The trial of Abu Agila Mohammad Kheir Al-Marimi, accused in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, has been postponed for a third time due to newly discovered evidence. According to the BBC, the trial was due to begin in Washington DC on Wednesday, but a new start date has been set for January 2025.

New Evidence Prompted the Postponement

Lawyers for Al-Marimi said that evidence previously unknown to both the defence and prosecutors emerged on Friday, 21 August; Al-Marimi has denied building the bomb that destroyed Pan Am Flight 103 on 21 December 1988, which killed 270 people. His lawyers told the court that constitutional and ethical obligations required the defence to investigate the new development.

They said they met Al-Marimi on Sunday and he agreed to request the postponement; the trial judge, Dabney Friedrich, has agreed that the start date should be set aside, underlining the potential importance of the new evidence. She would have been extremely reluctant to allow an 11th hour postponement after months of preparation and legal battles.

Impact on Victims’ Families and the Timeline

For the relatives of those who died and Al-Marimi himself, this latest delay means a verdict might not come until next spring — it is yet another development in a case that has seen countless twists over nearly four decades. Pan Am 103 was flying from Heathrow to New York when the bomb exploded in its forward hold, breaking the plane apart at 31,000 feet — all 259 passengers and crew on board were killed. Another 11 people died in Lockerbie when the wreckage fell on their homes.

Of the victims, 190 were American and 43 from the UK — Nearly four decades later, the bombing remains the worst terror attack and mass murder in British history. Al-Marimi has been in US custody since 2022 and was originally due to stand trial in May 2025; that date was set aside following a joint request from the prosecution and defence, who cited the complexity of the case and Al-Marimi’s ill health.

The trial was pencilled in for April this year but was called off again, after the defence asked for more time to prepare, and the Lockerbie bombing has been the subject of a joint Scottish-US investigation since December 1988. Prosecutors from the Crown Office and detectives from Police Scotland were due to travel to Washington to attend the case, and Scottish witnesses were expected to be among the first to give evidence at the trial.

Reactions from Victims’ Families and Officials

Laura Buchan, head of the Lockerbie investigation team at the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, said that the adjournment would be disappointing for the families and for those who have followed the case over many years. She noted that it would not be appropriate to comment on the reasons for the adjournment, as the matter remains before the court. She emphasized that Scottish prosecutors and police officers remain fully committed to supporting the pursuit of justice, even though the proceedings are led by the United States authorities.

Campaigner Kara Weipz, president of the Victims of Pan Am Flight 103 group, said she was “floored” when she received the news that the trial had been postponed. She told the BBC’s Radio Scotland Breakfast programme that she would pray that older relatives of victims would “remain healthy” so they can see the trial eventually take place. She added that her goal has always been for as many family members as possible to witness the trial and gain more of the truth.

Al-Marimi has been accused of carrying out the attack along with two Libyans who faced a Scottish court in May 2000; Three judges heard the case at Camp Zeist, a former US air force base in the Netherlands. After eight months, they ruled the atrocity was an act of state-sponsored terrorism carried out by members of the Libyan intelligence service. One of the Libyans, Abdulbasset Al-Megrahi, was convicted of mass murder and jailed for life. He died from cancer in 2012 after being released on compassionate grounds by the Scottish government.

The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission twice referred Megrahi’s case to the appeal court, but the conviction was upheld. The second Libyan, Al Amin Khalifah Fhimah, was acquitted and returned home to a hero’s welcome in Tripoli. The US government says Al-Marimi admitted bombing the plane along with Megrahi and Fhimah when he was questioned in a Libyan detention facility in 2012. The alleged confession was handed to Scottish investigators in 2017 and is now central to the prosecution case.

Al-Marimi has claimed the confession is false and was made under duress, but judge Friedrich ruled it can be admitted as evidence at the trial. The new evidence cited by the defence remains under investigation, and the court will decide its admissibility as the trial date approaches in early 2025.