The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) said Thursday it would fully review the Libyan intelligence officer’s – Abdelbasit Al-Megrahi – conviction.
The court will have to review the conviction to decide whether to refer the case for a fresh appeal.
Al-Megrahi’s family told reporters that it appealed to Glasgow-based committee for a fresh appeal in 2017, five years after Al-Megahi died.
Al-Megrahi lost an appeal against his conviction in 2002 – but got rejected, with the SCCRC recommending in 2007 that he should be granted a second appeal.
"Having considered all the available evidence, the commission believes that Al-Megrahi, in abandoning his appeal, did so as he held a genuine and reasonable belief that such a course of action would result in him being able to return home to Libya, at a time when he was suffering from terminal cancer. On that basis, the commission has decided that it is in the interests of justice to accept the current application for a full review of his conviction." SCCRC chief executive Gerard Sinclair explained.
Al-Megrahi was jailed for 27 years after being convicted in 2001 after finding him guilty of the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 in 1988 killed 270 people, including 11 on the ground in Scotland’s Lockerbie.
