The Invisible Rabbit
Further to Monday’s letter from the Deputy Chief Constable, we’ve now submitted the following Freedom Of Information request to Police Scotland, as per his suggestion.
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To: FOI <foi@scotland.police.uk>
15 July 2026
This week I received a letter from DCC Stuart Houston. It notes in part:
“During this time, Police Scotland utilised financial investigators, financial analysts and a forensic accountant to fully investigate the circumstances surrounding reported irregularities. Consideration was given to other crime types, such as, but not limited to, those listed in your letter.
These matters were also fully investigated, and all of the circumstances were reported to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service for advice and guidance.”
As Police Scotland announced that Operation Branchform was closed on 26 May 2026 and is no longer a live investigation requiring confidentiality, and as the matter is of such great public interest – involving as it does the extremely grave matters of public confidence in the Scottish Government and the integrity and independence of Police Scotland and COPFS when investigating potential crimes committed by members of that government – the information I request is therefore as follows:
(1) What advice and guidance was received from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service specifically regarding the initial complaint about the Scottish National Party’s suspected misappropriation of “ringfenced” fundraiser money (rather than the subsequent offence of embezzlement against the Party for which Peter Murrell was prosecuted and convicted)?
(2) On which date/s was this advice and guidance received?
(3) On which date (an approximate one, eg “August 2023” or “Spring 2022”, will suffice if a more precise one cannot be identified) did Police Scotland cease investigations into the original complaint of misappropriation of funds by the SNP (again as opposed to Peter Murrell’s subsequent embezzlement from the Party)?
(4) Did they do so on the grounds that (a) no crime was identified, or that (b) there had been a crime but the perpetrator/s could not be identified, or that (c) there had likely been a crime but evidence was insufficient for a prosecution, or for some other reason?
In the interests of transparency I can see no justifiable reason for these facts being withheld from the public.
The integrity of the government, police and prosecution service is not a matter of mere curiosity or prurience. It is vital to public faith in national institutions and I will pursue this matter with the Information Commissioner if necessary.
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We’ll be sending a similar one to the Crown Office, and our solicitor will also be writing to Police Scotland separately. We’ll continue to keep you posted.
Thank you for all your work on this important matter. I can’t believe that the mainstream media doesn’t seem to care.
Enigmatic headline. Was the, “invisible rabbit” pulled from a visible or invisible hat?
Or could it be a “Cheshire” rabbit, perhaps?
If so, then following the feline precedent , there be a leporine grin for us to see.
Had to look up the word “Leporine”:
“Of or characteristic of rabbits or hares”
It’s all coming together…
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« Alice felt that this could not be denied, so she tried another question, ‘What sort of people live about here?’
‘In that direction,’ the Cat said, waving its right paw round, ‘lives a Hatter; and in that direction,’ waving the other paw, ‘lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they’re both mad.’
‘But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ Alice remarked.
‘Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the Cat, ‘we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.’
‘How do you know I’m mad?’ said Alice.
‘You must be,’ said the Cat, ‘or you wouldn’t have come here.’
[…] ‘You’ll see me there,’ said the Cat and vanished.
Alice was not much surprised at this, she was getting so used to queer things happening. While she was looking at the place where it had been, it suddenly appeared again.
‘By-the-bye, what became of the baby?’ said the Cat, ‘I’d nearly forgotten to ask.’
‘It turned into a pig,’ Alice quietly said, just as if it had come back in a natural way.
‘I thought it would,’ said the Cat and vanished again.
Alice waited a little, half expecting to see it again, but it did not appear, and after a minute or two she walked on in the direction in which the March Hare was said to live… »
“….you can’t help that,’ said the Cat, ‘we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.’”
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As you say, it’ s all coming together. I cannot decide if the Cat’s view of Wonderland is the perfect metaphor for the rump-SNP, the Greens, the SG or Holyrood.
If we take a peek Through the Looking Glass, we find Humpty Dumpty saying:,“When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
Why do these words remind me of a certain former First Minister?
And of course that particularly wunderbar Weimar-esque line will not have escaped you:
« Alice was not much surprised at this, she was getting so used to queer things happening…. »
I am now old enough to remember ‘The Profumo Scandal’ of over 60 years ago. John Profumo was not forced to resign in disgrace for Shagging Christine Keeler, but, for lying to Parliament about it.
Of course, that was then – different times – lying to Parliament no longer appears to be wrong. But, he was caught, not for the “crime” but for the cover-up.
The SNP has not got itself into bother for misusing the ring-fenced funds, but through its attempted cover-up.
Do politicians never learn? Mind you, I have said on these pages before, re-appointing John Swinney as Leader, following his failure first time round does appear to be a sure sign of madness at the top in the party.
