Lockerbie bomber has ‘slim chance’ of appeal victory

Lawyers for a former Libyan secret service agent today appealed to a Scottish court to overturn his conviction for the 1988 Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people, claiming to have new evidence proving a miscarriage of justice.

But trial watchers cautioned that Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi has ‘‘no more than a slim chance’’ of winning his appeal, because of the rigid legal standards applied by Scottish High Court judges during his initial trial that ended one year ago.

In opening remarks to the five appellate judges sitting in Camp Zeist, a former US military base in ther Netherlands, defence lawyer William Taylor laid out two lines of attack:

He contested testimony that linked al-Megrahi to the suitcase concealing the bomb, and sought to call a new witness to testify about a security breach at London’s Heathrow Airport, challenging the trial court’s conclusion that the suitcase originated in Malta.

Al-Megrahi, 49, was convicted a year ago and sentenced to life imprisonment for planting the bomb that blew Pan Am flight 103 from the sky on December 21, 1988, killing 259 passengers and crew and 11 people on the ground. He will be eligible for parole in 20 years.

A co-defendant, Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, was acquitted.

Mr Taylor argued that the three trial judges, who not only presided over the case but acted as jurors, failed to see the relevance of ‘‘significant’’ evidence and accepted unreliable facts when determining their verdict.

Glasgow University legal professor John Grant said the defence faces an uphill battle and estimated Al-Megrahi’s chances of acquittal as ‘‘not very good.’’

‘‘Three senior judges actually decided the case,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s hard to imagine that the judges could have miscarried justice so severely that they would prejudice Mr Megrahi’s case.’’

Unlike a jury of laymen who can easily misinterpret the law, professional judges are less likely to make mistakes or falter on technical grounds.

In the 82-page verdict last January, the judges said they found enough evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Al-Megrahi was the perpetrator of what was then the worst terrorist attack against the United States.

‘‘This is an appeal against the verdict of three High Court judges who were the finders of fact, as well as the arbiters of the law,’’ Taylor said. ‘‘Because we have reasons for the verdict in writing, this case is far removed from a jury verdict which is, by its nature and by law, inscrutable.’’

Prosecutor Alan Turnbull said al-Megrahi’s appeal was materially ‘‘insufficient’’ to overturn the conviction. And before new witnesses can be heard, the defence must convince the judges of their relevance and explain why their evidence was not presented during the original trial.

The appeal questioned the testimony of Toni Gauci, a Maltese shopkeeper who identified the al-Megrahi as having purchased clothing found in the Lockerbie wreckage which police said was used to pad the bomb inside the suitcase.

An eight-page summary of the appeal said the defence also had obtained two affidavits from Raymond Walter Manly, a security guard at Heathrow, indicating that some time in the two hours before the ill-fated flight left London a padlock had been broken on a gate leading to the baggage area.

The defence said it had not been aware of Manly’s evidence at the time of the trial. The guard gave his depositions last February and March several weeks after the verdict was rendered.

Al-Megrahi’s family demonstrated outside the court room before the start of hearings, calling on the court to ‘‘reveal the truth.’’ His children held signs in English and Arabic, voicing sympathy for the families of the victims and describing their father as a ‘‘kind man.’’

Some of the relatives of the Lockerbie victims - 179 of them Americans - attended Wednesday’s hearing. They have persistently objected that the investigation did not trace the bombers up the chain of command, and hold the Libyan government responsible.