LORD Advocate James Wolffe QC conceded that the Crown had maliciously prosecuted two administrators of Rangers FC, then paid out taxpayers’ money of £21 million in damages and £3m in legal expenses.

Now it has emerged that his wife, judge Lady Wolffe, advised the Rangers administrators Duff and Phelps after the club’s collapse in 2012 and was paid a sum at the time said to be in the thousands of pounds.

The National can reveal that the then Sarah Wolffe QC gave advice to the administration team. It was said to include issues surrounding the 2011 purchase of Rangers by Craig Whyte using millions provided by Ticketus.

It was this transaction with the ticket mortgaging agency which later led to Whyte going to trial and being acquitted on fraud charges in June, 2017.

Others who were charged included Duff and Phelps personnel David Whitehouse, Paul Clark and David Grier – the first two have already received apologies, damages and their legal expenses after the Crown admitted malicious prosecution, while Grier is currently suing the Lord Advocate for £5m Neither Whitehouse, Clark or Grier would comment as they are awaiting the outcome of cases against the Lord Advocate, but Whitehouse’s spokesperson confirmed that Lady Wolffe acted for Duff and Phelps in 2012.

The involvement of Lady Wolffe very early in the administration and eventual liquidation of the club was not registered as a conflict of interest by the Lord Advocate who as a member of the Scottish Government is subject to the ministerial code.

READ MORE: Crown Office opposes release of files in £24 million Rangers prosecution case

Sarah Wolffe was made a judge in March, 2015, and her husband became the Lord Advocate in May, 2016, when he inherited responsibility for the case from his predecessor Frank Mulholland QC who is also now a judge.

Law journalist Peter Cherbi, who is in the ninth year of his campaign to establish a register of interests for Scotland’s judiciary says the case of Lady Wolffe and her husband proves the need for a register of interests, and says that questions must be asked of the Lord Advocate over his failure to acknowledge his wife’s prior involvement, either to Parliament or the courts.

Cherbi revealed in December 2017 that Lady Wolffe had been scheduled to be the judge at a hearing in the long-running case of Whitehouse and Clark versus the Lord Advocate before officials realised that would mean Lady Wolffe sitting in a case involving her husband and transferred the hearing to another judge.

"If there had been a register of judicial interests," said Cherbi, "then the mistake could never have happened as anyone could have seen that Lady Wolffe could not preside over a hearing involving her husband.

"The National's revelations today are quite shocking and questions need to be asked as to why the Lord Advocate has never mentioned his wife's prior involvement in the matter."  

 

A spokesperson for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service said: “There is no basis in fact to the suggestion that the Lord Advocate has breached the Ministerial Code. The Lord Advocate was named in the civil actions taken by Mr Clark and Mr Whitehouse and was obliged to respond to them. He was advised throughout by senior counsel and an independent legal team.”

They added: “None of the matters at issue gave rise to a conflict of interest for the Lord Advocate, whose register of interests is published by the Scottish Parliament.”

In response to The National's question to Lady Wolffe, a Judicial Communications spokesperson said: “It would not be appropriate to comment outwith a court process on the details of any case involving a member of the judiciary, whether in their judicial role or otherwise.”