[This is the headline over a report published (behind the paywall) in today’s edition of The Times. It adds nothing to what appears here and here, but I reproduce it (a) because it is The Times and (b) because it doesn’t emanate from Magnus Linklater:]
The father of a young woman killed in the Lockerbie disaster has said that a new film about the tragedy could help to aid justice more than 25 years on.
Jim Swire’s daughter, Flora, 23, died on December 21, 1988, when Pan Am flight 103 was destroyed over Lockerbie, killing 270 people. She had bought a last-minute ticket to spend Christmas in the US with her American boyfriend.
Dr Swire, 78, a veteran campaigner, said he hoped that the film, understood to be based on his fight for justice, could help “the truth to dawn” for the public over Britain’s worst terrorist attack.
Although details of the film are being kept under wraps, Jim Sheridan, the six-times Oscar-nominated director, is lined up to be the director.
Dr Swire said he hoped that the project would help to bring evidence into the public domain that he believes casts doubt over the conviction of Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi.
Dr Swire said: “The film is important because it brings into the public domain more of the truth about what really happened instead of a package of lies clearly supported by US sources. This may turn out to be the way by which the truth dawns for the general public.”
Kathy Tedeschi, whose husband, Bill Daniels, was a passenger, criticised the move. “There are too many people, like the FBI and Scotland Yard, who investigated this case, and I firmly believe they knew what they were doing and they got the right man,” she said.
Dr Swire and other relatives are to attend a meeting in Glasgow this week to decide when they will submit a request for a third appeal to overturn Megrahi’s conviction.
>> Kathy Tedeschi, whose husband, Bill Daniels, was a passenger, criticised the move. “There are too many people, like the FBI and Scotland Yard, who investigated this case, and I firmly believe they knew what they were doing and they got the right man,” she said. <<
ReplyDeleteIt is easy to sympathize with Ms. Tedeschi's loss.
It is harder to understand why she shows so little interest in gaining information about the circumstances, given the fact that you can hardly google Lockerbie without running into texts that raise doubt, with numerous unanswered questions.
Maybe she forgot to add
"I also believe, that what I read in the press will always be sufficient as my source of knowledge".
It's also a bit of an exaggeration to say that Scotland Yard "investigated" the Lockerbie case. By many accounts they blundered into Lockerbie, behaved like flash gits for a while and went home again. They then failed to do much at all about the Heathrow break-in; and did almost nothing about the emerging fact that the suitcase containing the bomb was loaded at Heathrow and NOT at Malta or Frankfurt. Not much investigating there.
ReplyDeleteApparently there was a Met investigation at Heathrow, but I don't know what was investigated. Clearly they paid no attention to Manly's evidence, and they certainly didn't investigate the provenance of the Bedford suitcase.
ReplyDeleteIt may have concentrated on the Heathrow check-in passengers - I really don't know. It didn't rate a mention at Zeist.