Prosecutions brought for breach of Protection of Wild Mammals Act: EIR release

Information requested

The number of prosecutions brought for breach of Protection of Wild Mammals Act since it was passed and in particular the number/percentage of cases where there was not a conviction held against the defendant, be it for the case being dismissed or the defendant not being found guilty.

Response

The answer to your question is provided in the table below. The Protection of Wild Mammals (Scotland) Act 2002 was passed by the Parliament on 13 February 2002 and received Royal Assent on 15 March 2002 with the first concluded cases appearing in Criminal Proceedings in Scotland data for the financial year 2003-04.

Number of people proceeded against under the Protection of Wild Mammals (Scotland) Act 2002, where main charge, 2003-04 to 2020-21.

Financial Year	Proceedings	Not guilty¹	Not guilty %
2003-04	3	1	33
2004-05	3	1	33
2005-06	24	8	33
2006-07	17	9	53
2007-08	15	9	60
2008-09	8	2	25
2009-10	10	3	30
2010-11	9	6	67
2011-12	5	5	100
2012-13	11	4	36
2013-14	9	4	44
2014-15	3	1	33
2015-16	5	2	40
2016-17	8	-	-
2017-18	4	-	-
2018-19	6	4	67
2019-20	-	-	-
2020-21	1	-	-

 

1 - includes Plea not guilty accepted, Deserted simpliciter, Acquitted not guilty and Acquitted not proven.
Source: Scottish Government Criminal Proceedings database

Data for 2020-21 are affected by the pandemic and subsequent court closures and may not be indicative of long term trends.

The latest available data are for 2020-21. Information for 2021-22 will not be available until publication of the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland, 2021-22 Statistical Bulletin. This is due to be published in 2023.

For future interest, the data on the number of people proceeded against in Scottish Courts for wildlife offences is also available from the Wildlife Crime Annual Report. The latest report can be accessed
here (please see Appendix 3).

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