A quick thread on the Alex Salmond trial, which begins today (Monday 9 March) at the High Court in Edinburgh - here’s how it’s going to work, and how we’ll be covering it: bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotla…
Alex Salmond is accused of carrying out a series of sexual assaults against 10 women, dating back to when he was serving as Scotland's first minister; there are a total of 14 charges, all of which he denies. And so it goes to trial.
The case will be decided by a jury of 15 people. It will be overseen by Lady Dorrian - the Lord Justice Clerk, Scotland's second most senior judge. The prosecution is being led by advocate depute Alex Prentice QC, and the defence by Gordon Jackson QC
There are no opening speeches - once jury is selected we go straight into the prosecution case. The defence can cross-examine each Crown witness. After the prosecution case, the defence can lead witnesses of their own - although they don't have to, onus is on Crown to prove guilt
In Scotland, there are three possible verdicts in a criminal trial - guilty, not guilty, and 'not proven' (which in practice is also an acquittal, and means the accused is innocent in the eyes of the law). Eight jurors would have to agree for a guilty verdict on any charge.
Our aim is to give you as much info from court as possible - but there are certain limitations on that. The media can't report anything that identifies or could lead to the identification of any of the ten women named in the charges, which means some details may not be published.
This includes "jigsaw identification", where different bits of info are published by different papers or websites which add up to give away someone's identity. Given there are ten people this applies to, everyone is going to have to be *very* careful of their reporting.
This applies to blogs and social media posts too, btw - as do Contempt of Court rules. People can be prosecuted for publishing anything that could prejudice the trial, like speculating about the guilt or innocence of the accused. So, y’know, think before you tweet.
I will also be taking this rule to heart; I’m going to tweet as much as possible throughout the trial (the judge may restrict it at some points), I will be erring on the side of caution over some details until we can get legal advice.
The trial has tentatively been scheduled for four weeks, but it could easily run shorter or indeed longer than that. I'll do a fresh thread for each day’s proceedings, which should hopefully make it easy enough to follow (or indeed mute)
