Disco explosion injured 230 after bomb strapped to DJ booth blasted through dance floor
Hundreds of people were injured in a horrific bomb blast after a Libyan Secret Service plot saw an explosive device planted beneath a DJ booth.
Three people were killed in the West Germany bombing back in 1986, while 230 party-goers at La Belle were injured in the explosion that destroyed the dance floor on this day in 1986.
Many of the people injured in the attack had fallen through the floor and into a cellar below after the bomb strapped to the DJ booth detonated at 1.45am.
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More than 50 American servicemen were injured due to the blast, while two of the three killed in the blast were US Army alumni, Sergeant Kenneth T. Ford and Sergeant James E. Goins.
A Turkish civilian, Nermin Hannay, 29, was also tragically killed following the detonation, which left many of the injured individuals permanently disabled.
Immediate reactions from US President Ronald Reagan led to missile strikes, a "murky" trial soon followed and the alleged involvement of at-the-time Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was aired.
Reagan, president of the United States at the time of the blast, immediately blamed Libya for the explosion and sanctioned a missile strike against the country.
Those airstrikes on Libyan capital Tripoli killed 30 soldiers and 15 civilians, while Gaddafi claimed his daughter Hana had been killed in the military move, although there are disputes over her existence.
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Four people involved in the discotheque bombing, Verena Chanaa, Yasir Shraydi, Musbah Eter and Ali Chanaa, had built the bomb and smuggled it into West Berlin in a Libyan diplomatic bag.
No individual had been accused of the bombing until the reunification of Germany, when Stasi archives were opened up and prosecutors eventually brought in five suspects for trial.
All but one were found guilty in a case that stretched from 1996 to 2001, deeming that the bombing had been "planned by the Libyan secret service and the Libyan Embassy".
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Four were found guilty and one, Andrea Häusler, was acquitted after prosecutors failed to prove she had known the bomb was in the Libyan bag in a trial BBC News deemed "murky" after German and American officials refused to hand over intelligence on the bombing.
Verena Chanaa, found guilty of murder, and Shraydi, found guilty of attempted murder, were sentenced to 14 years in prison while Eter and Ali Chanaa, both found guilty of being an accomplice, were sentenced to 12 years.
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