Sturgeon tells BBC: I'm serving a sentence for crime I didn't commit

Nicola Sturgeon has told the BBC she feels like she is “serving a sentence for a crime I did not commit”, after her estranged husband admitted embezzling £400,000 from the SNP, the party she led for years.

In an exclusive interview with Laura Kuenssberg, Scotland’s former first minister refused to apologise for the scandal and struggled to hold back tears, recalling gifts from Peter Murrell that turned out to have been purchased with stolen money.

Sturgeon told the BBC: “I am not responsible for the crimes that my former husband committed and I’m not going to apologise for somebody else’s crimes.”

She has consistently denied any knowledge of Murrell’s crimes, committed between 2010 and 2022.

The former first minister was not charged, following a police investigation. She was SNP party leader between 2014 and 2023 and in that role shared responsibility for monitoring the party’s accounts.

In the interview to be broadcast on Sunday, Sturgeon said: “For my own sake, but for the sake of people out there, a lot of women who end up finding themselves blamed for the actions of the men in their lives, I’m not going to contribute to that kind of sense that I am responsible for somebody else’s crimes.”

She added: “I will take responsibility for the things I do, the decisions I make. I’m sitting here with you right now, answering questions because I believe strongly in that accountability.

“But I am not responsible for the crimes that my former husband committed and I’m not going to apologise for somebody else’s crimes.”

Asked if she bore no responsibility at all despite her role, Sturgeon told the BBC: “No… [Murrell] perpetrated a crime on the SNP. By definition, that included me as the party leader. He misled. He deceived.

“He is serving and will be serving a sentence for a crime he committed. I’m out here feeling as if I’m serving a sentence for a crime I did not commit.”

That echoed comments from the former first minister earlier in the week, when she told an audience at a literary festival she was “deceived, betrayed and lied to” by her husband.

Murrell, the SNP’s former chief executive, used party funds to purchase items including luxury goods, jewellery, cosmetics, two cars and a motorhome.

Sturgeon became emotional when speaking to the BBC about a necklace gifted to her by Murrell that cost more than £400 and which she often wore in public.

Getty Images

She said: “I’d been campaigning a lot in Shetland and we went to visit, as part of the campaign, we went to visit this amazing business, the Shetlands jewellers, and I was being shown around the shop and I stopped at this pendant.

“I mean, you’ve seen pictures of it, it’s beautiful.

“Later that night, Peter said to me, I’ve got a surprise for you. And I saw you admiring this pendant and gave me it.”

She struggled to hold back her emotion, before continuing: “Sorry. I loved that necklace and I wore it a lot.

“And this is the other thing. The idea that I would have gone about wearing things that I had known were anything other than what they were presented as, a gift from my husband… to then find out that these were gifts given to me that he’d bought with the party’s money causes a level of, I don’t know, pain, bewilderment.

“I don’t know, I just… I’m not sure. I’m going to try. I am just not sure I will ever properly come to terms with that.”

Murrell spent more than 20 years as chief executive of the party before resigning in March 2023 due to controversy over details of membership numbers.

He was arrested less than three weeks later in connection with the Operation Branchform investigation into SNP funds.

Sturgeon was arrested two months later in connection with the inquiry and was questioned by detectives before being released without charge.

Following his guilty plea at the High Court in Edinburgh on Monday, Murrell was remanded in custody and could face a lengthy prison term when sentenced on 23 June.

The full Nicola Sturgeon interview will air on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg on BBC One at 09:00 BST on 31 May.

‘I’m the man with the money,’ Murrell told Shetland jeweller

Coffee machines, fountain pens and Grand Theft Auto: How Murrell spent the money

The questions raised by the Peter Murrell embezzlement controversy

Watch: Timeline of SNP finance probe

Advertisement