“Oliver Cromwell died in 1658. His body was exhumed in 1661 to be hanged in chains. Later, he was decapitated and his head was displayed on a pole outside Westminster Hall until 1685. There is a pole waiting for Megrahi’s head.”
INTEL TODAY (March 16 2020)
March 11 2020 — Glasgow (14:00) — The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission [SCCRC] has decided to refer the Lockerbie case back to the High Court of Justiciary for determination. As a result of the Commission’s decision, Mr Megrahi’s family is now entitled to instruct an appeal against his conviction Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY
RELATED POST: LOCKERBIE 30th Anniversary — PT/35(b) : An Overview of the Lockerbie Case
RELATED POST: Lockerbie 30th Anniversary — What do you think about the Lockerbie verdict? [Poll Result – December 21 2018]
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Lockerbie — Three Decades of Lies: J’Accuse…!
QUICK NOTES — To make it easier for the readers to retrieve various chapters of my book, I have created a special page “Lockerbie” where all the links to the chapters will be listed with a brief description. You can access that page directly as it appears at the far right of the top bar of this blog.
Lockerbie — Three Decades of Lies: J’Accuse…!
“More than 31 years after the atrocity the Government’s documents relating to it are still being sequestered in a special category of security in the National Archives where they are not accessible to requests under FOI nor from the media. Why would they do that? Government in secrecy is not democracy, any more than justice delayed is justice. Let us make the clearing up of these cruel mysteries our vision for 2020.”
Dr Jim Swire — Open Letter (The Herald – January 1st 2020)
UPDATE (March 11 2021) — Just a few days after the SCCRC decided to refer the Lockerbie case back to the High Court, I made it clear that it was not about to go well.
RELATED POST: Lockerbie — Diabolical Endgame [Part I : SCCRC & The Grounds of Appeal]
RELATED POST: Lockerbie Third Appeal — Day 1 (November 24 2020)
RELATED POST: Lockerbie Third Appeal — Day 2 (November 25 2020)
RELATED POST: Lockerbie Third Appeal — Day 3 (November 26 2020)
Here is what I wrote on March 16 2020.
One would conclude from the SCCCRC statement that the acquittal of Megrahi is a foregone conclusion. One would be wrong.
Again read carefully the statement:
“Because the court’s specific conclusion that he was the purchaser was integral to the court’s ultimate conclusion that he was guilty of the murders libelled, the Commission believes that, notwithstanding that the remaining chapters of evidence pointed to the involvement of operators of the Libyan state in the execution of the crime, a miscarriage of justice may have occurred because no reasonable trial court, relying on the evidence led at trial, could have held the case against Mr Megrahi was proved beyond reasonable doubt.”
In other words, the SCCRC has already narrowed the debate to a range from which any discussion regarding the truth about Lockerbie is rigorously excluded.
Libya is responsible for Lockerbie. End of the story. All that is left for the Appeal Court to debate is whether Megrahi or another Libyan terrorist is responsible for the crime.
And even that fight could be tricky… Megrahi may not be the purchaser, but he could very well be the mastermind of the attack.
On January 15 2021, Lord Carloway — The Lord Justice General in the appeal — delivered the opinion of the Scottish Appeal Court. The decision is available online. Without surprise to the readers of this blog, the Court has upheld the verdict of the trial court.
RELATED POST: Lockerbie Third Appeal — Judges uphold guilty verdict
Although Intel Today had long predicted the outcome of this third appeal, the judges have nevertheless found a way to amuse me.
In January 2001, the three Lockerbie judges wrote [Court Opinion] :
[1] At 1903 hours on 22 December 1988 Pan Am flight 103 fell out of the sky. The 259 passengers and crew members who were on board and 11 residents of Lockerbie where the debris fell were killed. The Crown case is that the cause of the disaster was that an explosive device had been introduced into the hold of the aircraft by the two accused whether acting alone or in concert with each other and others.
[2] It is not disputed, and was amply proved, that the cause of the disaster was indeed the explosion of a device within the aircraft. Nor is it disputed that the person or persons who were responsible for the deliberate introduction of the explosive device would be guilty of the crime of murder.
Twenty years later… Posted on the official website “Judiciary of Scotland” on January 15 2021 , the first sentence of the Megrahi decision summary reads:
“Mr Megrahi was convicted in January, 2001 of the murders of 270 people after a bomb was planted on a passenger plane which flew from London to New York. The plane disintegrated over the town of Lockerbie on 22 December 1988.”
