Police chief- Lockerbie evidence was faked

[cal04]

A FORMER Scottish police chief has given lawyers a signed statement claiming that key evidence in the Lockerbie bombing trial was fabricated. The retired officer - of assistant chief constable rank or higher - has testified that the CIA planted the tiny fragment of circuit board crucial in convicting a Libyan for the 1989 mass murder of 270 people.

The police chief, whose identity has not yet been revealed, gave the statement to lawyers representing Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, currently serving a life sentence in Greenock Prison. The evidence will form a crucial part of Megrahi's attempt to have a retrial ordered by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC). The claims pose a potentially devastating threat to the reputation of the entire Scottish legal system.

The officer, who was a member of the Association of Chief Police Officers Scotland, is supporting earlier claims by a former CIA agent that his bosses "wrote the script" to incriminate Libya. Last night, George Esson, who was Chief Constable of Dumfries and Galloway when Megrahi was indicted for mass murder, confirmed he was aware of the development.


The insider said: "He said he believed he had crucial information. A meeting was set up and he gave a statement that supported the long-standing rumours that the key piece of evidence, a fragment of circuit board from a timing device that implicated Libya, had been planted by US agents. "Asked why he had not come forward before, he admitted he'd been wary of breaking ranks, afraid of being vilified. "He also said that at the time he became aware of the matter, no one really believed there would ever be a trial. When it did come about, he believed both accused would be acquitted. When Megrahi was convicted, he told himself he'd be cleared at appeal." The source added: "When that also failed, he explained he felt he had to come forward. "He has confirmed that parts of the case were fabricated and that evidence was planted. At first he requested anonymity, but has backed down and will be identified if and when the case returns to the appeal court."


rest of the article(too long to post)
http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1855852005

[KoKo]

1. UhOh! The real culprits are the Syrian Fronted PLO funded by Iran....

according to this article. Says US has always known this but blamed it on Libya. Very convenient for Bush/Cheney that this comes out now.

How do we even know that this is the real truth? All the lies we've been told all these years, sigh. :shrug:

[MisterP]

2. a good place to put a lie is on the heels of a truth

"The Last Battle" had a monkey "mouthpiece of God" in it too

[mallard]

35. Re: a good place to put a lie is on the heels of a truth

Re; From Scotsman article:

"The first suspects in the case were the Syrian-led Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command (PFLP-GC), a terror group backed by Iranian cash. But the first Gulf War altered diplomatic relations with Middle East nations, and Libya became the pariah state."


The practice of falsely assigning grievous criminal charges to suit the politcal climate of the hour and induce public blame acccordingly does not say much for the 'original case'. This planting of fake evidence is already unbelievably corrupt enough to respresent the main impact of the story.

That's right, Mr P, all we really get from this story is reliable word that Libya indeed got set up, blamed and extorted. To assume that's as far as the schemers went with their deceptive ploys and to go on speculating about their 'honest' investigative work regarding the 'real' Syrian bombing culprits doesn't quite add up right.

[aquart]

6. Does it say why the PLO didn't take credit?

I don't recall them ever being ashamed of their works.

Oh, well. No idea if it's true. But I am going to have a giggle over "Syrian-Fronted PLO funded by Iran..." I'm simply going to enjoy it.

[KoKo]

21. Here's the quote from the Scotsman about Syrian/PLO/Iran ....

The decision of a former Scottish police chief to back this claim could add enormous weight to what has previously been dismissed as a wild conspiracy theory. It has long been rumoured the fragment was planted to implicate Libya for political reasons.

The first suspects in the case were the Syrian-led Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command (PFLP-GC), a terror group backed by Iranian cash. But the first Gulf War altered diplomatic relations with Middle East nations, and Libya became the pariah state.

Following the trial, legal observers from around the world, including senior United Nations officials, expressed disquiet about the verdict and the conduct of the proceedings at Camp Zeist, Holland. Those doubts were first fuelled when internal documents emerged from the offices of the US Defence Intelligence Agency. Dated 1994, more than two years after the Libyans were identified to the world as the bombers, they still described the PFLP-GC as the Lockerbie bombers.

A source close to Megrahi's defence said: "Britain and the US were telling the world it was Libya, but in their private communications they acknowledged that they knew it was the PFLP-GC.

[HamdenRice]

23. This does not accuse Arafat's PLO/Fatah --it's a different PLO

There were a lot of factions calling themselves PLO -- just like there are too many "Irish Republican Armies" to keep track of. This I believe was a Lebanese based PLO faction.

