The procedural hearing that started today is not, after all, about the issue of disclosure of the mystery documents. It is about whether, as the Crown argues, Mr Megrahi’s new appeal should be limited solely to the grounds on which the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission referred his case back to the Criminal Appeal Court, or whether other issues can be ventilated as well. Existing appellate decisions in earlier cases have held that the grounds of appeal should not be limited to those issues accepted by the SCCRC. This is why the current procedural hearing is being heard by a bench of five judges: so that the earlier three-judge decisions can, if the court is so minded, be overruled.
According to Ronnie Clancy QC for the Crown, allowing the appeal to go beyond the specific matters on which the SCCRC referred the case back to the court would be “absurd” and “illogical”.
Brief accounts of today's proceedings can be found on the BBC News website and on the icDumfries website.
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