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Sturgeon cleared after police investigation into SNP's finances
The Guardian
|March 21, 2025
Nicola Sturgeon is no longer under investigation as part of the police case looking into alleged mishandling of Scottish National party funds.
Police Scotland said the former Scottish first minister would not face any charges after her former husband, Peter Murrell, appeared for a private hearing at Edinburgh sheriff court yesterday on a single charge of embezzlement.
"I am completely in the clear," Sturgeon told reporters outside her home in Uddingston, near Glasgow. "That is the outcome I would always have expected."
Sturgeon, 54, and the former SNP treasurer Colin Beattie, 73, were arrested in 2023 as part of Operation Branchform, a long-running police inquiry into allegations that up to £650,000 of SNP funds had been handled fraudulently.
In a statement, Police Scotland said: "Following direction from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, criminal inquiries into two people arrested as part of the investigation into the funding and finances of the Scottish National party have now concluded.
This story is from the March 21, 2025 edition of The Guardian.
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