(11 Jan 2001) Natural Sound
XFA
In their last chance to persuade a Scottish court that two Libyan suspects didn’t bomb Pan Am Flight 103, defence lawyers in the Lockerbie trial said on Thursday the evidence against their clients simply doesn’t add up.
Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah will face life sentences in a Scottish prison if found guilty of murdering 270 people in the December 21, 1988, downing of the jetliner.
They have denied the charges.
The defence in the Lockerbie case began its closing arguments after about eight months of hearings at a special Scottish courtroom in the Netherlands.
They said prosecutors had failed to prove the "guilt beyond a reasonable doubt" necessary for a conviction.
The suspects are Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah.
And they’re accused of bringing down Pan Am Flight 103 on December 21 1998 over Scotland.
Two hundred and 70 people were killed.
William Taylor, representing al-Megrahi, said even the prosecution’s best evidence fails to prove "he was involved in any criminal activity at all."
He attacked one of the most important links in the prosecution’s case – where the bomb originated – telling the judges that prosecutors "simply failed to prove that the bomb got onto the plane at Malta airport."
Prosecutors claim the defendants loaded a brown Samsonite suitcase carrying a rigged Toshiba cassette player onto a Pan Am feeder flight at Luka airport on the Mediterranean island.
They say the unaccompanied bag left the island, having been tagged for transfer at Frankfurt, Germany, before being loaded onto the doomed flight in London.
Taylor charged prosecutors with ignoring evidence that points away from the two accused and implicates Palestinian terrorists operating in Europe in the late 1980s.
Explosives, bomb-making parts and a Toshiba cassette recorder similar to the one carrying the Lockerbie bomb were found by German police during a raid of the Palestinian group’s hide-out near Frankfurt.
In concluding their case on Wednesday, prosecutors dropped charges of conspiracy and violation of air safety, leaving only the charge of murder, the most difficult to prove.
Prosecutors called 232 witnesses since May, and said on Wednesday that while they failed to produce a "smoking gun" they were confident of a conviction.
A Legal Expert from the University of Glasgow is watching the case closely.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
"Bill Taylor is not obliged to prove the innocence of his client he merely has to cast doubt on the prosecution case in reference to Palestinian terrorists in Germany having the motive, the means and by that he referred to luggage tags , to bomb making equipment and to timing devices he is suggesting that they could have been involved and that in fact there is no evidence to support that his client was involved."
SUPER CAPTION: Clare Connelly, Legal Expert, University of Glasgow
Jim Swire spoke for the Lockerbie Victim’s families following Taylors arguments in court.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
"I think one can look at what we’ve heard this morning in a way which suggests the gravest possible implications in terms of what Mr Taylor alleging. It is of course for the judges to decide how they will make use of what Mr Taylor has presented to the court this morning but I have a grave feeling of foreboding about the content of Mr Taylors evidence this morning. I think it is of extreme importance."
SUPER CAPTION: Jim Swire, Spokesman for Lockerbie Victims’ Families
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