Trial of Libyan man charged over Lockerbie bombing delayed until 2027

The trial of a Libyan man accused of making the bomb which brought down Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie has been delayed until early 2027.

Jury selection was set to begin in the federal trial of Abu Agila Mohammad Mas’ud Kheir Al-Marimi in Washington, DC, last month.

However, the judge was forced to delay the start of proceedings after new evidence was discovered that defence lawyers wanted to examine.

Now the trial has been postponed until January 20, 2027, to allow time to process the new evidence and prepare expert witnesses.

The new evidence is described as “voluminous” and has been sourced for numerous other countries.

Lockerbie: Abu Agila Mas’ud faces life in prison.
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Victoria Cummock, widow of passenger John Cummock and the founder of the Pan Am 103 Lockerbie Legacy Foundation, said: “The 270 victims’ families are tremendously grateful to the U.S. and Scottish prosecution and law enforcement teams for their decades-long, stalwart commitment to pursuing accountability for all who perpetrated this heinous crime that impacted thousands of survivors, living victims and responders.

“We admire and support their dedication and desire to bring forward the strongest and most comprehensive case in this effort to definitively bring justice for the mass murder of our loved ones.”

Flight 103 was 31,000 feet over Lockerbie, Dumfries and Galloway, when a bomb in the plane’s forward cargo area exploded 38 minutes after take-off from London Heathrow Airport.

The flight was bound for John F Kennedy International Airport in New York.

The blast killed all 259 passengers and crew members and 11 people on the ground in Lockerbie. Citizens of 21 countries were killed, including 190 Americans and 43 from the UK.

Prosecutors allege Al-Marimi and others carried out the bombing at the direction of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, who was ousted and killed during a 2011 civil war.

Al-Marimi, now in his mid-70s, is charged with two counts of destruction of an aircraft resulting in death. He faces a maximum penalty of life in prison if convicted.

Prosecutors believe he brought a suitcase containing a bomb to an airport in Malta and gave it to co-conspirators for a flight to Frankfurt, Germany.

The suitcase travelled from Frankfurt to London, where it was loaded onto Flight 103, according to investigators.