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Publication - Statistics

Safer Communities and Justice Statistics Monthly Data Report: June 2025

Published
26 June 2025
From
Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs, +4 more … Minister for Victims and Community Safety, Lord Advocate, Director of Justice, Chief Statistician
Directorate
Safer Communities Directorate, +2 more … Justice Directorate, Children and Families Directorate
Topic
Communities and third sector, Law and order, Public safety and emergencies

This report contains summary statistics covering a number of important justice and safer communities areas. It is updated with the most recently published statistics.

Part of

Supporting documents

*New* The prison population rose over 2023 and 2024

In May 2025 (up until the morning of Sunday 1st June 2025):

  • the population decreased by 19 to 8,106
  • 2,099 were on remand: 1,733 (21%) untried & 366 (5%) awaiting sentence. 6,007 (74%) were serving a sentence.
  • 65% of arrivals were untried (600 of 921), 17% awaiting sentence (155) and 18% sentenced (166)

Chart 15: Prison populations (total and remand), 2019 to 1st June 2025

Chart 15 - Total prison and remand populations, from 2019 onwards. A graph of different types of lines. The Friday prison population overall and the remand population up to March 2020. Thereafter, daily population figures are provided. The trends are described in the body text.

The prison population is high. While the prison population reduced considerably during the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been substantial growth since 2023.

Measures taken to manage prison population levels include an emergency early release (EER) of short sentenced prisoners (those serving an overall sentence of less than 4 years) in summer 2024 and new legislation to amend the release point of short sentenced prisoners in late 2024. The revised release point (from 50% to 40%) commenced in February 2025.

Changes occurring in the sentenced prison population vary by sentence length banding, as shown in the chart below.

Chart 16: Prison populations by overall sentence bands, 26th Mar 2020 to 1st June 2025

Chart 16 - Prison population by Overall Sentence Band. A graph of different coloured lines. The sentenced population broken into overall sentence bands. The highest line to lowest line categories are “Long: 4 years plus” (highest line), “Short: less that 4 years”, “Life” (smoothly decreasing), “Short: one year or less”, and “Orders of Lifelong Restriction” (lowest line). The trends are described in the body text.

The populations serving short sentences (less than 4 years overall) fell substantially and rapidly during the COVID-19 pandemic, whereas populations serving long (4+ years) and indeterminate (order for lifelong restriction (OLR) and life) sentences remained at similar levels to pre-pandemic.

The population serving overall sentences of less than or equal to one year has fluctuated since the pandemic but increased overall across 2023 and early 2024. It reduced sharply during EER in 2024 but recovered quickly thereafter. However in late 2024 this group declined and has been at a further reduced level since commencement of the revised release point for short sentenced prisoners (40%) in early 2025.

The population serving overall sentences of between 1 and 4 years had been declining since the pandemic. However it increased across 2023 and early 2024. During EER it decreased sharply but recovered quickly thereafter and stabilised at similar level to pre-EER until the commencement of the revised release point for short sentenced prisoners (40%) in early 2025.

The population serving long sentences (4+ years) has been increasing since early 2022 (+27% from 2,090 on 1st Jan 2022 to 2,648 on 1st May 2025). The population serving indeterminate sentences has been stable overall over the same period, although small changes have occurred within this group – the number serving life sentences has declined, while the number serving OLR sentences has increased.

While recent changes in prison population levels have been largely driven by changes in the sentenced population, the remand population remains high. The remand population reached its lowest point of 1,114 on 24th April 2020, but grew rapidly thereafter to record high levels. It has continued to fluctuate at a high level to date. On 14th May 2024 the remand population reached a peak of 2,360. People on remand are required by law to be housed separately from sentenced prisoners

Time on Remand to Date

*New* Among the 2,099 people on remand as of the morning of Sunday 1st June 2025, the median continuous time spent with this status to date was 76 days.

Chart 17: Banded continuous time on remand to date, percentage of remand population

Chart 17 - Time spent on remand. A bar graph of prisoner numbers by the number of days on remand. The groupings of time on remand to date. The largest proportion – 32.1% or 674 people - had been there for over 140 days. 26.7% (561 people) had been on remand for 31 to 90 days. 13.2% (278 people) for 91 to 140 days. The remaining 586 (27.9%) had been on remand for 30 days or less.

Note: The remand population includes individuals whose trial has commenced but not concluded, as well as those awaiting commencement of a trial. As a result, the figures referenced above reflect only that an individual has held the same status for an extended period, but do not reflect the relationship between these times on remand and the ongoing court procedure(s) to which they relate.

Deaths in Prison Custody

There were 345 deaths in prison custody between the financial years 2012-13 and 2022-23. The annual number of deaths occurring in prison custody fluctuated between 2012-13 and 2022-23, but there has been a general upward trend. Of these deaths: 105 were due to probable suicide, 71 were due to diseases of the circulatory system, and 50 were as a result of drug misuse. There was a total of 16 deaths that involved COVID-19.

Chart 18: Number of deaths in prison custody recorded in each financial year, 2012-13 to 2022-23

Chart 18: Number of deaths in prison custody recorded in each financial year, 2012-13 to 2022-23 A graph with a general upward trend of deaths in custody between 2012-13 and 2022-23. The highest was in 2021-22, at 48.

Using standardised mortality ratios (SMRs) has demonstrated that the risk of death in the male prison population has been significantly lower than in the male general population of Scotland in each year between 2012-13 and 2022-23.  In 2020-21 and 2021-22, the risk was closer to that of the general population but remained significantly lower.

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