Journey Times in the Scottish Criminal Justice System 2024-25

6.    Overview of times for accused that proceed to court

[Supplementary Table 3]

When the procurator fiscal decides to raise court proceedings against the accused then the accused will be registered in court. This may result in a summary prosecution (in Sheriff or Justice of the Peace (JP) court) or a solemn proceeding (in either Sheriff court or High court).

When an accused is registered in court, several outcomes can occur:

• the accused is convicted, either after pleading guilty or being found guilty after evidence has been heard in Court,
• an acceptable plea short of plea of guilty as libelled is accepted (partial plea),
• the accused is acquitted following a not guilty or a not proven verdict,
• the accused has their plea of not guilty accepted by the prosecutor, or
• the case against an accused is deserted i.e. the Crown decides to not proceed with a prosecution at that time (though they may in some cases decide to prosecute at a future date).

Those convicted of a crime or offence in court can be admonished, given an ‘other’ disposal, a fine, a community disposal, or a custodial sentence. More information on these outcomes of criminal proceedings can be found here:

Criminal Proceedings in Scotland statistics - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

Figure 4 shows the number of accused who proceeded to court and received a verdict, along with the percentages of these cases (represented by colours) in which a verdict was reached within 1 year and over 1 year since police were first aware of the charges.

The number of accused who proceeded to court and received a verdict fell from around 100,000 in 2017-18 to 50,000 in 2020-21. In the most recent years, this figure has increased again to around 90,000.

Up to and including 2019-20, 85-86% of accused proceeded against in criminal courts had a disposal issued within one year of the offence being committed (Figure 4). This fell to 59% in financial year 2021-22 but has been increasing in the last two years reaching 70% in 2024-25.

Figure 4: Percentage of accused receiving a verdict within one year since police were first aware of the charges have been increasing in the last two financial years.

Number of accused who proceeded to court and received a verdict, along with the percentages of these accused (represented by colours) in which a verdict was reached within 1 year and over 1 year since police were first aware of the charges by financial year.