Sectarian incidents at football matches: FOI release

Information requested

You asked for:

1. The number of sectarian incidents that have taken place at football matches across Scotland.
2. The information to include the number of arrests that have taken place, the number of prosecutions and those who have received a guilty verdict.
3. The information for the last five years.

Response

Hate Crime in Scotland 2017-18
https://www.copfs.gov.uk/images/Documents/Statistics/Hate%20Crime%202017-18/Hate%20Crime%20in%20Scotland%202017-18.pdf and;

Charges reported under the Offensive Behavior at Football and Threatening Communications Act 2016-2017
https://www.gov.scot/publications/charges-reported-under-offensive-behaviour-football-threatening-communications-scotland-act/pages/4/.

As there are no charges recorded on the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service database reported under the Act after 2017-18, I am unable to provide data from the past five years. This is because the Act was repealed on 20 April 2018. Revised Lord Advocate’s Guidelines dated 9 March 2018 outlined that criminal offences, which may previously have been reported using section 1 or section 6 of the Act, should be reported using alternative common law or statutory offences. Therefore, after this date, new charges which previously would have been reported under the Act may instead have been reported under a different offence.

About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.