Sturgeon’s lawyer defends no comment interview in SNP finances probe

Nicola Sturgeon’s decision to answer police questions with “no comment” was standard legal advice, her solicitor said, as the fallout from Peter Murrell’s guilty plea dragged renewed attention back to the SNP’s finances and fundraising.

Aamer Anwar said Sturgeon later provided written answers to detectives and rejected the suggestion that silence at interview had obstructed Police Scotland’s inquiry. The defence line matters because, in criminal investigations, a suspect can be advised not to answer questions while evidence is tested elsewhere, but that legal protection often collides with public expectations that senior political figures should be fully open when party finances are under scrutiny.

The context is Operation Branchform, Police Scotland’s long-running investigation into SNP finances and fundraising, which began in July 2021 and is understood to have concluded in March 2025. Sturgeon was arrested on 11 June 2023 at Falkirk police station and later released without charge. She has consistently denied wrongdoing and previously said she knew “nothing more” about the investigation after her arrest.

The renewed pressure comes after Murrell, Sturgeon’s estranged husband and former SNP chief executive, pleaded guilty on 25 May 2026 at the High Court in Edinburgh to embezzling more than £400,000 from the party. Reuters reported that the money was diverted to buy items including cars, a motorhome and luxury goods. Daily Business reported that the figure admitted was £400,310.65, covering the period from August 2010 to January 2023.

Earlier allegations in the case centred on £666,953 raised since 2017 for a proposed second Scottish independence referendum, money that was said to have been improperly spent. The scale of the sums involved has made this far more than a narrow criminal case: it has become a test of how long a governing party can remain under suspicion before that suspicion starts to shape public judgment, even when one of its most prominent figures has not been charged.

Scottish Conservative leader Russell Findlay has used Murrell’s guilty plea to press the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service for answers on why Sturgeon was not charged. Anwar criticised Findlay’s description of silence as a tactic of organised crime, saying Sturgeon’s position was no different from her earlier comments about Murrell’s criminal conduct. The legal defence may be routine, but the political damage from years of scrutiny over SNP finances is now harder to contain.