The Appeal - week 1a
The Lockerbie Bombing Trial
Start: 23/10/2002 *** Updated: 27. 10. 2002
This page will keep you informed about the first week (23.01-25.01) in the appeal of the Lockerbie Bombing Trial in Camp Zeist.
Latest and updated news at bottom of page.
Come and join the discussion: Was the verdict of the Lockerbie bombing trial unjust ?
What is going on inside and outside the court ? Is Al Megrahi going to win his appeal ?
Lockerbie Crisis Discussion Room - your opinion !
23/01/2002 AP/BBC (!), Reuters et. al
Appeal hearing started
Lawyers for a Abdel Baset Ali Al Megrahi appealed his conviction in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing and asked a Scottish court Wednesday to hear new testimony disputing when and where the lethal bomb was placed on board the Pan Am flight. At the opening of the hearing, defense attorney William Taylor said he wanted to call a witness to testify about a security breach at London's Heathrow Airport, challenging the conclusion that Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi had placed the bomb on a plane in Malta. The court indicated it might delay ruling on the defense request until hearing more of the evidence. Prosecutor Alan Turnbull said al-Megrahi's appeal was materially ``insufficient'' to overturn the conviction. The hearings could last several weeks.
The formal appeal note delivered by Alistair Duff from McCourts Solicitors
The hearing was the first time television cameras allowed inside a British courtroom.
Before the hearing, al-Megrahi's family walked to the courthouse carrying signs in English and Arabic expressing sympathy for the victims of the crash but calling for an acquittal. ``We sympathize with the families of the victims and feel their pain. We pray for justice to reveal the truth,'' one sign read. ``Father you are a kind man and that is why we love you. Kind people don't harm others. We believe in your innocence and hope the others do,'' said another held by his son, Muhammad. One stated: "Father, we pray for you. Every night we ask God to help you. It is cold here and we have plenty of homework. We are here for you."
Others proclaimed that "false judgment is the father of all sins" and that the appeal judges should "look solely with the fear of God to the truth which you shall seek with greatest diligence."
Website of International Movement to Free Abdelbaset Al-Megrahi Lawyers for al-Megrahi submitted the written grounds for the appeal in June, taking nearly five months to draft the legal reasoning to quash the case against their client. Their arguments were not made public until the appellate hearing began. Libyan attorney Ibrahim Legwell, advising the Scottish defense team, said he and al-Megrahi expect to overturn the conviction. ``He is fully confident he is innocent,'' Legwell told BBC television on Tuesday.
Inside the modern, wood-paneled courtroom, Megrahi was a picture of calm. Dressed in a beige and white waistcoat and white robe and wearing a dark red fez, he sat impassively throughout the hearing, flanked by two burly prison warders and listening to his lawyer's submissions via an Arabic translation headset. Entering the court for the three-hour morning session, Megrahi smiled and waved to relatives and supporters in the public gallery, separated from him by a bulletproof glass panel.
Beside them, in the space he occupied for much of the trial and where he collapsed when the verdict was pronounced, sat Jim Swire, the aging British medical doctor whose daughter Flora died in the blast.
BBC Comments (you need Real Player to listen to audio files)
Comment from BBC´s Shukman US victim´s stepmum Rosemary Wolfe comments on appeal hearings Libyen head of defence Ibrahim Legwell comments on appeal hearings ...more live BBC comments on Lockerbie appeal hearing To quash the conviction, Scottish law requires that the defense prove a ``miscarriage of justice'' or present significant new evidence that could not have been heard in the earlier trial. An eight-page summary of the appeal said the defense had obtained two affidavits from Raymond Walter Manly, a security guard at Heathrow, indicating that in the two hours before the ill-fated flight left London a padlock had been broken on a gate leading to the baggage area.
At the start of the hearing, the defence team issued a nine-page submission detailing their grounds for appeal. Mr Taylor told the five appeal judges he intended to show that the trial judges had effectively misdirected themselves as jurors and led to a miscarriage of justice. He said would be questioning the validity of parts of the written opinion and intended to bring fresh evidence which cast doubt on the conviction. Alan Turnbull QC, for the Crown, argued that the evidence was not sufficient to justify being heard in the appeal.
The defense said it had not been aware of Manly's evidence at the time of the trial. The guard gave his depositions last February and March, a few weeks after the Jan. 31 verdict. Police, who interviewed Manly after the bombing, apparently did not pursue the lead or share the information with prosecutors. The defense learned about him only after he was interviewed by the British press after the trial.
