‘Betrayed’ Lockerbie families consider options

Relatives of Americans who died when a bomb destroyed Pan Am Flight 103 were gripped in a “riptide of despair” after the bomber returned home to cheering crowds in Libya, saying Friday they were considering how they could respond to Scotland's decision to free the Libyan.

Two hundred-seventy people were killed — most of them Americans — when explosives ripped open the jet’s fuselage in midair over the Scottish town of Lockerbie. Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, an intelligence officer for Libya, which had tense relations with the West throughout the 1980s and 1990s, was not convicted of the bombing until 2001. The trial came only after years of negotiations over his extradition with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.

Scottish officials freed al-Megrahi, who they said was dying of prostate cancer, on compassionate grounds this week after he had served eight years of his 27-year sentence for murder. Cheering crowds led by Gadhafi’s son greeted al-Megrahi at the Tripoli airport Thursday night — a sight that incensed relatives of his victims.

“He’s home with family, and that’s a lot more than any of us got to do with our children or husbands or wives that perished on that flight,” said Jan Doyle of New Haven, Conn., whose daughter Tricia, a 20-year-old student, was aboard Pan Am 103.

Frank Dugan, head of Victims of Pan Am Flight 103 Inc., an activist group founded by relatives of the Lockerbie victims, told The Associated Press that family members planned to conduct a conference call Friday night to discuss their options. One possibility, Dugan said, is to join protests when Gadhafi visits New York next month.

Larry Mild of Severna Park, Md., whose step-daughter, Miriam Wolfe, also was killed, said the families felt “totally betrayed” by the release of al-Megrahi, which she said had opened a new “riptide of despair.”

“There’s nothing we can do about it,” Mild said. “We feel helpless, on the one hand. On the other hand, we know there’s a bunch of families out there and other Americans who feel the same way.”

The White House, which protested al-Megrahi’s release Thursday, sounded the same theme Friday, with President Barack Obama saying he share d the families’ distress at al-Megrahi's homecoming, which he called an “offensive” display.

A key factor for many families is the nagging sense that the full story of the Lockerbie bombing has never been told. With al-Megrahi free and near death, they said they were distraught that the truth would never be known.

Longstanding suspicions
“He was not the only person involved," said Robert Hunt of Webster, N.Y., whose daughter, Karen, a student at Syracuse University, died that day. “Unfortunately, he was the only one who was convicted of this heinous crime.”

Susan Cohen of Middle Township, N.J., echoed longstanding suspicions by skeptics of the Lockerbie trial, speculating that al-Megrahi was not even ill and was released as part of a diplomatic initiative to improve relations with Gadhafi.

Libya is one of the world’s leading oil producers; international oil companies have resumed exploration and production there after the United States rescinded its designation of Libya as a sponsor of terrorism three years ago.

“Shame on Scotland and England and even our own government for not doing more to ensure that this didn’t happen and for its own cozying up to Gadhafi,” said Cohen, whose daughter, Theodora — also a student at Syracuse University — was aboard Flight 103.

Kathleen Flynn of Montville, N.J., whose son J.P. was among the victims in 1988, also questioned whether al-Megrahi was truly ill, asking, “Who knows if we are getting the real facts on his medical condition?”

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