Corporate homicide in Scotland

In Scotland, there had not been a single charge under the CMCHA 2007, never mind a conviction. However, in March 2023 the Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain KC instructed the police to investigate whether the Scottish Prison Service should be prosecuted for corporate homicide – the Scottish equivalent of corporate manslaughter. This follows the death of remand prisoner Allan Marshall, who died after being restrained by 13 prison officers at HMP Edinburgh in 2015.

Marking International Workers Memorial Day on 28 April 2023, the STUC Scottish Trades Union Congress and Scottish Hazards safety campaign published figures showing an almost doubling of annual workplace deaths in Scotland since 2019, from 11 to 21, and called for the urgent reform of the corporate homicide legislation. They said the 2007 Act must be replaced with new statutory offences to hold companies and corporations to account for workplace deaths. Since the Act was introduced, more than 300 workers have died, but there have been no prosecutions recorded, they added.