Imagine you are accused of a serious crime. It goes to court. You’re tried in front of a jury of your peers. The verdict is in. Not Proven. What happens next? Is it the same as Not Guilty? And if not, in what way is it different? Did the jury believe you? Or do they still have their doubts? And how will the verdict be seen by your friends and family, your employer, the wider world: what will they think of it all? What does the Not Proven verdict actually mean? This, essentially, is how the not proven verdict actually works in Scotland and has always worked. Questions are asked but never answered. Not Proven is widely used but never explained. No one ever tells a jury what the definition might be nor do they tell them what the difference is between Not Proven and Not Guilty (if there is one). Indeed, judges in Scotland are specifically instructed not to explain the verdict to juries and there’s a good reason for that: nobody knows. Which begs an important question for Scotlan