[Minstrel Boy]

3. Lockerbie has much to do with the CIA drug trade

David Guyatt on "the narcotics trafficking, gun-running and money-laundering cover-up of Pan Am flight 103"

Within hours of Pan Am 103 exploding over the small Scottish village, CIA agents were swarming over the wreckage. Clearly they were looking for something extraordinary. Aboard the downed plane was a secret, five-man Defence Intelligence Agency “team” headed by Major Charles “Tiny” McKee. A suitcase belonging to McKee was recovered and emptied before being returned to the site to be “found” again. Inside had been a large quantity of Heroin, some “sensitive” documents, plus a large quantity of cash and travellers cheques. These items were “purged” from official records. Incredibly, an unidentified body was also removed from the crash site. No official explanation has been given for these extraordinary examples of evidence tampering.

The DIA team had been in Lebanon searching for US hostages held by Hezbollah. Whilst in Lebanon, McKee’s team is said to have come across a secret CIA operation known as “CIA One,” who were collaborating with Manzur El-Khassar, a Syrian drug dealer. El-Khassar was closely aligned to Lt. Col. Oliver North’s highly illegal activities around the world. These included covert trafficking of narcotics and weapons. The Syrian was also involved in brokering weapons to Iran in exchange for hostages. El-Khassar’s precise role in the Lockerbie bombing may be the missing link that unravels the entire story.

...

El-Khassar, in exchange for his help to release US hostages held in Lebanon, and, presumably, for past favours to the Contra’s, was permitted to ship Heroin to the US. The US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) maintain that his pipeline, through Frankfurt airport, was a carefully controlled “sting” operation. Others, more cynical doubt this explanation.

Dark rumours persist that Major “Tiny” McKee had unearthed the illegal dope connection and realised that elements within the CIA were actively collaborating in it. Deciding to report the matter to his superiors, McKee booked his team on a flight home aboard the ill fated Pan Am 103. Their travel plans were intercepted and reported to Syrian intelligence, who notified El-Khassar. He, in turn, arranged to have a bomb planted inside the suitcase used to carry the regular Heroin shipment - to dispose of McKee and his evidence.

...

http://www.deepblacklies.co.uk/lockerbie-the_syrian_connection.htm

[aquart]

8. So, NOT the PLO?

Someday I wanna meet the one who's blowing up all these planes. Someday when I've been given ten minutes to live.

To believe this, I have to believe there's a skilled assassination squad, not necessarily loyal to the constitution, which has been able to keep its secrets. And I don't disbelieve it.

I just don't know.

[Minstrel Boy]

12. Actually, the story doesn't mention the PLO.

It does mention the Syrians and the PFLP-GC. It all comes down to a lot of nastiness going on in the Bekka Valley in the early '80s, sides getting blurred, and narcotics money.

Syrian drug dealers got wind a DIA team were meaning to expose their arrangement with the CIA, and blew up the plane carrying them and the evidence. The CIA, if you read the accounts, were quick on the scene and removed a bag belonging to the DIA.

[aquart]

15. Thank you.

On my best day I wouldn't be able to keep all that straight.

[leesa]

24. But of course the CIA would NEVER blow up the plane to hide their

arrangement with the Syrian drug dealers. Who knows what the truth is.

[daleo]

4. The blame for this can be placed on the neo-cons enemy of the day

Lybia, Syria, Iran, Iraq...everyone will get their turn. Truth is irrelevant.

[countmyvote4real]

7. Interesting. So why did Libya fold?

I know they were sued and I thought that they paid out.

Anyway, it's very easy for me to believe that agents of our own government did this. Call me cynical. Call me an American believer. And I firmly believe the same sort had a hand in coordinating 9/11.

[daleo]

17. Maybe they were offered a deal they couldn't refuse.

Yeah, anything goes. This happened during Reagan days, so anything could have happened then too. Qaddafi was the Ossama (or Zarquawi) of the day, and every bad thing was attributed to him. I always assumed that the Reagan administration couldn't be trusted to tell the truth about anything at the time - they were like Bush, making it all up as they went along.

[annabanana]

19. (It was the SAME people) eom

[Roland99]

20. And that's the truest statement of all.

:scared:

[acmavm]

5. Next thing you know they'll be blaming it on Cindy Sheehan and the

peaceniks down in Crawford.

Amazing how everything always works out so conveniently for this bunch of crooks and thugs.

[Bluebear]

9. It was Clinton's fault!

Why not, everything else seems to be for the RW.

[librechik]

25. 1989--Bush Senior was in charge.

typical!

