Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill

 When Pan Am Flight 103 was blown up over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in December 1988, killing 259 passengers and 11 people on the ground, it was the single worst terrorist atrocity ever committed in Britain—and the deadliest terrorist attack on American lives until September 11, 2001. Yesterday, the only man ever convicted of the attack left Scotland on a Libyan jet, flying safely through the same skies his victims had been bombed out of 21 years ago and arriving in Tripoli to a hero’s welcome.

Libya had a plane waiting for terrorist Abdel Basset Ali Megrahi even before Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill had announced the Libyan’s release from jail yesterday. Within hours of the announcement, Megrahi, convicted under Scottish law for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 in which 270 people were killed, was on his way home, flying safely through the same skies his victims had been blown out of 21 years ago.

In making his announcement of Megrahi’s release on “compassionate grounds,” Mr. MacAskill intoned that “when such an appalling crime is committed, it is appropriate that a severe sentence be imposed.” Imposed, perhaps—but not carried out. Megrahi served less than a third of the 27 year “minimum” demanded in his 2001 life sentence. That works out to 11.6 days in prison for each of his victims, or about 14 days if you count from the time of his 1999 arrest.

Whatever else Megrahi’s release is, then, it is not justice. The argument for compassion rests on Megrahi’s case of advanced and apparently terminal prostate cancer. We’re not sure what “compassion” is owed to a man by a country already too compassionate to apply the death penalty to mass murderers. Nor do we quite understand what Mr. MacAskill intended by his remark that Megrahi may face “a sentence imposed by a higher power.” In this world, it makes no small difference to a man whether he ends his days in a foreign prison or in the bosom of his family and country.

Mr. MacAskill also went to some lengths to explain why he decided against releasing Megrahi under a prisoner transfer agreement between Libya and the U.K. that was hastily passed this spring by the U.K. Parliament. The minister claimed he had denied the Libyan transfer request out of regard for assurances Tony Blair’s government had given the U.S. government and the families of the victims that Megrahi would serve out his sentence in Scotland. We doubt the victims’ families will be consoled that Mr. MacAskill sought to placate them on procedural technicalities while ignoring the substance of Mr. Blair’s promise.

As it is, the transfer agreement has now come into disrepute amid allegations, widely floated in the British press and strenuously denied by the government, that it amounted to a quid pro quo for potential lucrative energy and arms deals for U.K. companies. Whatever the case, British justice will almost inevitably be tainted by the perception every time a British firm strikes a deal in Libya.

More significantly, Megrahi’s release is a reminder of the pitfalls of treating terrorism as a matter best dealt with by the criminal-justice system. Megrahi has steadfastly proclaimed his innocence; if that’s true then the system has failed at the most basic level. But if he’s guilty, as we have no reason to doubt he is, the system has failed on an even more fundamental level. In either case, justice has not been served, much less the compassion still owed to those made bereft by the bombing of PanAm 103.

Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill, Terrorist Sympathizer and Moonbat. Indeed!

Moonbat is a special feature of Liberally Conservative and posted each Saturday. For previous awards visit Moonbat Awards.