathrow baggage area hours before the jumbo jet fell from the sky.
"Had (this) evidence been available at the trial it would have supported the body of evidence suggestive of the bomb having been infiltrated at Heathrow," the appeal grounds said.
They referred to Mr Raymond Manly, a former Heathrow security guard, whose evidence lawyers learned of only after Megrahi was jailed and Mr Al-Amin Khalifa Fahima, was acquitted.
Lawyers claimed the trial judges had drawn wrong conclusions from evidence by Mr Tony Gauci, who identified Megrahi as the purchaser of clothes and an umbrella packed in the suitcase with the bomb. They said the court erred in finding that the items were bought on December 7th, 1988.
Megrahi sat listening calmly through headphones to an Arabic translation of Mr Taylor's complex arguments that the Lockerbie appeal had little precedent in Scottish law. A technical hitch meant the appeal adjourned at lunchtime until today.
Some bereaved relatives of passengers on the doomed jet from the US and Britain attended the hearing. Megrahi's relatives waved placards outside before the session began. One read: "We sympathise with the families of the victims and feel their pain. We pray for justice to reveal the truth."
Ms Kathy Tedeschi of New Jersey, who was widowed in the blast, said: "I want to see justice done. I still feel sure Megrahi is guilty and I want to see him in jail in Scotland."
USA Today yesterday cited senior US officials as saying Washington and Tripoli were close to a deal take Libya off the US list of terror sponsors if it paid up to $6 billion in compensation for the bombing.
It quoted an official as saying Libya - on the list since 1979 - understood the need to accept responsibility for the bombing. Libyan officials said a deal with the US would not be struck until after the appeal. - (Reuters)