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Police submit SNP financial report to prosecutors
Image caption Peter Murrell was arrested in April last year as part of Operation Branchform
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Detectives have sent a report to the Scottish Public Prosecution Service in relation to Peter Murrell after the former SNP chief executive was accused of embezzling party funds.
The force said in a statement that it had submitted a “standard prosecution report” to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS).
Police Scotland added: “Enquiries are continuing and we are unable to comment further.”
Murrell is the husband of Nicola Sturgeon, former First Minister of Scotland.
The Crown Office will now decide whether there is sufficient evidence to prosecute Mr Murrell.
It will also decide whether it believes a prosecution would be in the public interest.
Murrell was arrested on April 5, 2023 and later released without charge pending further investigation.
Almost two weeks later, SNP treasurer Colin Beattie was arrested and released pending further inquiries. He later stepped down as treasurer.
Sturgeon was arrested on June 11, 2023, and was questioned by officers for more than seven hours at a police station, before she was also released without charge while further investigations were carried out.
Image source, Getty Images
Image caption Nicola Sturgeon was arrested and released without charge in June 2023
Investigations into Mr Beattie and Ms Sturgeon remain ongoing.
Sturgeon denied that her decision to resign as First Minister and leader of the SNP in March last year was influenced by the police investigation.
Police Scotland’s Operation Branchform spent more than two years investigating what happened to £660,000 in donations made to the SNP by independence campaigners.
On the day of Murrell’s arrest, officers searched the home he shares with Sturgeon in Glasgow.
The SNP headquarters in Edinburgh were searched on the same day and a luxury motorhome valued at around £110,000 was also seized by police outside Mr Murrell’s mother’s home in Dunfermline.