New documents shed further doubt over the evidence used to convict a Libyan man for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie Scotland, on December 21, 1988.
Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, who was convicted in 2001 and released on bizarre “compassionate grounds” in 2009 amidst rumors of oil deals, was the only person to serve prison time for the crime.
This new evidence and a review of the case makes it almost certain he was innocent.
Among the wreckage of the plane, which was carrying mainly US and UK passengers on route to JFK International, were small fragments of a circuit-board alleged to be part of the bomb’s timer, which were found in a wooded area many miles from the immediate scene. The prosecution, using supposed CIA and FBI experts, asserted that the fragment examined was an exact match of a series of Timer’s sold to the Libyan Government. However newly released documents have revealed that the fragment was actually quite different. Instead of the tin and lead compound found on the Libyan circuit-boards, the fragment contained “pure tin”. It was not an exact match.
The evidence was discovered by a British Ministry of Defence scientist, but was never passed on to Megrahi’s lawyers, implying that the Libyan had been deliberately set-up.
In response to the new findings an MOD spokesperson told Al Jazeera that the board was likely modified before use, and this explains the difference. However this was never explored in the trial or backed up by any independent analysis.
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Evidence of a set-up:
This is not the first claim that the circuit-board evidence was fraudulent. Even the UK Guardian reported in 2007 that the fragment was a probable fake. This however didn’t stop the mainstream media invoking Lockerbie to win public support for the disastrous campaign against Gaddafi in 2011.
Edwin Bollier the now elderly former owner of the company that created the Timers, told the Guardian:
“Two years before Lockerbie, we sold 20 MST-13 timers to the Libyan military. FBI agents and the Scottish investigators said one of those timers had been used to detonate the bomb.”
He became a defence witness because of unease about the fragments he was shown. They did not match the circuit-boards his company produced.
“I was shown fragments of a brown circuit board which matched our prototype. But when the MST-13 went into production, the timers contained green boards. I knew that the timers sold to Libya had green boards.”
He further claims during the trial that the evidence had been tampered with.
“…the trial was so skewed to prove Libyan involvement that the details of what I had to say was ignored. A photograph of the fragments was produced in court and I asked to see the pieces again. When they were brought to me, they were practically carbonised. They had been tampered with since I had seen them in Dumfries.”
The Star Witness:
The prosecution’s star witness at the trial was a man named Tony Gauci, a shop owner from Malta. He identified Megrahi as a man who had bought clothing and an umbrella from him on December 7, 1988 – remnants of which were later recovered from debris at the scene.
The 2007 Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission (SCCRC) investigation, which has almost been completely ignored by the media, supported an appeal by Megrahi, citing Gauci’s testimony as unreliable. It was established that the only date Megrahi could have purchased the clothes was on December 7, but they determined that there was “no reasonable basis in the trial court’s judgment for its conclusion that the purchase of the items from Mary’s House, took place” on that day. .....read more
http://wideshut.co.uk/lockerbie-bomber-hypocrisy-and-conspiracy/
