SCCRC ruling now as effective as a review of Lady GaGa

... I noted this extraordinary claim:

"A Scottish Government spokesman said there was no doubt about the safety of Megrahi’s conviction."

The spokesman’s either uninformed or lying. No doubt? (...) A proclamation quite as bold as their’s, however, should send even the most epistemologically idle thinker into a fit of dubiety. The verdict was based on contradictions, bad procedure and very little evidence. Again, though, you don’t need to trust a cosmic schmuck like me – the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission ruled that its safety was just as doubtful as that of a clapped-out Reliant Robin. In laying claim to certitude, then, the spokesman showed lusty contempt for their state’s reviewal procedures. And, considering this largely ignored nugget o’news, why not?

"The Scottish government has been accused of using newly enacted (…) legislation to push through a law that will prevent supporters of the Lockerbie bomber from appealing his case.

"A clause buried in the emergency legislation that followed the British Supreme Court’s ruling on 'the Cadder case' allows High Court judges to have the final word on whether an appeal should be heard on their own ruling on a case."

In other words, if the Review Commission challenges a verdict they’re not mad-keen to revisit they can simply flick it aside and claim it’s "not in the interests of justice". They’re the judge, jury and while not quite executioner they are the appeals court. They’ve made an SCCRC ruling about as effective as a review of, say, Lady GaGa. It might provoke a few ripples on the internet but people, by and large, will act as if it never had been.

[From a recent post by bensix on his blog Back Towards The Locus.]