GD467/1/2/5

1983-1993

SMG/SHRG /Outright Scotland: important legal cases

Photocopies of doucments not writen by SMG, SHRG etc not listed, as are acknowledgements of communications that cannot be identified.,

 9 July 1970 photocopy of letter from Stanley Brown, Crown Agent, Crown Office, Edinburgh to Colin Hervey, SMG.#  
I have received your letter of 1 July about the prosecution of hs in Scotland. The only offences exclusively relating to homosexual condust are as detailed by Mr Hill in his letter of 29 April. These are -
1. Sodomy, which is defined as the unnatural connection between male persons, and
2. Section 11 of the Criminal Amendment Act 1885 which provides that any male person who in public or private commits, or is a party to the commission of, or procures or attempts to procure the commission by any male person of any act of gross indecency with another male person, shall be guilty of an offence.

23 June 1975  photocopy of letter from WH Caswell Probation Officer to Nation Council for Civil Liberties#
Re: [name given] d 1954 (20 years)
I am not sure if anything can be done in the case of the above you man.
This is a single man serving a two year sentence at Wormwood Scrubs whose EDR is 28.8.76 …​ offence of buggery with another serving soldier of the same age. …​ clearly an offence under military law the effect is that he is serving a sentence as a civilian for something which would normally be outside the interest of the lay and which would certainly never result in this sort of sentence …​
Also letter from NCCL to Secy of State for Defence 24 Jul 1975.

13 Dec 1976 letter from Malcolm Crowe, SMG to Lord Advocate
…​ I am appalled to learn that the Paisley Procurator-Fiscal, standing in in another Sheriffdom, has prosecuted in the Sheriff Court a 15-year-old boy for sexual intercourse with a 14-year-old girl contrary to s.5 of the 1885 Criminal (Amendment) Act.
…​ boy concerned is considerably more naive than the girl …​
22 Dec 1976 reply form Crown Office
…​ there was no error regarding the age of the boy. ,, Crown Counsel …​ carefully considered .. considered that the circumstances merited prosecution.

Letter dated 6 August 1976 on SMG headed paper  letter for publication from Member of SMG Angus Robbie, Chairman, South Aberdeen Liberal Association.
"##THE SCOTSMAN, August 6 1976
Dear Sir,
POLICE AND INDECENCY
Your front-page report (Scotsman, JUly 31 [1976]) of the conviction of a Glasgow District Councillor for indecently assaulting a policeman makes sorry reading.  …​ raises several questions.
First, why was it felt necessary to detail two young policemen in plain clothes to keep surveillance on a public lavatory? Surely the occasional but regular presence of a uniformed office and/or police car would have been a better deterrent to those who commit a nuisance. This, and the youth of the two plain clothes men suggest that the police were using "agents provocateurs".
The remarks of P.C. Sheils that he could "take observations" of the adjoining lavatory cubicle through a hole in the wall are particularly distasteful. IF that cubicle was being used by a perfectly lawy-abiding person would PC Sheils have been committing an offence by taking observations?
…​

8 Mar 1977 photocopy of letter frin Ian Dunn, Legal Action Committee, SMG to Minister of Education, Queensland re Greg Weir’s Case# .. to do with sex education in schools in Australia and a gay teacher.

 30 May 1977 letter from Sandr [?] to Malcolm [Crowe]
Name given …​ new [female] member  …​ understanding husband …​ divorce …​ sympathetic solicitor. [Not clear quite what this is about.]