Court seeks mystery plane crash answers

By Gayle Young, CNN Rome Bureau Chief

ROME, Italy (CNN) -- Some of Italy's top military personnel appeared in court on Thursday to face charges that they covered up the true cause of a mysterious 1980 civilian airliner crash that has intrigued Italy for two decades.

Italian aviation authorities have never been able to determine why the DC-9, on a domestic flight for Itavia Airlines, plunged off the Italian coast 20 years ago, but prosecutors have publicly speculated the doomed airliner was caught in a dogfight with Libyan fighter jets or was hit by a stray missile.

Prosecutors admit they are unable to prove their theory. But they say they have evidence that military personnel erased air traffic control tapes and withheld documents that would have shed light on the lost plane.

The long-awaited trial is expected to last more than two years and include testimony from more than 3,000 witnesses.

For two decades a team of prosecutors led by chief magistrate Rossario Priore have amassed mounds of data about the doomed flight.

Divers have combed the waters off the island of Ustica, near where the plane crashed, to retrieve thousands of pieces of the plane's fuselage, some no larger than a few inches across.

The ragged bits of metal have been carefully reconstructed in an airplane hangar outside of Rome.

Explosive experts say there is evidence the plane was shot down and Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi has fuelled speculation by claiming a Libyan plane that was carrying him from Europe that same evening was attacked by French and U.S. military jets.

The U.S., French and Italian governments have all repeatedly denied they were conducting military operations in the region on that night. They say there is no evidence that European military planes were in the area when the plane crashed.

On trial now in Rome are nine Italians, including four former generals and the former chief of Italy's civilian aviation control authority, charged with treason and misleading investigators.

Priore has said he doubts the truth of the plane's downing will come out during the course of the long trial. But he hopes to receive answers to at least some of questions that have dogged the Otavia flight.

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