Man jailed for tweeting names of Alex Salmond accusers

Alex Salmond was cleared of 13 charges in Edinburgh last year

A man has been jailed for six months for tweeting the names of women who gave evidence against former first minister Alex Salmond at his trial.

Clive Thomson, 52, admitted breaching a contempt of court order when he named the women on Twitter on two occasions in August last year.

Mr Salmond was cleared of 13 charges of sexual assault at the trial in Edinburgh, which ended in March 2020.

Thomson, from Rosyth in Fife, knew about the strict court order.

It was issued by judge Lady Dorrian, who presided over Mr Salmond's trial, and prohibited the identification of the complainers who gave evidence at the trial.

Defence advocate Mark Stewart QC said Thomson had committed "an act of extreme foolishness, folly and bravado".

Mr Stewart said he had not "for one minute fully appreciated the gravity of what he was doing" and asked the court to impose a community payback order instead of prison.

Sentence 'justified'

But Lady Dorrian and two other judges decided a jail sentence was justified.

In a virtual hearing, the judge told Thomson he had committed a blatant and premediated breach of the court order.

Lady Dorrian said his actions had been likely to cause "serious stress and concern" for the women and could deter people from making complaints in other cases.

"You knew what you were doing and you deliberately chose to flout the court order," the judge said.

Thomson was told he had 48 hours to surrender himself at a police station in order for him to be taken to jail.