A COURT of Session judge will rule on whether Rangers administrator David Whitehouse will be able to have documents to enable him to make a full complaint of criminal action against the Crown Office and also take part in the forthcoming judge-led inquiry into the malicious prosecution he suffered.
The National revealed that Whitehouse and his colleague Paul Clark, of insolvency specialists Duff and Phelps, have been paid £21 million in damages and £3m in legal expenses after the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service admitted they had been maliciously prosecuted.
A virtual hearing in the Court of Session heard that Lord Advocate James Wolffe QC, a Scottish Government minister and head of the prosecution services, opposes the release of documents.
The Court heard Whitehouse’s lawyer, Roddy Dunlop QC, the Dean of the Faculty of Advocates, say that the judge-led inquiry would be about finding out “how on earth this happened.”
Dunlop said: “It is inconceivable that Mr Whitehouse will not be front and centre in that inquiry, and it is inconceivable that he will not want to cooperate fully. These documents should be usable by Mr Whitehouse for the purposes of cooperating with that inquiry. “Lord Tyre said he would issue a written judgement later.
Whitehouse’s PR adviser, Jack Irvine, said his client “needs all the documents to enable him to co-operate with an investigation and to assist in the planned public inquiry ... frankly I am shocked that everybody is trying to filter and put a lid on complaints.”
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