The Associated Press
1/31/01 7:30 AM
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Pat Brunner, Hamburg, N.Y., lost daughter Colleen:
"There is no closure. There never will be closure. I really dislike that word. There's some justice but no closure. Nothing will bring back 270 people and my beautiful daughter."
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Robert Hunt, Rochester, N.Y., lost daughter Karen:
"We're extremely happy that the one defendant was found guilty and disappointed that the other was found not guilty."
"The word `innocent' didn't sit real well."
"All along, we have said these two people were just the henchmen. They did not act on their own. We're hoping that during the civil trial, more evidence will come out."
"When you lose a loved one, you never really get over it. You just learn to live with it. Because the people who are really responsible will never totally be brought to justice, that big scar will always be with you. It will always be in your heart."
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Joanne Hartunian, Niskayuna, N.Y., lost daughter Lynne:
"It isn't that we don't want to let our children go. They're gone. This doesn't change anything but I must know why my daughter died. We feel we have to get to the bottom of this."
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Paul Hudson, Albany, N.Y., lost daughter Melina:
"Near joy. "This is something we've waited for for a long time. To have it come out like this is, of course, very good because it means we'll probably get close to full justice and I think we'll get much more -- if not the full -- truth. This verdict definitely links Libya to the bombing. I don't see how Gadhafi and Libya can deny responsibility."
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Daniel Cohen, Cape May Court House, N.J., lost daughter Theodora:
"Even this verdict points the finger in the right place. I am tremendously relieved. It's what I wanted. Both would have been better, but the important thing is that the Libyan government has been indicted in this thing."
"Thank God, the whole thing didn't end in nothing."
Susan Cohen, Daniel's wife:
"There's no way now they can say that Libya didn't do this. The important thing now is not these two guys, but the country that sent them to do this despicable act.
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Bob Monetti, Cherry Hill, N.J., lost son Richard:
"I'll tell you this, in a U.S. civil court, it'll be drop-dead easy to convict Libya, not just this one guy."
Eileen Monetti, Bob's wife:
"Sept. 11, which was his birthday, will come and Rick won't be there. That'll never change. Does this give us some relief? Yes. Does it give us some resolution? Yes."
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Bert Ammerman, Riverdale, N.J., lost brother Tom:
"This has been a surreal experience. There has been a great deal of comfort for me. I will be indebted forever to the Scottish police and the FBI. I didn't have to hear the verdict. I saw the evidence, and I believed all along that both men were guilty."
"Al-Megrahi being found guilty, that to me shows and points all the evidence to Gadhafi's feet."
"To have al-Megrahi found guilty today is really very satisfying. It leads right to the door of Gadhafi. Gadhafi is a coward."
"I don't hold out much hope that our new president and the English leadership will show much backbone in pursuing this. They have already made it clear that peace in the Middle East supersedes this in importance."
"The labyrinth of evidence proved to me beyond a doubt that both these men were involved."
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Carole Johnson, Greensburg, Pa., lost daughter Beth Ann:
"We are not too hopeful for help from our government. The only reason we had a trial was the persistence of the families."
"Watching this trial unfold just added to our feeling that the government was not interested. They want to have that oil flowing again (and) 189 dead Americans are expendable."
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Audrey Bergstrom, Minnesota, lost son Philip, a U.S. Army sergeant:
"We were also told our loved ones died for our country. But when you are dying for your country, you fight back. You're not up 31,000 feet in an airplane where you don't have a choice. We say our son was held hostage, and then he was murdered."
"My husband and I wanted to know who did it. Now what we want to know is why. And I don't think we'll ever know why."
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Jeannine Boulander, Shrewsbury, Mass., lost daughter Nicole:
"I believe that the word closure should be eliminated from the vocabulary, but this certainly closes a chapter in what has been a long odyssey."
"I certainly do not want to be defined by my daughter's death. I would rather be defined by the efforts of all of these families to make sure that this was brought to trial."
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Doris Cory, Shrewsbury, Mass., lost son Scott:
"Most of us have mixed feelings about this verdict. But I don't really know how I feel. I feel absolutely numb."
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Neal Gallagher, deputy director of the FBI:
"It's not a sense of satisfaction because there were still 270 people murdered that day."