Socrates MacSporran
I too am old enough to remember the profumo scandal, and yes, it was his lying to Parliament that was his downfall.. I also remember well when Swiney was leader from 2001-2003, & what a disaster of a leader he was back then… He is even worse today, because he IS a liar, & one that gets away with his lying..Everyone talks about how Sturgeon got rid of those she feared could take and do her job better, makes me think Swiney taught her well? Because as the leader of a party that was formed to get INDEPENDENCE, he had a great fear of people like our late Great Margo, so much so, he intended to stick her 5th on the list, SNP were just a list party back then..But putting a hero for Indy 5th on the list meant she could never win a seat, so he too was FEART of the competition…Had it not been for Campbell Martin alerting Margo to Swiney’s intentions, she would have been kicked to the kerb by Swiney, but Margo was too clever for the likes of Swiney, she resigned from the party, stood as an INDEPENDENT and WON her seat…Swiney back then also made it clear he favoured devolution.. NOTHING about
that man has changed, he is still a Liar and still the most useless of leaders, unfortunately there is NO Alex Salmond to step up and oust him as leader today..
REDACTOR MAN has been the only job he got right from letting the truth be known..
And as it happens, “Redactor” rhymes with “Tractor”…
“Redactor” rhymes with “Tractor”…
Its synonym , “expurgator” rhymes with “traytor”
It’s only madness if he wasn’t doing what they wanted.
The smell isn’t going away, it’s only getting worse.
Your investigative journalism should win awards Stu. It shames the rest of the media. What you are doing is vital for democracy. Thank you.
“The smell isn’t going away, it’s only getting worse”
Indeed, and what is being revealed to us more and more each day demonstrates that a “colonial society is… the most putrid carrion that ever rotted under the sun” (Cesaire).
If this society is so bad why don’t you piss off to tea towel land and feel at home in the caves with the inbreds and rats.
We’ll let me be the first to say, your commitment isn’t half cocked.
Youtube Vid below “The Bell Is Tolling For Her!” | Nicola Sturgeon Refuses To Release Police Statement.
youtube.com/watch?v=pXgLfotFWz4
You’re lucky Stu that you’re still getting answers.
Many years ago, I held similar well documented grievances against corrupt and deceitful players in the Establishment, and the case went before a certain Mr Swinney for adjudication, Minister in charge, and who was tasked to do nothing beyond require aforementioned rogues to simply answer the fkg questions. – Questions they couldn’t answer without confessing their guilt.
I hadn’t the money for a lawyer, never mind a KC of Roddy Dunlop’s stature. It was so black and white, frankly, I didn’t think I needed one. (Wrong).
Swinney, at length, wrote me an extremely patronising letter, which was so removed from the substance of my grievance that I had to enquire if he’d addressed the wrong grievance by mistake. Herd these c#!ts up a Cul-de-sac, and they’ll teleport to a different street.
But no, it was quite deliberate, and in subsequent “reply”, the gutless wanker Swinney merely stonewalled with the reply he had “nothing to add to the (non) – reply I’d already been given. So much for a slam-dunk injustice and the “power” of documentary evidence proving it.
Swinney has ALWAYS been an honourless and deceitful coward; an Establishment flunky groomed life-long in the Local Authority system, who’s every instinct is to shut down any grievance and defend the Establishment, no matter how despicable, corrupt, and disreputable the said Establishment is revealed to be. As a man, he cares nothing about truth, justice, or professional integrity. NOTHING.
Such a craven, two faced, tactless and deceitful puppet for the Establishment is the very last individual who should ever have been put in charge of breaking that Establishment’s colonial subjugation of Scotland, but I rather suspect that may be the very reason the talentless no-mark actually is.
Same too for the Sturgeon “inquiry”. The thought of so-called ‘Honest John’ being put in charge of getting to the truth of anything simply makes me puke.
I tried to tell the nation that, way back before the 2014 Referendum. Check my earliest Wings contributions. Had the Independence movement listened to my warnings, long before Sturgeon and Robertson emasculated the SNP, together, we could all have averted over a decade of SNP chicanery and treachery. We might be settled into life as an Independent Scotland who wasn’t currently pursuing a death wish by provoking war with Russia.
More power to your elbow Rev Stu, but heed my caution, it isn’t over until the fat lady sings. Do not put a modicum of faith in ultimately seeing justice for justices sake, because it means nothing to these worms, who flee the truth the way cockroaches scuttle away from the light. There is no confession or contrition coming. They are incapable of it, like a psychopath is incapable of empathy. Even if they were sane and rational individuals, that sanity would merely affirm they have far too much to lose.