In a second argument, defense lawyers said the trial court ``ignored or failed to give proper regard'' to facts undermining the testimony of a shopkeeper from Malta who claimed al-Megrahi bought clothes in his store that were later identified as those used to pad the bomb inside the suitcase. In an 82-page ruling, the trial court accepted the prosecution's case that al-Megrahi was a senior figure in Libyan intelligence and had sent the bomb unaccompanied in a bag from Malta via Frankfurt and London. Defence lawyer William Taylor QC claimed that no "reasonable" jury would have found Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi guilty of the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing.
But the appeal argues the identification of al-Megrahi by the shopkeeper, Toni Gauci, was shaky and that the date of the purchase of the clothing was doubtful. Defence lawyers in the trial questioned the reliability of Mr Gauci's evidence and the panel of judges admitted he had not made an "absolutely positive" identification of al-Megrahi either in court or from photographs.
Unlike the main trial when the prosecution had to prove its case, the burden of proof is on the defense in the appeal. The prosecution, or Crown, need do nothing more than say that trial judges had come to the correct verdict.
The hearing was adjourned after a technical hitch (surprise !) meant the court was unable to resume for the afternoon proceedings. Court adjourned until Thursday January 24.
Submissions for Megrahi begin at Camp Zeist by The Lockerbie Trial briefing Unit / Glasgow University
The Lockerbie appeal started today at the Scottish Court at Camp Zeist. The grounds of appeal were made available to parties attending the court and these have been posted on this web site.In his opening submissions Bill Taylor, who is representing Megrahi, focussed on the approach that the appeal judges should adopt in reaching their decision in the appeal. A complex argument was presented to the court. Mr Taylor said that the grounds of appeal have identified misdirections that have resulted in a miscarriage of justice. He said that for the appeal to be successful it is necessary to show that the misdirection has contributed to the formation of the judgement of the court but it is not necessary to show that the misdirection is solely responsible for the verdict. He suggested to the court that a miscarriage of justice can arise if the decision of the trial judges failed to have regard to relevant evidence or had regard to irrelevant evidence.
These submissions reflect the fact that the Lockerbie trial was not like a standard criminal trial as there was no jury present and the verdict of the court was reached by the three judges. The judges issued a written verdict which gave some indication as to how they had reached that verdict. A written verdict or reasons explaining how the verdict has been reached is never provided in jury trials. Under Scottish law there are criminal trials where the juries are not present and the presiding judge delivers both the verdict on guilt or innocence and also passes sentence. These are called summary trials and they deal with less serious criminal charges. The fact that the decision was reached by the three judges means that the appeal process is more like an appeal from a summary trial. Bill Taylor has invited the judges to approach the appeal in this way. If this is accepted, the questions for the appeal judges are whether the trial judges misdirected themselves on a point of law and whether the inferences drawn were from an erroneous interpretation of the evidence.
Mr Taylor suggested that the question of the credibility and reliability of the evidence is open to the appeal court to consider if there has been a specific line of attack. He suggested that in an appeal from a trial where there was no jury present that it would be appropriate for the Appeal Court to interfere where the judge's account of the evidence is unsatisfactory. The court did not sit after a break for lunch due to technical difficulties with the stenographer's equipment. (end LTBU)
More reactions from relatives:
Time has done little to ease the pain of many people caught up in the 1988 Lockerbie disaster packed into a courtroom for the Lockerbie bomber's appeal against life imprisonment. It was not the first time some had sat in the special Scottish court set up at Camp Zeist. ``I never thought we'd be back here,'' said Susan Kosmoski from Michigan, who watched much of the initial 85-day trial which ended in January 2001 with the dramatic conviction of former Libyan secret agent Abdel Basset al-Megrahi. ``I didn't think it would be so emotional but it is,'' she told Reuters outside the court Wednesday, the first day of Megrahi's appeal.Kosmoski's husband Greg was one of the 259 people who died aboard the Pan Am jumbo jet which disintegrated into a ball of fire and twisted metal when a bomb in the hold exploded miles above the sleepy Scottish town of Lockerbie on December 21, 1988. A further 11 people on the ground died. ``It's bringing back everything we've been suffering for the last 13 years,'' Kosmoski said.
Standing in the rain outside the court at the former U.S. military base, Megrahi's children carried pictures of white doves and the message in Arabic: ``Dad, we're expecting you home.'' ``We sympathize with the families of the victims and feel their pain. We pray for justice to reveal the truth,'' read a placard waved by his brother-in-law Mohammed Magdami.
