News

Courts in the north and north-east face "significant" delays and increased costs as thousands of people fail to appear for court cases every year, The Press and Journal reports. Since 2015, officials have granted more than 10,000 arrest warrants to track people who have failed to appear in the dock,

Fifty-six per cent of people think sentencing in Scotland is too lenient, according to a survey published by the Scottish Sentencing Council. Ipsos MORI conducted a 15-minute telephone survey with 1,000 randomly selected adult residents in Scotland between 13 March to 7 April 2019 on behalf of the c

Victims of stalking are among those who could get the right to explain to courts how they have personally suffered as a result of crime. A new consultation asks if victims of all serious crimes - including human trafficking, domestic abuse and religiously aggravated offences - should be able to deta

Ken Gerber has joined Mitchells Roberton from Anderson Strathern as a director and partner today. Mr Gerber is a specialist in commercial property, landlord and tenant law and offers strategic advice to family businesses.

Brodies LLP has been named Legal Advisor of the Year at this year’s Scottish Business Insider Deals and Dealmakers Awards.

Andrew Linehan has joined Murray Beith Murray as a rural partner, the firm has announced. Mr Linehan is a specialist in agricultural law and rural property matters with extensive private client experience.

Research from KPMG UK has revealed that house prices in Scotland risk a six per cent drop if Britain leaves the EU without a deal at the end of next month. KPMG warned that a decrease of 10-20 per cent is "not out of the question" if the market reacts more strongly than expected.

Families Need Fathers Scotland has produced a manifesto to coincide with the publication this week of the Scottish government's plans to reform the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. The Way Forward for Scotland calls for changes in the law and legal procedures to "promote the positive value to children

Legal academics and practitioners gathered at a conference in Dundee on Friday to share their expertise on a variety of Scots law issues. Reflections on Scots Law was organised by the Scottish Universities Law Institute (SULI) and allowed authors of recent and forthcoming SULI texts to discuss

Macnabs has drafted more than a hundred wills for clients and raised over £7,000 for charity this year after taking part in a will-writing campaign in which lawyers give up their time for free to write wills for local people, in exchange for a donation to the charity. The firm has taken part i

The average prison time for money laundering offences rose to a record high of 27 months last year after the introduction of new sentencing guidelines, the Financial Times reports. Research undertaken by Thomson Reuters showed that the average length of jail sentences for offenders convicted of mone

Ahead of the new parliamentary year, MSPs from the Scottish Parliament's Justice Committee are spending a day with police officers, legal professionals and others working in the wider justice system in the Scottish Borders. The committee's role is to consider, scrutinise and investigate justice and

A massive haul of suspected drugs seized by airport security turned out to be cake mix for a vegan bakery, police have said. An employee of vegan pizzeria Purezza was transporting the white powder in 25 blue bags and was held up while waiting for tests to be completed.

A legal challenge brought by a cross-party group of parliamentarians to temporarily halt the effect of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s advice to Her Majesty the Queen to shut down the UK Parliament ahead of “Brexit day” has been rejected. A judge in the Court of Session re

Belfast solicitor Laura Banks has warned that the UK government could be brought to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) over its failure to legislate following a landmark ruling on Widowed Parent's Allowance. Ms Banks acted for Siobhan McLaughlin in the case, which was heard by the UK Supreme