[Festivito]

10. This came out before on DU, around the time Libya became friendly.

Libya denounced its nuclear program a few years ago. This was touted as a positive fallout from Bush's war policy. It was really due to this information coming out, and Libya probably didn't even have nuclear abilities--all the easier to get rid of them.

[genieroze]

11. Our country is run by some very evil, nasty, jerks. I don't think it will

ever get better seeing how long it's been going on.

[burrowowl]

13. I wouldn't be surprised

not at all!

[wli]

14. all false flag, all the time n/t

[bos1]

16. recycling lockerbie for the latest purpose

Best to go back to the original investigations -- at the time it was revealed that the bomb was snuck onboard via a regular drug-smuggling route that was being allowed to run because it was being surveilled by western intelligence/law enforcement. Meaning it was a protected drug smuggling line being watched in order to catch the bad guys, if you believe that. The other option being that the US intelligence agencies ARE the drug runners, as has been revealed many times since at least Vietnam and the Golden Triangle heroin being flown by CIA-contracted airline Air America, not to be confused with the pro-Democrat talk radio network. And don't forget the Contras-cocaine connection, with Ollie North shipping the "paste" as his own diaries revealed.

[DoYouEverWonder]

18. Whoever is responsible for the Lockerbie bombing

is also responsible for the Gander tragedy.

Funny how Ollie North is in the middle of both crashes.



Tragedy at Gander

On the morning of December 12, 1985, at 0645 local time (0515 EST), Arrow Airlines flight 1285, a DC-8-63 charter carrying 248 passengers and a crew of eight, crashed just after takeoff form Gander International Airport, Gander, Newfoundland, Canada. All on board perished as a result of the impact or the post-crash fire, which, fed by the contents of the stricken aircraft’s full fuel tanks, took local fire fighters nearly four hours to bring under control and approximately thirty hours to completely extinguish. The firefighters were hampered in their efforts because of the rugged terrain, which initially prevented more than one fire truck at a time from being used.

The passengers on the ill-fated charter were U.S. Soldiers. All but twelve were members of the 3d Battalion, 502d Infantry, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault); eleven were from other Forces Command units; and one was a CID agent form the Criminal Investigations Command. They were returning to Fort Campbell, Kentucky, home station of the 101st Airborne Division, after completing a six-month tour of duty in the Sinai with the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO). This international peacekeeping organization, made up of contingents from ten nations, had been established under terms of a protocol between Egypt and Israel signed on August 3, 1981. The MFO has had the mission of implementing security provisions contained in the 1979 Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty.

http://www.qmfound.com/gander.html


Gander: The Untold Story
http://www.sandford.org/gandercrash/investigations/gander_paper/html/_3.shtml


1985 – Aircraft Crash at Gander
http://www.pinetreeline.org/other/other18/other18an.html

[Octafish]

22. "Cover-up of Convenience -- the Hidden Scandal of Lockerbie"

A well-written overview, with too many snips from me...

WSWS : Book Review

"Cover-up of Convenience—the Hidden Scandal of Lockerbie"

by John Ashton and Ian Ferguson, Mainstream Publishing, 2002, ISBN 1840183896

By Steve James
24 April 2002

John Ashton’s and Ian Ferguson’s work on the circumstances surrounding the destruction on December 21, 1988, of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland is worthy of careful study. It raises serious doubts, not only regarding the recent conviction of the Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, now incarcerated in Barlinnie jail, Glasgow, but over the entire official presentation of events before and after the crash, from 1988 to the present day. They give indicators as to how the full facts regarding the atrocity which killed 270, perhaps 271, people might be uncovered and conclude with a series of searching questions which any genuinely independent inquiry into the Lockerbie disaster should direct toward various governments, intelligence services, and individuals.

Ashton and Ferguson have followed Lockerbie for years. Ashton worked as the deputy to the late British film maker Allan Francovich, whose film The Maltese Double Cross, examined various alternative scenarios that have been advanced as an explanation for the Lockerbie disaster, favouring that the bombing was a consequence of a CIA controlled drug running operation utilised to spy on Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian armed political groupings and factions.

SNIP...

Ashton and Ferguson note that there were many general indications of a possible attack on an American flight in late 1988. After the 1988 American attack by the USS Vincennes on an Iranian Airbus, in which 255 pilgrims were murdered, Iranian broadcasts warned that the skies would “rain blood” in consequence. A Syrian backed Palestinian group with a history of attacks on passenger aircraft was known to be operating in Germany. Many staff at the US Embassy in Moscow altered flight plans to avoid Pan Am over the Christmas period.

SNIP...