On November 2 2016, the UK Government [Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS)] decided to withhold all Lockerbie air accident investigation reports [dating from 1990 Jan 01 to 1992 Dec 31] until at least 2026, and possibly indefinitely.
The last chapter of my book begins with this sentence:
“Pan Am Flight 103 disintegrated in flight over Lockerbie on December 21 1988 — not December 22 — because of a massive structural failure due to well-known issues of metal fatigue in section 41 and 42 of the Boeing 747, not because of an explosive device.”
I have always known that I would have to be patient and wait at least until 2026 to prove that no bomb was involved in the disintegration of Pan Am Flight 103.
But surely, after one trial, two decisions by the SCCRC and three appeals, the judges could at least agree on the correct date of this tragedy. Is it too much to ask?
END of UPDATE
“On March 11 2020, the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission [SCCRC] decided to refer the Lockerbie case back to the High Court of Justiciary for determination.
As a result of the Commission’s decision, Mr. Megrahi’s family was therefore entitled to instruct an appeal against his conviction. To many observers, the SCCRC decision marks the beginning of Justice. I am afraid that I share neither their joy, nor their hopes.
The Devil is in the detail. And a careful reading of the SCCRC statement of reasons indicates that all hopes of Justice have already been annihilated.”
Lockerbie — Three Decades of Lies: J’Accuse…!
Chapter IX – Diabolical Endgame
On December 21 1988, Pan Am flight 103 fell out of the sky. All 259 passengers and crew members died. Eleven residents of Lockerbie were killed.
Eleven thousand four hundred and three days later, the SCCRC came to the conclusion that Abdelbaset al-Megrahi — the only man ever convicted of the worst terrorist attack in UK history — may have been innocent.
In the meanwhile, Saturn went for a full orbit around our Sun and my heart has beaten approximately about a billion times. In this universe, we all move at our own pace.
“The wheels of justice turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine.”
How many more years will it take for Justice to acknowledge that Megrahi was innocent?
And when, if ever, will Justice finally address the obvious question: Who did it?
Short answer: probably never.
I will discuss later the decision of the SCCRC to exclude most grounds for appeal. But I can say today that the SCCRC decision is worse than the Lockerbie verdict. Shame on you!
PS — We are glad to report that most Intel Today readers (89%) believe that the Lockerbie verdict is a spectacular miscarriage of justice.
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REFERENCES
On July 4 2017, the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission confirmed that it has received a new application to review the conviction in the case of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al-Megrahi.
On May 3 2018, SCCRC chief executive Gerard Sinclair stated that “the (SCCRC) commission has decided that it is in the interests of justice to accept the current application for a full review of his conviction.”
January 2 2020 — Intel Today:
“In a recent document (dated December 9 2019) seen by Intel Today, Gerard Sinclair — the Chief Executive of the SCCRC [Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission] — states that he is hopeful that a final decision will be reached before the end of this financial year, which is the end of March 2020.
Intel Today is reasonably confident there that the SCCRC will find that there may have been a miscarriage of justice, for the six reasons specified by their predecessors in 2007 and also on at least some of the further additional grounds advanced since then.”
To mark the 30th Anniversary of the Pan Am 103 tragedy, INTEL TODAY ran a series of articles regarding the key piece of evidence — known as PT/35(b) — linking Lockerbie to Libya.
RELATED POST: LOCKERBIE 30th Anniversary — PT/35(b) : “A RIDDLE, WRAPPED IN A MYSTERY, INSIDE AN ENIGMA.”
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RELATED POST: Lockerbie 30th Anniversary — PT/35(b) : The Most Expensive Forgery in History
RELATED POST: Lockerbie 30th Anniversary — PT/35(b) : How was the Lockerbie Key Evidence Forged?
RELATED POST: Lockerbie 30th Anniversary — PT/35(b) : When Was the Lockerbie Key Evidence Forged?
RELATED POST: Lockerbie 30th Anniversary — PT/35(b) : Who Made the Most Expensive Forgery in History? And Why?
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Lockerbie — SCCRC Refers Case Back to Court
One Year Ago — Lockerbie : SCCRC Refers Case Back to Court [March 11 2020]
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