Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 1995

2 In section 1 (confiscation orders)—

(a) in subsection (1)—

(i) for the words from “High Court” to “pronounced)” there shall be substituted the words “High Court or sheriff court (in this section and sections 2 to 7A of this Act referred to as “the court”) of an offence to which this section relates the court, on the application of the prosecutor, may”, and in the remainder of that subsection for the word “Court” where it appears there shall be substituted the word “court”; and

(ii) in paragraph (b), for the word “property” where it first appears there shall be substituted the word “amount” and for the words “the value of that property” there shall be substituted the words “that amount”;

(b) in subsection (2), after the word “following” there shall be inserted the words “offences when prosecuted either on indictment or on summary complaint before the sheriff if the offence is punishable by a fine in excess of level 5 or by imprisonment for a period of more than 3 months or by both such fine and imprisonment”;

(c) after subsection (2) there shall be inserted the following subsections—

“(2A) Any application under this section shall be made—

(a) in proceedings on indictment, when the prosecutor moves for sentence or, if the offender is remitted for sentence under section 104 of the 1975 Act, before sentence is pronounced; and

(b) in summary proceedings following the conviction of the accused.

(2B) A confiscation order shall not be made unless the court orders some other disposal (including an absolute discharge) in respect of the offender.

(2C) If the court decides to make a confiscation order, it shall determine the amount to be payable thereunder before making any decision as to—

(a) imposing a fine on the person;

(b) making any order involving any other payment by him.

(2D) Where a court makes a confiscation order against an accused in any proceedings, it shall, in respect of any offence of which he is convicted in those proceedings, take account of the order before—

(a) imposing any fine on him;

(b) making any order involving any other payment by him,

but subject to that, the court shall leave the order out of account in determining the appropriate sentence or other manner of dealing with the accused.

(2E) Where a court makes both a confiscation order and a compensation order under section 58 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 1980 against the same person in the same proceedings in relation to the same offence and the offence involves the misappropriation of property, it shall direct that the compensation shall be paid first out of any sums applied towards the satisfaction of the confiscation order.”;

(d) subsection (3) shall cease to have effect; and

(e) in subsection (5) for the words “High Court” and “Court” where they occur there shall be substituted the word “court”.