But for American relatives such as Kathy Tedeschi, whose husband Bill Daniels died in the atrocity, justice means Megrahi serving life. ``I watched most of the initial trial -- either in New York on the closed circuit television, or twice over here. I want to see justice done. I'm still sure he's guilty and I want to see him in jail and in Scotland,'' she said. Tedeschi said she had flown in specially from New Jersey to spend two weeks watching the appeal.
American Jack Flynn, who lost his 21-year-old son J.P. Flynn over Lockerbie, said he still believed in al-Megrahi's guilt. "I am fully convinced that Mr al-Megrahi is guilty," he told AFP. "I have read the verdict 20 times." He described the new evidence submitted by the defense as "insignificant." The families of British victims have been less adamant about his guilt, and are hoping the appeal will pave the way to an inquiry into who ordered the bombing.
For Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora died along with 269 others in the Lockerbie bombing, the appeal of the Libyan convicted of the mass murder marks just one more step forward in a 13-year quest for the truth. Far from bringing down the curtain on the tragic affair, Abdel Basset' s al-Megrahi's last ditch bid, starting on Wednesday, to clear his name should mark the start of a new chapter -- unravelling the ``why' ' of the December 21, 1988 crash over the Scottish town of Lockerbie. The ageing British doctor, who watched every day of the original trial and collapsed at its dramatic denouement last January, has campaigned tirelessly for a public inquiry into the motives for the bombing which sent shockwaves across the globe. And when the full legal process has run its course, Swire believes Britain can no longer muffle his cries.
``The end of the appeal marks the end of the government's excuse not to allow a full inquiry,'' said Swire, who has become the high profile voice of the families of the British victims. The September 11 hijacked airliner attacks on New York and Washington, and governments' rapid action against prime suspect Osama bin Laden, has only served to highlight Britain's ``cover-up mentality'' over Lockerbie, Swire told Reuters. ``The immediate response to September 11 was devastating military action against those alleged to have carried it out. After Lockerbie, there has still been no attempt whatsoever to uncover the motive for the bombing.''
Immediately after Megrahi's conviction and the release of his Libyan co-accused Al-Amin Khalifa Fahima, Scotland's top legal officer said it was clear the Libyan secret agent had not been acting alone. But Lockerbie's ``Mr Big'' -- be it an individual, an extremist organisation such as bin Laden's al Qaeda or a pariah state -- remains elusive and uninvestigated. ``Even if this guy (Megrahi) remains guilty, he is still just a minor executive in a broader plot,'' said Swire, whose theories point accusing fingers at Tehran and Damascus.
Swire believes Iran had a far stronger motive than Libya -- to avenge the U.S. shooting down six months earlier of an Iranian airbus, killing all 286 on board. The trial also failed to explain the bomber's use as detonator of an ``ice cube'' timer -- a relatively crude device which was being used in the late 1980s by Palestinian extremists with alleged links to Syria, Swire said. Swire added that whatever the outcome of the appeal, he believed the American victims' families would pursue their planned civil action against Libya, although the British would not necessarily follow suit. ``The British families will get dragged along on the coat-tails of a U.S. civil suit, but if Megrahi is found not guilty, we would not plan to have any involvement because Libya has not been implicated, '' Swire said.
More about Dr. Jim Swire
Appeal hearing continues - day 2
24/01/2002 AP/BBC (!), Reuters et. al
On the second day of the appeal hearing for Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, defense attorney William Taylor tried to persuade the five High Court judges to review the guilty verdict and order his immediate release.The Lockerbie appeal has heard that the trial judges who convicted a Libyan man of the bombing misunderstood and misinterpreted crucial evidence. Bill Taylor QC, for al-Megrahi, told the court on Thursday that new evidence had emerged in recent months that could "tear holes" in the trial judges' ruling.
A BBC correspondent at the court described the second day's proceedings as "pretty dry stuff". In one exchange, defence lawyer Bill Taylor QC was quoting from previous cases when one of the five appeal judges, Lord Cullen, said: "I fail to see the relevance of that." Mr Taylor replied tersely: "I'm coming to that." Lord Cullen responded: "I can't wait."
Taylor argued that the three trial judges misinterpreted evidence and failed to give enough weight to contradictions in the testimony of Maltese shopkeeper Toni Gauci, whose evidence provided the essential link between al-Megrahi and the explosives-packed suitcase. Taylor said the evaluation of the evidence by the three trial judges, who described him as a careful and reliable witness, led to a miscarriage of justice when they rendered their verdict last Jan. 31.
