Ex-SNP Westminster Leader Mocked Over Explanation For Nicola Sturgeon Amid Embezzlement Scandal

The former first minister of Scotland says she "did not know at all" about her husband's crimes.

Political Correspondent

Ian Blackford stunned online critics after he came up with a strange explanation for former first minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon’s ignorance about her estranged husband’s embezzlement crimes.

Peter Murrell, chief executive of the Scottish National Party between 2001 and 2023, pleaded guilty to taking more than £400,000 from the SNP this week.

He has been charged with embezzling funds from the party between August 2010 and October 2022.

Murrell was arrested as part of Operation Branchform, a Police Scotland probe into the party’s finances, in 2023, and charged in April 2024.

He has been remanded in custody and is set to be sentenced at the end of June.

He made a series of extravagant purchases while he was SNP chief, including a £124,550 campervan for his own personal use.

His estranged wife Sturgeon was also arrested in 2024 and questioned by detectives, but was never charged with any offences.

Sturgeon, who led Scotland from 2014 until 2023, has insisted she “did not know at all” about her husband’s crimes and that she has been “deceived, misled, lied to and betrayed”.

The ex-SNP leader, who separated from her partner in January 2025, revealed that........

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