SNP’s Peter Murrell bought wine tools with taxpayer’s cash
Wine accessories were among the haul of items bought by the former chief executive of the Scottish National Party (SNP), who has been sentenced to five years in prison for embezzling money from the political organisation.
Police have released information and images of items purchased by Peter Murrell, estranged husband of Nicola Sturgeon (the former First Minister of Scotland), using the almost half a million pounds he embezzled from the SNP between 2010 and 2022.
Murrell was arrested in April 2023 in connection with Operation Branchform and was convicted in May 2026 after pleading guilty to a charge of embezzlement at Edinburgh High Court.
Judge Lord Young said Murrell had carried out a “calculated crime of dishonesty” but told the court he had been unable to identify a clear motive for the “not very sophisticated” theft of £400,310.65.
Sturgeon has denied any knowledge of his crime, saying simply that she was “deceived”. She resigned two months before Murrell’s arrest.
What did he buy?
According to police authorities, the biggest ticket items that Murrell bought with the stolen cash were a motorhome (£124,550), a robotic lawn mower (£3070), two coffee machines (worth £1865.75 and £3231.90) and a Smythson tea set (£2,396), along with two Jura watches from luxury jeweller CW Sellors (at £4,795 and £4,555.25) and a home library set-up (£1946).
Furthermore, a Dyson lamp from John Lewis (£656.94), a Dyson Supersonic stand (£59.99) and two Dyson hoovers (£499.99 and £599) also made it onto his shopping list.
Additionally, Murrell bought an Oyster Jewellery Box (£2,495) and a Mara Stationery Bureau (£1,681), both from Smythson, and a cornucopia of other stationery-related items including Montblanc fountain pens, various pen pouches, rollerball pens, writing folders and Smythson folios, amounting to more than £19,000.
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“It is, quite frankly, an outrageous amount of money to spend on pens in my opinion, what about your opinion?” police asked Murrell when questioning him upon his arrest.
Wine accessories
Also included among his purchases were a number of wine-related items, including an ornate silver wine coaster (pictured above), which he bought for £3,500 under the guise of “leadership expenses.”
Two Le Creuset wine stoppers (£55 and £35) and a Le Creuset wine opener foil remover (from £22.05 on Amazon) were also bought and paid for using tax-payers’ money.
During Murrell’s sentencing, Judge Lord Young said: “You carried out a large number of fraudulent acts over a 12-year period while you were chief executive officer of the Scottish National Party. In total, a sum of just over £400,000 was taken from that organisation and your offending increased in frequency and in amount over time.
“You found yourself unable to stop this offending and it was only the detection of the crime which brought it to an end. Your actions involved a significant breach of trust to the organisation, which you led, and to the individual members and donors of that organisation.”
Checks and balances
“Because of your position of authority,” Judge Young continued, “you were able to circumvent the checks and balances that existed. The manner of the embezzlement, although not particularly sophisticated, included the fabrication of invoices, you gave false information to junior members of staff to input into the accounting system.”
The judge added that he hoped the five-year prison sentence handed down to Murrell would serve as a deterrent “to any senior officials in other large organisations who might be tempted to abuse their position in the way that you did.”
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