Taylor said the wide publication of al-Megrahi's photo in newspapers and the 12 year lapse between the trial and time of the purchase had biased the identification and rendered his testimony unreliable. The defense repeated Thursday that during a police interview Gauci had once mistaken al-Megrahi for a Palestinian terrorist, Mohammed Abu Talb, jailed in Sweden. Taylor said Gauci contradicted himself and presented inconsistencies which misled the initial judges in their findings.
"This was a finely-balanced, circumstantial case in which the trial court's misdirections...were sufficiently material to have occasioned a miscarriage of justice," said William Taylor for Megrahi, quoting copiously from an 82-page written judgement. Testimony on soccer matches, Christmas decorations and rainfall more than 13 years ago was combed in minute detail as Taylor argued that trial judges erred in the date they said Megrahi bought clothes to swaddle the bomb -- December 7, 1988. That was a crucial plank upon which Megrahi's conviction was founded. "If it's not December 7th, it can't be Megrahi," said Lockerbie expert John Grant, a Glasgow University law professor.
Megrahi's lawyers also say vital new evidence has emerged since the trial which undermines the original judges' acceptance that the bomb bag was loaded in Malta, from where it flew via Frankfurt to London Heathrow to be placed on Pan Am 103. They want to call former Heathrow security workers to testify that a padlock was forced on a secure door near a Heathrow baggage area hours before the jumbo jet was blown up.
Day 2 of the Lockerbie Appeal by The Lockerbie Trial briefing Unit / Glasgow University
Bill Taylor, Q.C., on behalf of the appellant Megrahi, continued his submissions relating to the role that the appeal court should adopt. He contended that the appeal is not for a review of the evidence but only to ascertain whether there has been a miscarriage of justice. He submitted that the appeal court must review if there are errors or misdirections on a material point that led the trial court to make a decision that is adverse to the appellant. Taylor submitted that if it was demonstrated that the trial court had misdirected itself on the material evidence or identification then that is a miscarriage of justice.The court did not rule on Taylor's submissions and he moved on to his first ground of appeal, the finding that the date of purchase of the clothing at Mary's House in Malta as 7 December 1988. This ground of appeal is, of course, linked to the second ground of appeal, the finding that the identity of the purchaser of this clothing was Megrahi. The focus was on the evidence given at trial by Tony Gauci, you owner of Mary's House. Taylor asserted that the trial court misdirected itself in inferring that, on the day of the purchase of the clothing, Tony Gauci's brother Paul was watching football on television. He claimed that the public holiday on 8 December, the weather and the existence of Christmas decorations pointed away from 7 December as the date of purchase, the only day in this period on which Megrahi had been proved to be in Malta. Taylor claimed that the failure to call Paul Gauci as a witness, despite the fact that he was on the Crown's witness list, was clearly a weakness in the Crown case. He referred to his submission made to the trial court on this point and submitted that the trial court should have said whether his submission weakened, undermined or did not affect the Crown case.
Paul Gauci was in court on the day that his brother gave evidence and was due to give evidence himself. Instead a joint minute was prepared by the Crown and defence which referred to Paul Gauci. Taylor's submission was that this joint minute had been misconstrued by the trial judges and he refuted that the terms of the minute agreed that Paul Gauci had been watching football on either 23 November or 7 December. It was submitted that this was a material piece of evidence and the misdirection by the judges, as to the terms of the minute, amounted to a miscarriage of justice.
