‘Sorry’ sheriff who had shares in Rangers to retire after misleading report during botched club takeover
A SHERIFF who owned shares in Rangers is set to retire after submitting a misleading report during the failed police investigation into the takeover of the club.
Sheriff Lindsay Wood granted 22 warrants to police during the botched fraud probe despite regularly attending Gers matches and social events.
According to The Times, David Grier, 61, who was a consultant with the financial firm Duff & Phelps, submitted a formal complaint against Wood in May 2022 with the Judicial Office for Scotland.
One of the warrants that was issued in 2015 allowed police to raid the offices of Holman Fenwick Willan, the legal firm representing Duff & Phelps, in London.
But the raid was deemed to be unlawful and "executed without proper safeguards”.
Craig Turnbull, sheriff principal of Glasgow and Strathkelvin, has now concluded that Wood submitted a misleading report following an investigation.
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The report had attempted to justify his decision to issue the warrant and also included information that he was oblivious to when he did so.
It appeared that he relied heavily on information that was supplied by the senior investigating officer, Detective Chief Inspector Jim Robertson.
The information was taken directly from a “police warrant request sheet” which was compiled by DCI Roberston, who reportedly sang a Rangers song as he conducted interviews.
But it has been ruled that he gave “patently untrue" evidence and acted in an "intimidatory and threatening” way while behaving in a “reprehensible” manner.
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Duff & Phelps, now Kroll, were the multinational finance firm that managed Rangers’ affairs after it entered administration in 2012.
Finance experts Grier, David Whitehouse and Paul Clark were the individuals appointed to the case.
The three men were then arrested two years later over allegations of fraud that was linked to the sale and collapse of the club.
Although the charges were dropped, many fans of the club blamed them for not doing enough to have possibly prevented the demise of the club.
Four other individuals, including Craig Whyte, the businessman who bought Rangers for £1 from Sir David Murray in 2011, were also charged but later cleared.
The scandal also cost the taxpayer more than £40million to those who were prosecuted maliciously.
In his complaint, Grier claimed that Wood used the police warrant request sheet for the report that was submitted to Lord Carloway “without telling the court that was what he had done”.
Turnbull then found that he did "not dispute this".
He wrote: "The sheriff relied upon the police information sheet in the preparation of the supplementary report.
“He accepts that the report looked as if it was his own note of what he was told by the police officer [Robertson] in the application for the warrant in question.
"The sheriff accepts that there was material in the report which he did not know when he granted the warrant.”
And after finding the complaint substantiated, Turnbull added: “An [appeal] court has a legitimate expectation that reports provided to it by judges of the court below are complete, accurate and not misleading.
“In the present case the supplementary report was misleading.”
Turnbull also said that Wood had apologised and accepted responsibility.
He added: "The sheriff has given notification of his intention to retire in May 2023.
In response to Wood not discharging his responsibilities properly, he said: "That failure requires to be marked in some way.
“My recommendation is that formal advice be given.”
However Carloway, who is the most senior judge in Scotland, said no action would be necessary and overturned the recomendation.
A spokesperson for the Judicial Office told the Scottish Sun: “The Lord President carefully considered the Sheriff Principal’s report and written representations from Sheriff Wood in relation to the provision of formal advice.
"As almost 7 years have elapsed since the conduct complained of occurred and the sheriff has recognised his error and expressed remorse, the Lord President has decided that it would neither be appropriate nor desirable to issue formal advice.
"It would serve no concrete purpose.”
Wood owned a total of 110 shares in the club's old parent company in 2008.
But these became worthless when it went into administration four years later.
However Turnbull did not investigate the alleged conflict of interest between Wood and his affiliation with Rangers.
Grier launched a £9million lawsuit against the lord advocate as well as Police Scotland after claiming he had been wrongfully arrested.
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This was upheld earlier this month after an appeal and found that the botched investigation was described as “incompetence, poor judgement and a lack of professionalism.”
Grier also filed a complaint against Robertson who is believed to have applied for early retirement.
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