It’s ALWAYS the money with the worst of the Progressives, isn’t it? Swear to Gawd – that’s what always trips them up, one way or the other, from the Clintons to AOC to Bernie, the list goes on and on.

This time it’s the husband of former First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon who’s been pinched as part of a “funding probe.”

The husband of former Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon was held by police on Wednesday as part of an investigation into the funding of the governing pro-independence Scottish National Party before later being released without charge.

Police Scotland said a 58-year-old man had been arrested at 0645 GMT and questioned by detectives before being released pending further investigation more than 11 hours later.

Its officers also carried out searches at a number of addresses linked to the investigation.

Peter Murrell, 58, who stood down as the SNP’s chief executive last month, was taken into police custody on Wednesday morning, according to a party official who asked not to be named.

D’oh!

So maybe it wasn’t all work-related exhaustion that caused his wife’s resignation (My post on that).

The Scottish Daily Express has been on the case for a while, and they are all over today’s developments, as they’ve been harsh critics of Sturgeon and the SNP for ages. In fact, when she resigned, their headline didn’t exactly reflect “bon voyage” goodwill, if you get my drift.

Bye bye Nicola Sturgeon, don’t let the door hit you in the backside on the way out

Apparently the funds in question – some £600K worth – had been donated specifically for Sturgeon and the SNP’s doomed run at Scottish independence. That measure failed, and when an accounting of the funds raised for it was requested, that’s when the numbers hanky-panky started. Her husband Murrell – as party chief executive – was smack in the middle of it all.

…Up until a few weeks ago Mr Murrell was the chief executive of the SNP but resigned from his role after journalists were handed false SNP membership figures.

The party’s hierarchy has been under investigation over the past 18 months amid questions about an alleged £600k of “missing” cash from an independence online crowdfunder in 2017.

Activists reported it to the police in 2020 over claims that the cash was spent elsewhere and not on what was promised. The finances of the party showed that the money had allegedly gone missing a there was only £96,000 in the bank at the end of 2019.

The allegations are that the bulk of the funds were (in Scottish parlance) “ring-fenced” or money laundered into other accounts and spent.

This is a pretty cringe-worthy TV news shot of one’s home if you’re a former head of state. The police are scrabbling around, literally signaling they are going to start digging in the former First Minister’s yard for evidence. as if it were an episode of a BBC-produced PBS Mystery!

Is she on gardening leave?

— Lance Forman (@LanceForman) April 5, 2023

Sorry, Smedley. Most unfortunate, but we’ve not found the corpse in the poppy bed yet. Care for tea?

This is incredibly suspenseful. And nobody’s talking.

…A big blue tarpaulin tent has also been erected in their garden, connecting to their living room, to give cops privacy while they search for evidence.

…It is understood that they are not digging up the garden at this moment in time. Cops were also seen examining a storage unit in the garden and have bagged up a number of items from their search to be inspected further.

…It is not known how long they will remain in place at the Murrell home but the evidence gathering does not seem to be slowing down, with Ms Sturgeon already leaving the property before they arrived on Wednesday morning.

Mr Murrell has not been seen in public since he was doorstepped by a Sunday Mail reporter last month and asked questions about the finances of the party and the SNP leadership election.

I’ll bet she’s worried the publicity is going to screw up that schweet U.N. gig she was hoping for.

I can hardly wait for next week.