Former SNP chief executive admitted embezzling more than £400,000 from party funds over 12 years, court hears.
Former SNP chief executive Peter Murrell left court in handcuffs on Tuesday after prosecutors revealed the extraordinary scale of a scheme that saw more than £400,000 siphoned from party funds over a 12 year period.
During a hearing at the High Court in Edinburgh, the court heard how Murrell embezzled £400,310.65 from SNP accounts containing money raised through membership fees, donations and legacy payments.
The hearing provided a detailed account of how party money was allegedly spent on personal purchases including luxury vehicles, watches, household goods and a £124,550 motorhome that became one of the most controversial symbols of the SNP finance investigation.
Murrell, who has admitted the embezzlement charge, was taken from court in a prison van and will return on 23 June for sentencing.
Among the most striking revelations was the fate of the motorhome purchased in October 2020 using SNP funds. The vehicle was delivered to an industrial estate before being driven to Murrell’s mother’s home in Dunfermline, where it remained until police seized it in April 2023.
The court heard the motorhome had covered just four miles when officers recovered it.
Prosecutors also outlined how false invoices and misleading accounting entries were used to conceal spending.
Two watches costing £9,350 were allegedly recorded in the SNP’s accounting software as “event merchandise”, despite being personal purchases.
The court heard Murrell created false invoices for an “Apple processor” and “studio light fittings” worth more than £14,000. Investigators later discovered some of the money had instead been spent on garden equipment found during police searches.
Officers also recovered items including a robotic lawnmower, while a smart doorbell costing more than £2,000 was not recovered.
The hearing was told that Murrell made 383 purchases through Amazon, spending £42,660.74 on items that were not for party purposes. Deliveries were made to his home address, SNP headquarters and addresses linked to family members.
A further 238 purchases were made from other retailers using SNP charge cards.
The list of spending disclosed in court ranged from major purchases to relatively modest personal expenses. One SNP card was even used to pay a £30 parking ticket incurred outside Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy.
Prosecutors also detailed how party funds were used in connection with personal vehicles.
Murrell spent £16,498 of SNP money paying off the balance on a Volkswagen Golf. The court heard he later used fraudulent expense claims to fund a £12,000 deposit on a Jaguar I-PACE, with further false invoices allegedly created to cover the remaining cost of the vehicle, which totalled more than £81,000.
According to the Crown, the offending continued for years and involved the use of party charge cards, bank transfers and accounting records that disguised personal spending as legitimate SNP expenditure.
The court heard Murrell first instructed his legal team to discuss a guilty plea in March this year after being served with a dossier of evidence gathered during the long running police investigation into SNP finances.
The case forms part of the wider Operation Branchform investigation, which examined the handling of party funds and led to extensive searches and seizures by Police Scotland.
Murrell now faces the prospect of a substantial custodial sentence when he returns to the High Court later this month.
For many observers, however, it was the image of a £124,550 motorhome sitting virtually unused for more than two years, and recovered with only four miles on the clock, that summed up one of the most remarkable political finance scandals in modern politics.
