John Orr rose from village bobby at Monkton in Ayrshire to become the chief investigating officer in the Lockerbie case. When the bomb exploded, he was already joint head of CID in Strathclyde Police with the rank of detective chief superintendent. He arrived at Lockerbie in the early hours December 22, 1988, having been seconded at the request of the then chief constable of Dumfries and Galloway.

Norman McFadyen, then regional procurator-fiscal for Edinburgh, formally requested the handover into Scottish jurisdiction of the two Libyans. Mr McFadyen, now the Crown Agent, is head of department for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. He was involved in the Lockerbie criminal investigation and headed the Crown Office trial team at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands.

Lord Hardie was key to the prosecution and the last Lord Advocate to appoint himself a judge in March 2000, just six weeks before the start of the trial at Zeist. He had served as an advocate-depute from 1979 to 1983 and had been Lord Advocate for three years before he joined the bench, amid rumours there was insufficient evidence to convict the Libyans and allegations that he had mishandled the integration into Scots law of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Alan Turnbull, QC, was engaged as one of the two senior counsel leading the Crown team in the preparation for, and conduct of, the Lockerbie trial, as well as appearing in the subsequent appeal proceedings. In 2006, he was appointed to the Court of Session and High Court of Justiciary, becoming Scotland's youngest judge at the age of 47. One of his first cases on the bench was to preside over the Tommy Sheridan libel case.

Advocate-depute Alastair Campbell, QC, was senior prosecution counsel in the Lockerbie trial and the successful outcome brought him international prominence. In 2003, he was appointed a judge and became Lord Bracadale.

Colin Boyd, QC, Lord Hardie's successor as Lord Advocate, is said to have had a key role in the conviction of Megrahi. His successful ascent through the Crown Office is thought to be based in part on the trial. He stepped down as Lord Advocate last year to go into private practice.

Bill Taylor, QC, was defence counsel for Megrahi at Camp Zeist. Following the failure of his appeal and Fhimah's acquittal, he was heavily criticised. Formerly a part-time member of the commission, he is now a sheriff.

Alistair Duff was the defence lawyer for Megrahi and Fhimah in the original trial. He is now a member of the Scottish parole board. Professor Hans Koechler, the United Nations' observer at the Lockerbie trial and appeal, subsequently accused Mr Taylor and Mr Duff of betraying Megrahi by failing to represent him properly.

Eddie MacKechnie, Fhimah's solicitor, managed to secure his acquittal, and was asked to see what more could be done following the failure of Megrahi's appeal. He gathered new evidence and sent thousands of documents to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission before withdrawing from acting for Megrahi in September 2006.

Tony Gauci, key crown witness and owner of the Maltese shop where the defendants are said to have bought the clothing packed around the bomb. The disparities in his different statements to the police are thought to be vital to the decision to grant leave for a fresh appeal. Gauci identified Megrahi as the man who bought the bomb-damaged clothes found amid the wreckage.

J Thomas Thurman, the FBI examiner, identified a fragment of a circuit board which, he said, was from the Lockerbie bomb and was made by the same company that provided the electronics for an unexploded bomb discovered at Dakar airport in Senegal 10 months before. That device was being carried by Libyans, to be used in the country's war against Chad. Mr Thurman said the circuit, manufactured by Swiss electronics company Mebo, was used exclusively by Libyan intelligence officers. Until Mr Thurman announced his discovery, the main suspect behind the bombing had been Iran. Thurman was later removed from his job after a US Department of Justice investigation concluded his FBI forensics lab had a record of fabricating evidence.

Lord Sutherland, the presiding judge at Camp Zeist, was appointed to the bench in 1985. He was the longest-serving judge to preside over the case.

His colleague, Lord Coulsfield, has been a judge since 1987. He was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in 1960. Recently retired, he has carried out a number of inquiries and has been commissioned to investigate the policy of disclosure.

Lord MacLean was the third judge at the trial. He retired from the bench in 2005, but remains a member of the Judicial Appointments Board in Scotland, and is currently chairing the Billy Wright inquiry in Northern ireland.

Lord Cullen, former Lord President and Lord Justice General, was head of the five-judge panel which presided over the appeal of Megrahi at Camp Zeist in 2002. The other four judges were: Lord Kirkwood, Lord Osborne, Lord Macfadyen, and Lord Nimmo Smith.

Tony Kelly, Megrahi's solicitor, became famous for being the lawyer responsible for single-handedly taking on ministers about prison conditions. He hit the headlines in 2004 when the courts awarded damages to prisoner Robert Napier because he had been forced to slop out.

He has since been involved in a number of high-profile legal challenges to the Scottish Executive in relation to the European Convention on Human Rights and the Crown's policy on disclosure.