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| Costs, Sentencing Profiles and the Scottish Criminal Justice System 1997 |
| 2. Financial Implications of Criminal Justice Decisions | |
| 2.1 This chapter provides an indication of the expenditure of the different agencies involved in the criminal justice process. The chart below illustrates the proportionate share of the total expenditure (capital and current by local and central Government) for each of the agencies. | |
| Expenditure by Criminal Justice Agency
1997-98 Source: The Scottish Office |
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| (1)
Cost relates to all the core activities and central
overheads at the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal
service and is not restricted to the costs of criminal
business. Expenditure includes the costs of investigation
of deaths and the Scottish Charities Office. (2) Relates only to the criminal business of the courts. |
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| 2.2 Legal aid expenditure on criminal accounts paid during 1997-98 is shown in the table below: | |
| Criminal Legal Aid: Analysis of accounts paid by procedure and court, 1997-98 |
Solemn |
Summary |
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Court of First Instance |
Total paid (£)(m) |
No. of cases |
Average Cost
per case |
Total Paid |
No. of cases |
Cost per case |
| High Court | 12,020 |
1,629 |
7,379 |
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| Sheriff Court | 14,754 |
8,913 |
1,655 |
43,784 |
49,125 |
891 |
| District Court | 8,870 |
13,203 |
672 |
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| Total | 26,774 |
10,542 |
2,540 |
52,654 |
62,328 |
845 |
| Source: Scottish Legal Aid Board's Annual Report 1997-98 |
| 2.3 In addition, expenditure on advice and assistance in criminal matters costing £7.583m, Assistance by Way of Representation (ABWOR) costing £2.438m, the duty solicitor scheme costing £0.904m, and appeals costing a further £1.723m, was incurred. |
| 2.4 The costs of various court disposals in the financial year 1997-98 are estimated to have been as follows: |
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| * The probation figure covers only " standard" orders and not those which include participation in intensive projects. |
| 2.5 The tables below show the court and prosecution costs of a criminal case in 1997-98 for the high, sheriff and district courts. |
| Criminal
Case Costs 1997-98 Court Costs |
| Type of Case | Average cost per case | |
| High Court | plea at section 76 diet plea at preliminary diet plea at trial diet Judge and Jury trial (evidence led) |
£304 £304 £304 £11,676 |
| Sheriff solemn | plea at first diet plea at trial diet Sheriff and Jury trial (evidence led) |
£103 £761 £4,668 |
| Sheriff summary | plea at first diet plea at intermediate diet plea at trial diet case concluded at evidence led trial |
£69 £103 £172 £971 |
| District Court | plea at first diet plea at intermediate diet plea at trial diet case concluded at evidence led trial |
N/A* N/A* N/A* N/A* |
| Source: Scottish Court Service |
| * Local authorities who are responsible for the administration of the district courts do not collect information on costs in this way. |
| Criminal
Case Costs 1997-98 Prosecution Costs |
Type of Case |
Average Costs per Case |
% disposed
at each stage |
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1996-97 |
1997-98 |
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| High Court Cases | plea at section 76 diet plea at preliminary diet plea at trial diet Judge and Jury trial (evidence led) |
£1,105 £6,373 £6,373 £7,844 |
£1,161 £6,777 £6,777 £8,341 |
4.6 0.4 51.7 43.3 |
| Sheriff & Jury Cases | plea at first diet plea at preliminary diet plea at trial diet Sheriff and Jury trial (evidence led) |
£752 £3,493 £3,531 £4,077 |
£848 £3,939 £3,982 £4,597 |
17.7 26.7 27.2 28.4 |
| Sheriff summary (includes Stipendiary cases) | plea at first diet plea at intermediate diet plea at trial diet case concluded at evidence led trial |
£78 £199 £229 £331 |
£88 £224 £258 £373 |
52.0 14.3 21.3 12.3 |
| District Courts (excludes Stipendiary cases) | plea at first diet plea at intermediate diet plea at trial diet case concluded at evidence led trial |
£45 £122 £140 £210 |
£51 £138 £158 £237 |
77.4 7.0 9.7 5.9 |
| Source: Crown Office |
| Notes: 1 The divisor used is the number of cases disposed of at each stage in each level of court. |
| 2 Case related expenditure is not recorded by court type but is apportioned according to |
| average time values for each disposal avenue. |
| 3 Corrected Prosecution Cost figures for 1996-97 are reprinted here (as shown in the |
| Correction Slip published on 8 April 1998 to correct the costs for 1996-97) |
| 2.6 Almost 80,000 separate fines were imposed by the sheriff courts in 1997-98; these ranged in value from £5 to £175,000. |
| Between 20 and 30 percent of fines imposed by sheriff courts are paid within the time allowed. Around half of those outstanding generally require means enquiry court appearances. On average the cost of recouping a sheriff court fine at various stages is as follows: |
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| (Note that these costs are the same irrespective of the size of the fine.) |
| The amount of fines recovered by the Sheriff Courts in 1997-98 (including sums remitted from the High Court of Justiciary) was £12,353,000. |
| A total of 138,700 fines were handled by the district courts in 1997-98, including 62,100 court fines, 73,800 registered fines and 2,800 compensation orders. Of those fines which had a final outcome in 1997-98, excluding those for which data was not available, 84% of court fines, 76% of registered fines and 82% of compensation orders were fully paid. A further 7% of court fines were fully or partly remitted, 2% resulted in a supervised attendance order being imposed and 6% resulted in imprisonment. The corresponding proportions for registered fines were 23%, 0.6% and 0.4% respectively. |
| A total of just under 8,000 court fines, registered fines and compensation orders in 1997-98 resulted in the issue of an extract conviction warrant. There were a total of 63,800 citations to appear at a means enquiry court; 38,000 warrants for appearance at a means enquiry court were issued. |
| Over £6 million was received in court fines, registered fines and compensation orders by district courts in 1997-98. |
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