Taylor then examined the evidence relating to the weather. During the trial a meteorologist had given evidence of the weather on both 23 November and 7 December. Taylor submitted that the court failed to take proper account of the meteorologist's evidence that there was 10% chance of rain between 6.30pm and 7.30pm on 7 December 1988 and that on 23rd November there was a light shower between 6.30pm and 7.30pm. Tony Gauci had given the evidence that the clothes were purchased from Mary's House in the early evening and that there had been rainfall on the day the clothes were purchased and the ground was damp. Mr Taylor submitted that the trial court had erred when it relied on evidence about the weather in concluding that the clothes were purchased on 7 December. He notes that whilst the court refer to the consistency of the evidence in supporting that the clothes were purchased on 7 December they fail to refer to other evidence which supports a conclusion that the clothes were purchased on 23 November which includes the weather, the date that Christmas decorations were hung and the date that Tony Gauci ordered pyjamas. He suggested that this is a material error which led to the court making a decision which was adverse to the appellant. (end LTBU)
Court adjourned
Judges, Lawyers Argue Over Lockerbie - day 3
25/01/2002 AP/BBC (!), Reuters et. al
On Appeals judges sparred with defense counsel Friday over crucial testimony that placed the Libyan convicted of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing (news - web sites) in Malta before the explosives were smuggled onto the Pan American airliner. It was the third day of the appeal by Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, 49, who was jailed for life one year ago for the attack that killed 259 people on board Pan Am flight 103 and 11 people in the Scottish town of Lockerbie.Presiding judge Lord Cullen upbraided defense attorney William Taylor for using ``strong language'' when the lawyer accused the the three-judge trial court of disregarding conflicting testimony by Tony Gauci, a Maltese shopkeeper. Taylor said the judges ignored in particular contradictions over when Gauci claimed al-Megrahi had bought clothing in his store. Shreds of the clothing were identified as being in the suitcase concealing the bomb. Gauci testified he sold the clothing about one week before the Dec. 21, 1988, attack, when al-Megrahi was known to be in Malta. It was the only witness account directly linking the former Libyan intelligence agent to the contents of the suitcase.
``One small error in a long trial might not have the effect of causing your Lordships to believe there has been a miscarriage of justice,'' said Megrahi's lawyer William Taylor.``But the concatenation of a series of errors -- each of which individually might be explicable -- might be such as to persuade your Lordships a miscarriage of justice has occurred,'' he said. Concatenation means a linked sequence. Taylor argues that the trial judges, who sat without a jury, ``misdirected themselves'' -- drew mistaken inferences -- to reach their guilty verdict. ``In my submissions I identify a series of errors large and small,'' he said on Friday.
Reading from the record of the nine-month trial, Taylor cited ambiguities in Gauci's account about the exact date when a man resembling al-Megrahi was in the shop, contradicting himself on whether Christmas decorations were already up. ``The court had a duty not only to record the contradictory piece of evidence, but also to give reasons as to why the other statements could be ignored,'' Taylor said, sharply criticizing the three judges who heard the case without a jury. He argued the shopkeeper's testimony was unreliable and should be discounted. Presiding judge Lord Cullen, reading from the 82-page verdict, reminded Taylor that the trial judges admitted Gauci was unclear about the timing, and chided Taylor several times for overly accusing the trial judges.
Christmas lights vital aspect
The trial judgement said Mr Gauci's evidence that the sale happened at about the time Christmas decorations were being put up on the island pointed to December 7 as being the date. That, combined with evidence that al-Megrahi was staying in Malta at the time and Mr Gauci identifying the Libyan as his customer, led the court to decide that the clothes which were later packed around the bomb were bought by al-Megrahi that day. But Mr Taylor said the trial judges had wrongly ignored the fact that Mr Gauci gave two different versions of the story in court. He said Mr Gauci initially said that the decorations had been put up, then "changed" his evidence to say that they were in the process of being put up.He also said that Mr Gauci had given a third version to police when they interviewed him in September 1989, when he said the decorations were not up. Mr Taylor said: "The court had a duty not only to record the contradictory piece of evidence, but also to give reasons as to why the other statements could be ignored. "There would only be consistency within these two pieces of evidence if it could have been established in the evidence that the Christmas decorations did go up about two weeks before Christmas. "The only information on the matter of when the Christmas decorations were put up is from Gauci himself. "His evidence about Christmas decorations therefore fell to be accorded very little weight."
Mr Gauci also told the original trial that he sold the clothes to al-Megrahi "about two weeks" before Christmas. But Mr Taylor argued that the trial judges failed to take into account his admission that he was better able to recall the date when he was interviewed by police 10 years earlier. Mr Taylor said Mr Gauci's failure to link the sale to a public holiday on 8 December should have been considered by the court as evidence that the clothes were unlikely to have been bought on 7 December. Mr Taylor said: "At no time during many police interviews did he mention that the day of the sale preceded a public holiday. That matter alone militates against December 7 1988 being the day of the sale."
