Search: David J Black

Police Scotland has run internal training courses to support officers with reading, writing, statement-taking and everyday speech, prompting concerns about the calibre of new recruits. A freedom of information request by The Herald confirmed the training was delivered in collaboration with SEMPER Sc

Tens of thousands of offenders in England and Wales, including sex offenders, shoplifters, drug dealers and violent criminals, will avoid prison under sweeping sentencing reforms to be put before Parliament next month. The Sentencing Bill will require judges to presume against custodial sentences of

A Lord Ordinary has recalled a petition by two companies seeking to reclaim computer code from two former employees on the basis that they had breached confidentiality and infringed their copyright after finding that the petition had been granted without full disclosure. PE Ltd and another company s

Young people who engage in rioting and large-scale public disorder offences have been urged to consider the impact a criminal record will have on their lives. The warning comes from a senior Crown Office prosecutor after a 17-year-old was sentenced to 18 months' detention for firework-related disord

So-called SLAPPs are being used in the UK to silence and intimidate people who expose or criticise the actions of authoritarian regimes including Russia and China, MPs have said. A new report published by Westminster's joint committee on human rights has called for stronger action to stop the growth

Original painting by George Willison (1741-1797), engraved by Valentine Green (1739-1813). Original mezzotint print, published 1770. Print commemorating the victory of Archibald Douglas in the House of Lords. A portrait of Douglas appears in the medallion, supported on a plinth by a figure of J

From Dublin to Dundee and Belfast to Birmingham, the labouring poor of 19th century Britain and Ireland had to contend with the widespread scourge of child-stripping – the theft of their children’s clothing by heartless thieves who faced the full rigour of the law when apprehended. Local

Prison reform campaigners have called for a cap on the number of prisoners in Scotland as jails grow dangerously overcrowded and under-resourced. The country’s prison population reached an average of almost 8,000 last year, an eight per cent increase since 2023.

Alastair Tibbs reviews Netflix's new documentary on the Grenfell Tower fire. In the early hours of 14 June 2017, the London sky was ignited. What started as a spark from a faulty fridge soon became the blaze that claimed the lives of 72 men, women and children. It was, however, a perfect storm of ne

The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal by an Aberdeen-based offshore drilling company against a decision of the Court of Appeal that a hire cap provision could be applied to its provision of a support vessel for an oil platform for the purposes of calculating corporation tax due in the accounting

The public inquiry into the death of Sheku Bayoh has appointed a third senior counsel amid mounting tensions over its leadership. Jason Beer KC, a specialist in public inquiries and head of 5 Essex Chambers, has joined Angela Grahame KC and Laura Thomson KC on the legal team supporting the inquiry.

A telecoms worker from Paisley has been sentenced for creating and storing AI-generated images of child sex abuse.  Risto Bergman, 42, who is originally from Finland, pled guilty to making pictures showing young girls being abused. 

Almost 40,000 offenders will be subject to electronic monitoring at any given time under a major expansion of tagging technology at the centre of forthcoming sentencing reforms. Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary, is reported to have secured £700 million in funding from the chancellor, Rac

George William Penrose was born in Port Glasgow on June 2, 1938. He graduated MA from Glasgow University in in 1959 and qualified as a chartered accountant in 1962. In the same year he also graduated LLB from Glasgow University. He was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates on 17 July 1964 and began

A former nurse who stalked and terrified a woman after matching with her on a dating app has been jailed again – this time for breaching a non-harassment order. Adele Rennie, 34, from Kilmarnock, pled guilty at the town’s Sheriff Court yesterday. She admitted contacting a woman she had p