Courts dealing with increasing crime as appeals decline

The first-quarter figures for 2019-20 reveal a six per cent increase in business at the High Court and a four per cent rise in Sheriff Court solemn and five per cent in Sheriff Court summary business.

The downward trend in the Justice of the Peace court also continues with a 16 per cent reduction since the last quarter.

The fifth statistical bulletin from the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service contains quarterly figures on activity in the High Court and all Sheriff and Justice of the Peace courts giving national trends as well as detailed figures for local courts in solemn and summary criminal business.

The figures reveal:

• The percentage of trials adjourned due to lack of court time fell from 5.6 per cent in 2014/15 to 3.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2019/20 – a drop of 2.5 percentage points;
• Of appeals registered in 2018/19, 16 per cent relate to an appeal solely against conviction, 67 per cent to appeal solely against sentence and 17 per cent to a joint appeal against conviction and sentence showing that appeals solely against sentence are the most common type;
• Overall the volume of criminal cases being appealed has reduced between 2014/15 and 2018/19 by 18 per cent.

David Fraser, chief operations officer, said: “I am delighted that we are now able to add appeals data to the QCC report which provides the key statistics for anyone interested in seeing a detailed picture of trends and performance in Scotland’s criminal courts.

“The addition of information on appeals represents another advance in the drive for openness and transparency on court activity.”