Friday 15 December 2017

Megrahi petition again on Scottish Parliament Justice Committee agenda

Justice for Megrahi’s petition (PE1370) calling on the Scottish Government to set up an independent inquiry into the conviction of Abdelbaset Megrahi features on the agenda for the meeting of the Scottish Parliament’s Justice Committee to be held on Tuesday 19 December 2017 at 10.00 in Holyrood Committee Room 2. The agenda and accompanying papers can be accessed here. The two documents submitted by Justice for Megrahi for this meeting appear among the papers as Annexe A and Annexe B.

Annexe A reads as follows:

Introduction
As you are aware the above petition has been kept open by the Justice Committee
since 8 November 2011 to allow various developments related to the Lockerbie
case to be monitored by the Committee.

The Committee last considered the petition at its meeting on 5 September 2017,
when it agreed to keep the petition open pending the completion of Operation
Sandwood.

In this submission JFM wishes to bring the committee’s attention to matters which
have developed since the petition was last considered.

Developments
Operation Sandwood: JfM has continued to co-operate fully with Police Scotland
and had a further process meeting with them in October. Another meeting is
planned for 15th December.

Our understanding is that in respect of Operation Sandwood, the main enquiry
is completed and essential forensic reports received. It is anticipated the final
report will shortly be passed to Police Scotland’s independent QC as a preliminary
to its being submitted to Crown Office.

We continue to have complete faith in the police to deliver a thorough and
objective report and in particular value the close liaison they have encouraged
as their investigation proceeded.

Crown Office Consideration of Police Report: As previous correspondence with the
Committee shows we continue to have concerns about the objectivity and
independence of Crown Office personnel who will consider the Operation
Sandwood report.

While acknowledging the appointment of James Wolffe QC as Lord Advocate,
we would ask the committee to note that when the Police report is received by
Crown Office, it must be subject to objective, unbiased and independent
consideration.

It remains essential that the ongoing political scrutiny of the process by the
Justice Committee continues and does not stop when the report goes to Crown
Office. It is in the public interest that political monitoring continues while Crown
Office considers the Operation Sandwood report and makes its final conclusions
public.

Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC): We understand that
an application for another appeal has been made to the SCCRC by Mr Megrahi’s
family.  We are not aware of the details of their submission but believe that
the findings of the Operation Sandwood report will be critical to the appeal
consideration.

Conclusion
We believe that the political oversight being provided by the Justice Committee
into this major criminal investigation is very much in the public interest. Having
monitored the progress of the police investigations for nearly 4 years it is essential
that Crown Office, an organisation that has shown provable bias in the past, is
held to political account to ensure the openness and objectivity of its consideration
and the probity of its eventual decision.

Given the central importance of the findings of Operation Sandwood to any future
prosecutions, enquiries or appeals, we would respectfully urge the Committee
to allow Petition PE1370 to remain on the table.

8 comments:

  1. contact the Trump administration

    1) Hillary was involved with US victims and pointed to Libya. Trump wants Iran

    2) weeks after Muller resigned, he got paid a lot of money in lieu of a kickback
    to visit Libya decades later to look for evidence on Lockerbie. This is normal.
    Blair got a 1/2 million dollar speaking engagement days after he resigned in June 2005 in LA and has been get money ever since. Blair and his wife even got money from convicted felons Milken in speeches for over a million dollars.

    You say you want a new trial. Do not rely on a system that failed you


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  2. Who does Megrahi believe did it?

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    Replies
    1. How would he know, any more than the rest of us?

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  3. Not necessarily related to the petition but i'm currently reading Kenny MacAskills book
    On page 116 while discussing the meteorological evidence he states

    "Meteorological evidence was led for the period 7/8 December and 23/24 November. The latter period had light intermittent rain at Luqa airport and the weather in Sliema, where Gauccis shop was located was very likely to have been the same. On 7th December there had been a trace of rain at Luqa airport at 9am, but no rain was recorded later that day"

    He goes on to say of the meteorologist "He was asked if there was any likelihood of rain there between six and seven in the evening. His response was that it was 90% that there wouldn't have been".

    Am I correct in thinking that he got this back to front? I thought the weather for the 23rd was rain not the 7th? hopefully Rolfe or someone else knowledgeable can confirm if that's correct.

    Now surely as justice secretary he should know exactly the evidence. more importantly in years to come, as he's expected to be an authority will this glaring error become the truth.
    can someone clarify please?

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    Replies
    1. The evidence at the trial was that there had been rain at the relevant time on 23 November, but 90% probability of no rain at all on 7 December. The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, largely on the basis of this evidence, found that no reasonable court could have concluded that purchase date was 7 December.

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    2. As the professor says, he does seem to have got that the wrong way round. Not a stickler for accuracy is our Kenny.

      He refused point blank to read my book. I think he prefers to remain in ignorance.

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  4. Whether raining or not a shopkeeper would not be able to recognise the nondescript burnt offerings shown, let alone identify them as specific items sold to a specific person on a specific day.

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    Replies
    1. That's not what happened. The brown checked trousers had a serial number on them and were a part of a small production run which made them uniquely identifiable. They were identified by the manufacturer as having been supplied to the Gauci shop on (I think) 18th November 1988. Gauci remembered selling them, together with other items, to a particular customer. Items found blast-damaged fitted the description of other items sold at the same time.

      Not all of these items were badly damaged or could be described as burnt offerings. But in any case they were never shown to Tony. It simply didn't happen that way. I think it's important to criticise what actually happened, not to invent things that didn't happen and criticise these.

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