BBC report questions Lockerbie evidence
19 Aug 05
Quashed convictions raise doubts over expert's evidence at Lockerbie trial
The testimony of a key expert prosecution witness in the trial of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi over the Lockerbie bombing has been called into question, following a report that successful appeals have been taken in other cases in which he gave evidence.
BBC Newsnight Scotland has revealed that convictions in three other cases involving Alan Feraday, led by the Crown as an electronics expert, were quashed after questions arose over Mr Feraday's evidence. In one case the Lord Chief Justice said that Mr Feraday should no longer be allowed to present himself as an electronics expert.
The BBC understands that the papers in one case are now with the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, which is currently considering an application by Megrahi's legal advisers to have his case referred to the appeal court for a further hearing.
Megrahi, a former Libyan intelligence officer, is serving a life sentence for the Lockerbie bombing in which 259 passengers and crew and 11 local residents were killed when PanAm flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie in 1998. The judges who heard his trial accepted Mr Feraday's evidence that he was in no doubt that a circuit board fragment found after the disaster was part of a detonator.
A Crown Office spokesman said that the scientific evidence in the trial had not come solely from Mr Feraday and that other expert witnesses were called.
Eddie McKechnie, the solicitor now representing Megrahi, said that he thought that serious issues about his client's conviction arose from this development.
The Review Commission is not likely to decide until the middle of next year whether Megrahi's case should be sent back to the appeal court.