Taylor acknowledged he may have ``overstated'' his case, but did not back down from his contention that the judges had erred. Taylor also questioned the credibility of Gauci's identification of al-Megrahi from a photograph he was shown more than two years after the purchase, which did not match the description of the buyer that he gave investigators earlier. The appeal is expected to last several weeks. In his opening statement on Wednesday, Taylor asked the court to hear new testimony suggesting the bomb could have been put aboard the plane in London's Heathrow Airport rather than in Malta.Some Lockerbie experts agree there are question marks over key parts of the judgement -- such as the issue of Gauci's evidence. ``The absolutely crucial findings are against the weight of evidence,'' Edinburgh University law professor Robert Black said.
Briton Jim Swire, whose daughter perished in the bombing, has missed little of the court proceedings since the original trial began in May 2000.``We've heard some very interesting arguments being put forward, but ultimately it's up to the judges to be convinced whether the verdict should stand or fall,'' Swire told reporters.
Judges took a more active role on Friday than during the first two days of the hearing, grilling Taylor on the finer points of his submissions in exchanges sometimes verging on the testy. ``They're making Taylor run the gauntlet,'' Glasgow University School of Law's Clare Connelly said. ``They're certainly putting him through the hoops.''
APPEAL CONTINUES Day 3 by The Lockerbie Trial briefing Unit / Glasgow University
At the start of the day Lord Osborne sought clarification from Mr Taylor on some of the submissions he made yesterday. Mr Taylor responded to these and told that court that he intended to show that the trial judges misconstrued some evidence, failed to deal with evidence that they should have and where they did deal with evidence, there were errors in this. He suggested that there were errors, which by themselves or in combination with others, produced a situation where a miscarriage of justice occured. He noted that whilst one small error may not on its own lead to that conclusion, that a series of errors may persuade the judges that a miscarriage of justice occurred. In response to the question by Lord Macfadyen, Mr Taylor confirmed that he would identify those errors which stand alone and those which are part of a series of errors.
Bill Taylor QC continued his submissions in respect of ground of appeal A1 to the five judges sitting in the Scottish Court in Camp Zeist. Ground A1 states that "The court erred in finding that the date of the purchase of the clothes from the shop at Mary´s House...Sliema, Malta was 7th December 1988". In the morning he focussed on references in Tony Gauci´s evidence that the clothing purchased from his shop ´Mary´s House´ in 1988 was around the time that Christmas decorations were put up in Sliema. This submission together with those heard in the last two days, which were about the weather on 23rd November and 7th December 1988 and Tony Gauci´s brother Paul, are relevant to the conclusion of the trial judges that the clothing that was contained in the suitcase that contained the bomb was purchased on 7 December 1988 from ´Mary´s House´ by Mr Megrahi. This date is of importance because whilst Mr Megrahi was in Malta on 7th December, he was not there on the 23rd November 1988. In concluding his submissions in respect of ground of appeal A1, Mr Taylor submitted that the trial court judges had materially misdirected themselves as to the date the clothing was purchased and that all the errors surrounding the evidence of the date of purchase relate to a crucial issue in the trial and all either individually or cumulatively have led to the court making an error.
For the remainder of the afternoon, Mr Taylor focussed on ground of appeal A2 that "the court concluded that Gauci´s evidence of identification by resemblance was reliable ´as far as it went´. In reaching that conclusion the court failed to have proper regard or to give proper weight..." to (certain) considerations which are listed. His argument is essentially that Mr Gauci´s evidence was not consistent. He referred to various examples of this including the identification of Mr Megrahi by Mr Gauci when he gave evidence during the trial. He submitted that no explanation was given as to whether Mr Gauci was making any allowance for the fact that 12 years have passed since the clothes were purchased and whether Mr Megrahi now looked like the man who had bought the clothes or that man 12 years older. He completed his submissions in respect of ground of appeal A2.
The matter of when the Crown would respond to the request that new evidence be heard was discussed. It appears that Mr Taylor will complete his submissions to the court and then the Crown will respond. Mr Turnbull indicated that the Crown would first respond to Mr Taylor´s initial submission regarding the approach the appeal judges should take in making their decision on the merits of the appeal. He said that thereafter rather than dealing with the first ground of appeal, the Crown would instead deal with the question of the new evidence that the defence wish to present to the court. It is already known that the Crown will object to this new evidence. Whilst they accept that it was not available during the trial they have stated in their skeleton arguments that it fails to meet the test of being prima facie of materiality.
The appeal continues on Monday when Mr Taylor will make his submissions in respect of the accuracy of the records from Frankfurt Airport and the inference drwan by the trial judges that the unaccompanied bag began its journey at Luqa airport. (end LTBU)
Court adjourned until Monday January 28, 2002 at 0900 hours