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Family of convicted Lockerbie bomber launches legal bid to clear his name


    LONDON (Reuters) - Relatives of the late Libyan intelligence officer convicted over the 1988 Lockerbie airline bombing have launched a bid to clear his name, a Scottish legal body said on Thursday.

    Abdel Basset al-Megrahi was the only person ever convicted over the attack on Pan Am flight 103 in which 270 people, mostly American and British, died.

    Jailed for life after being found guilty in 2001, he was released on compassionate grounds eight years later after being diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer and died in Libya in 2012.

    The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) said it had received an appeal from Al-Megrahi's family to review his conviction.

    "If we believe that there may have been a miscarriage of justice, we will then send it to the Court of Appeal," said Chris Reddick, director of corporate services at the SCCRC.

    (Reporting by Jack Stubbs; editing by Stephen Addison)