According to the authors, from as little as two hours after the crash, US intelligence officers were at the southern Scottish site. Over the next days many more arrived. They were not looking for survivors or explanations as to the cause of the crash. They did not cooperate with local rescue services. Instead, they were searching for particular pieces of debris, luggage and particular corpses. Ashton and Ferguson cite finds of large quantities of cash, cannabis and heroin on the flight, as well as intelligence papers owned by McKee, whose luggage was removed and replaced. A report noting the location of hostages held in Beirut was apparently found on the ground. There were reports of helicopter-borne armed groups guarding and then removing a large box, and an unidentified body.

A police surgeon from Bradford, David Fieldhouse, insists that one body was moved, after it had been tagged and its location noted, while another disappeared entirely. Fieldhouse was subsequently victimised. Other concerns were raised by local police officers, some of which phoned Labour MP Tam Dalyell, who then began to take an active interest in the case.

CONTINUED...

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/apr2002/lock-a24.shtml

The Secret Government doesn't care who they kill. Few remember that the Saudis and Kuwaities invited Bush 41, Baker, Powell and the whole Gulf War 1 clan over to receive gold Rolexes and so forth, their Royal 747 flew out of Houston and suffered an on-board explosion over the Gulf of Mexico. The jet returned safely, with what looked like a four-foot wide circular hole in the wing, near the fuselage. The photo was on the AP newswire, but I've never seen it since.

[bribri16]

26. Gaddafi has always claimed that Lybia was not responsible but he

gave in to payments for economic (embargo) reasons. The families made out with millions from the Lybian government but should rightfully be collecting from the US. I remember the debates about this incident and I remember the voices claiming that evidence was fabricated. I think this revelation might be curtains for Gaddafi whose dealings with the US after being attacked and after being charged with Lockerbie were criticized by many in his nation.

[Lori Price CLG]

27. Police chief- Lockerbie evidence was faked

Police chief- Lockerbie evidence was faked

A former Scottish police chief has given lawyers a signed statement claiming that key evidence in the Lockerbie bombing trial was fabricated.

The retired officer - of assistant chief constable rank or higher - has testified that the CIA planted the tiny fragment of circuit board crucial in convicting a Libyan for the 1989 mass murder of 270 people.

The police chief, whose identity has not yet been revealed, gave the statement to lawyers representing Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, currently serving a life sentence in Greenock Prison.

<snip>

Lori Price

[snot]

28. KICK n/t

[truthisfreedom]

29. wild. absolutely wild.

[ellie]

30. what the fuck?

It is way past time to disband the CIA and FBI.

Edited to fix a drunk-induced typo.

[Robeson]

33. To paraphrase the immortal words of Gore Vidal....

...yes, when the CIA was created, we became a national security state. And not meaning to hurt anyone's feelings about a fellow Dem, but that had to be the worst legacy Harry Truman left us.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

34. Who was the President in 1989? Poppy Bush, wasn't it?.......

Junior has been using a LOT of his dear old Dad's organization, including Rumsfeld, right?

And Rumsfeld has been using a shadowy group known as the OSP and/or OSI, right?

Is it possible that this group has been operating FAR earlier than we've been told?

Is it possible that the same group that fabricated evidence about Iraqi WMDs also fabricated the Lockerbie evidence?

Either that or a series of uncanny coincidences.

"Disband the CIA and FBI"? It occurs to me that a number of very good people have already been drummed out of their respective organizations by the NeoCons.

[Autumn Colors]

31. Holy shit

A friend of my then-current boss was killed on that flight. Wow.

[JackRiddler]

32. In the end it all comes out...

What a surprise.

Lockerbie was pinned on Syria/Iran until Bush I needed Assad for the first Gulf War in 1990. Suddenly, it was Libya.

Meanwhile, it's clear that there was a regular CIA-connected drug run on the flight. The mules may have been tricked into carrying the bomb on themselves out of Lebanon, and the whole thing's been a cover-up since.

16 years later comes this... the stuff called "conspiracy theory." Unthinkable that it could have been covered up for so long, the debunkers have been saying. And here we are.

Must it also take 16 years with 9/11? Anthrax? Wellstone? The real reasons for the Iraq invasion? The 2004 election?

[emad]

36. On the morning of 9/11 BBC news carried a story saying that

UK cops had either ignored or covered up a corroborated statement made by a Heathrow Airport baggage handler that the freight cargo the holding depot for the Lockerbie flight had been broken into and contents tampered with.

This BBC news item was then mothballed after the hijackers struck the WTC.

[SweetLeftFoot]

37. Hmmmm

I work as a journo in Scotland - but I'm Aussie - and all the journos here say they knew the official story was bullshit but weren't allowed to publish because they didn't have the evidence.