Letter: Lockerbie justice

So when he says Kenny McAskill released Megrahi because evidence in the ongoing Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission (SCCRC) appeal would have exposed the disgraceful behaviour of the Crown Office (Letters, 30 July), and the inexplicable decision by the original trial judges fatally damage the reputation of the Scottish justice system, we should take note.

Whatever the reasons for the abandonment of Megrahi's SCCRC appeal and the immediate compassionate release that followed it, there were numerous reasonable grounds to suggest the man McAskill released may have been innocent. This must have made the compassionate release decision easier for him.

Tam Dalyell's view would explain McAskill's failure to entertain the possibility that the Scots justice system may have got the verdict wrong. A similar protective position was taken by the late Lord Denning, Master of the Rolls, who opined that it was better to have innocent men and women in prison - or even hanged - than admit that the English criminal justice system had failed.

This view is preposterous, ignores the fact that miscarriages of justice can be rectified by appeal, and allows the persons who committed the crimes to carry on bombing/murdering or whatever.

I believe the ability to admit, and perhaps learn from, errors is the sign of a healthy system.

Surely Scotland's reputation for justice and the search for the truth about Lockerbie would be best served by finding a way of hearing Megrahi's abandoned appeal on the grounds identified by his QC and the Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission?

Or better still, a UN inquiry that would have access to all of the evidence including that denied to the Scots court by Public Interest Immunity Certificates imposed by the London government, or similar secretive pacts with the US administration?

TOM MINOGUE

Victoria Terrace

Dunfermline