'Dupe' could have carried Lockerbie bomb

The trial is reaching its conclusion

The bomb on board Pan Am flight 103 could have been put there by a "dupe", a defence lawyer has told the Lockerbie trial.

William Taylor, QC, suggested that an unwitting passenger may have been used by a terrorist group to put the device on the plane.

And he also suggested that it could have been planted at London's Heathrow Airport.

The defence advocate, who is acting on behalf of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, was continuing his final arguments at the Scottish court in the Netherlands on Tuesday.

Trial details

The two accused are Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, 48, and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah, 44

Pan Am Flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie on 21 December 1988, killing all 259 people on board and another 11 on the ground

The two men deny murder. Charges of conspiracy to murder and a breach of the 1982 Aviation Security Act were dropped

The trial is taking place in a Scottish courtroom at Camp Zeist, in the Netherlands

The case is being heard by a panel of Scottish judges

He said that a passenger could have been duped into taking the bag containing the bomb on board.

"The most obvious way for any suitcase to get on board is by passenger check-in," he said.

"The Crown have not proved that the improvised explosive device was not introduced by a passenger."

Mr Taylor said that Khaled Jaffar, one of the passengers who died in the disaster, was nervous and constantly looking around him at Frankfurt Airport prior to the flight.

"His demeanour could have been because he was given another bag to introduce at Frankfurt," he added.

Mr Taylor also dismissed the Crown's theory that an unaccompanied suitcase containing the bomb was placed on board an Air Malta flight at Luqa airport in Malta.

He said the suitcase had ended up in a luggage container close to the skin of the aircraft.

"The only airport where such control could be exercised was Heathrow," he said.

"The improvised explosive device did end up in the optimum position - either it was introduced at Heathrow or the position of the device was achieved by extraordinary chance."

Mr Taylor said a dramatic increase in security staff at Heathrow Airport in the wake of the disaster was testament to the "inadequacy of security" there before it happened.

The QC said three areas of Heathrow Airport could have been breached - an interline shed, the baggage build-up area and an area alongside Pan Am 103.

Mr Taylor focused on baggage storage

The court had heard that on the day of the disaster, some bags destined for Flight 103 were placed into the luggage container in the interline shed which stored bags from connecting flights.

This was left unattended at the baggage build-up area.

It was later taken to the tarmac where bags from Flight 103 from Frankfurt were loaded and the container was placed on the connecting aircraft bound for New York.

Mr Taylor described security at the interline shed as "inadequate" and said somebody could have placed a bag onto a conveyer belt which ran into the shed from the outside.

It was also left open and unattended overnight.

Left unattended

He said: "In the case of the interline area there was scope for a case to go into a container in error.

"This would make it easier for a case to be placed deliberately in a container such as AVE 4041 the container which held the case containing the bomb."

Mr Taylor also pointed out that the container was left unattended outside an office in the baggage build-up area for 40 minutes that day.

He said a label indicated the container's destination and flight number.

Mr Taylor described the identification of Mr Al Megrahi as the person who bought clothing, which was in the bomb suitcase, from a shop in Malta as unreliable.

Charred fragments of clothing found in the plane wreckage were traced back to witness Tony Gauci's shop.

Mr Taylor described his evidence as "utterly unreliable" and said talk of "resemblance" was worthless.

The judges are expected to adjourn the trial once the defence's closing submissons are completed and announce a date when they will deliver their verdict.