Cyprus supreme court orders plane crash retrial

NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) -- Cyprus' supreme court has ordered the retrial of four former airline officials who were acquitted by a lower court of manslaughter charges in a 2005 plane crash that killed 121 passengers and crew.

Six of the supreme court's nine judges said Tuesday that the lower court was mistaken in its "selective and piecemeal" evaluation of the evidence and called its reasoning that there was nothing linking the defendants to the crash "fundamentally flawed."

Prosecutors had argued that the defendants failed to prevent the Helios Airways Boeing 737-300 from being flown by "unsuitable and inadequate" pilots.

Greek investigators blamed the Aug. 14, 2005, crash outside Athens, Greece, on human error after an unpressurized cabin knocked out both pilots soon after takeoff from Cyprus.