And if anybody in Swinney’s entourage reads this, please pass on my regards to the wee rat. I hope that Swinney is panicking like a cornered beast, facing his long overdue comeuppance for being a life long tosser, wholly and entirely bereft of professional integrity. The man is a stain upon Scotland, grossly over promoted, and well rewarded because of how useful he is to the enemies of Scotland. And coming after Sturgeon, he can’t even claim to be original to the roll.
I have been arguing since 2015 on here about the SNP and Sturgeon true commitment to Independence being Nil.
Its worse than just the SNP and Sturgeon or even her cabal, you have so called Independence supporters actively arguing against all the evidence reported, but instead making out that the problem is Wings, Alba Party or even Salmond him self and yet show me anyone in Scotland who’s done more for Scotland than salmond.
The so called Independence paper what a pile of unionist piss, then you have the so called bloggers saying vote SNP twice knowing this will achieve nothing other than keep people funding their lifestyles and Scotland tied the this shit union.
I’m sorry to hear about your experience but not surprised.
There is truly something sinister in the SNP and the party is rotten to the core and its all starts at Sturgeon’s door.
Everything sinister in the SNP and its cabal is sex and gender related.
Long time no see, Breeks. Best to you.
Amen to that.
Don’t stay away too long again, Breeks.
Well, Breeks, I note you’re still of the opinion that former colonies should roll over and accept forced re-colonisation by the former imperial power.
I’m afraid that makes any other opinion you may care to advance deeply suspect. I’m afraid that makes you, as a self-confessed supporter of Scottish Independence and Scottish decolonisation, a laughing stock.
Sorry.
“Prick”.
Wee Wally Winky reminds us of more innocent times.
Was it “Winky”? I forget.
Starmers commons exit today was quite bizarre..
Standing ovation given when he said “To my wife and children, I love you. Goodbye.”
Yikes!
Best keep an eye on him in case he jumps off London Bridge into the Thames (perish the thought).
“This will be my last answer from this despatch box.
Every prime minister knows when they take up the torch that the day will come when they have to pass it on. That day has come for me.
This is the end of my political journey.
In six years, we went from historic defeat in 2019 to historic victory in 2024, and in two years in government I leave the country in better shape than I found it.
I’m proud of everything that we have achieved.
Can I just take time to say to you, Mr Speaker, and all those who work for the house and in our constituency offices, thank you for all your hard work.
To our civil service, thank you also for all your hard work.
To my political team, many of them here today, who came on this journey with me, thank you so much for everything you have done, and being prepared to walk through fire for me.
To my colleagues on these benches, I am proud of all we have achieved together and proud of each and every one of you.
To my successor, and each of you, I will give my full support.
To all colleagues across the house, can I wish you good health and happiness.
To all those in the gallery, whose lives have been changed or improved by this Labour government, and all across the country who struggle to be seen or heard, you’re the reason I came into politics.
To my wife and children, I love you.
Goodbye.”
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This is what he actually said in summing up.
AX
Well at least I made it to the end 🙂
(Hatey for instance has problems reading things like oaths to the end so gets the meaning implicit completely wrong).
🙂
Anyway, that’s 5 to 10 minutes of typing time you’ll never get back..
Aw, YL.
I’m touched to discover you’re thinking of me.
I guess there’s absolutely no point in asking you to stop.
There must be something about me reminding you that a solemn oath of fealty shouldn’t be lightly entered into, nor lightly broken, that grinds your gears.
I guess that’s because you know I’m right.
HMcH
Errrrrrrr..
That’s a No.
Please accept my explanation that it no way infers respect or conviviality!
PS: anyways remember to read right to the bottom of contracts before you sign them, AND, this is the important bit – not all oaths are like your “till death do us part” civil partnership vows or your Scotchland Office tea trolley division official secrets act “in this life or the next” imagined in yer wee heid gravitas..
Oh heck, I’ve logged this on post midnight once your ward/ wing is locked down..
6.48am tomorrow it’ll have to be then “old boy” when the WIFIs back on unless of course something this evening has upset you so very very much (awww bless) and you’ve been indulging in matrons “medication trolley” ahem..
Have a look at this!!!
Might be more money missing that just the Independence Referendum Fund.
youtube.com/watch?v=Y7REz7A-Sh0
Come on Watson! The game’s afoot!
Yaxley-Lennon…
the Authentic Alien Invader,
link to bbc.co.uk
We shout protest outside Holyrood or Bute house demanding Swinney is removed from office and investigated.
We should protest outside Holyrood or Bute house demanding Swinney is removed from office and investigated.
Great to see you back Breeks. You have been missed!
Aye. Right.
Everybody waiting for the march on Hollyrood to impeach ScotGov has had to put their lives on hold.
“Heather” Herbert (friend of the site) has been arrested and charged.