AN ACTIVIST behind attempts to set up a Glasgow safe injection facility has told MSPs it could save 140 lives each year if scaled up.
The estimate comes after Scotland recorded its highest ever total of 1,339 drug-related deaths in 2020 – the highest in Europe amid hopes the crisis can be treated as a health emergency.
But Peter Krykant, an activist, campaigner and project lead at England-based Crantoun, has been warned by prosecutors that there’s “no legal route” for safe consumption rooms to be allowed.
The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) has told MSPs that the Lord Advocate could issue “focused and targeted statements of prosecution policy”, although this would not amount to “immunity from prosecution”.
In June 2017, former lord advocate James Wolffe was asked by Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership to confirm whether those bringing forward and delivering a proposed safe consumption room in the city would not be prosecuted.
Mr Wolffe said that “the public interest objective in a consumption facility was a health rather than justice one”, but concluded “it was not possible to grant the request”.
In evidence submitted to Holyrood’s Criminal Justice Committee, COPFS has warned that Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain “cannot as a matter of law, whether through prosecution policy or otherwise, decriminalise conduct which is, by law, criminal”.
READ MORE: Scotland’s drug deaths: 1,339 Scots died in 2020
The submission adds: “Nor can the Lord Advocate grant an immunity from prosecution in advance.
“In the context of drug consumption rooms, it is not possible for the Lord Advocate to introduce a legal framework which would: a) establish an appropriate system for licensing and oversight of the safety of such a facility b) address the scope of exemption from the criminal law, both for those operating and working within the facility, and for users, and c) deal with questions of civil liability.”
But the prosecution service has stressed “it is possible for the Lord Advocate to issue focused and targeted statements of prosecution policy”.
It added: “Any statement of prosecution policy should not be understood as providing immunity from prosecution.
“Prosecution policy is a matter solely for the Lord Advocate as the independent public prosecutor. Any proposal in relation to a statement of prosecution policy on drug consumption rooms would have to be considered on its individual merits.”
‘No deaths’ at safe injection facility
In his submission to MSPs, Mr Krykant, who ran a safe injection facility in Glasgow for 10 months, stressed that “no deaths occurred”, adding that five “overdose events” took place on site, with naloxone being administered to reverse the impacts as well as the drug being administered for two nearby overdose incidents.
Mr Krykant said that if it was rolled out to a “full-time service”, his “conservative estimate” would be that over a 10-month period, “well over 100 overdoses could have been managed” and “140 over a calendar year”.
He added: “When this is reflected just within one site in the city centre and taking into account that Glasgow City had 291 fatal overdoses, there is no doubt that overdose prevention sites could contribute to a reduction in drug related deaths along with various other health and societal benefits as widely discussed from the existing data from both the unsanctioned site in Glasgow and the hundreds of sites around the world.”
Drop in drug possession cases proceeding to court
Meanwhile, the number of drug possession offences proceeding to court is almost one third of the level it was five years ago, COPFS has confirmed.
COPFS has revealed that 1,000 simple single drug offences proceeded to court in 2020-21, compared to 2,818 in 2016-17. The number of offences being taken to court has slowly fallen each year.
The data from COPFS also shows that the number of offences handed a warning has increased from 2018-19 when 433 warnings were issued, 779 in 2019-20 and 1,180 last year.
The route of single simple drug possession charges (COPFS)
The figures have been revealed after Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain announced that class A drugs are being included in a list of offences liable for official police warning in place of prosecution.
Class B and class C drugs possession offences were already subject to the official police warning scheme.
READ MORE: UK ministers say Peter Krykant’s Glasgow ‘mobile drug fix room’ is illegal
In its submission to Holyrood’s Criminal Justice Committee, COPFS concluded “there has been a increase in the number of single charge possession cases reported” to it, but acknowledged “the total number of cases which are being prosecuted in the courts continues to decrease”.
It added: “Two thirds of single charge possession cases reported to COPFS are dealt with by alternatives to prosecution, with the vast majority being offered a financial penalty.
“In 2020-21, one tenth of single charge possession cases were prosecuted in court, this compares to a quarter in 2018-19, and one third in 2017-18.”
READ MORE: Scots possessing Class A drugs to escape prosecution in legal shake-up
Despite the change in stance on diverting simple possession offences away from prosecution, as indicated by the Lord Advocate, COPFS’s serious organised crime unit remains “focused on the organised crime groups which present the greatest risk of harm to Scotland’s communities”.
The unit targets those who are “operating at a senior level”, which includes “controlling, orchestrating and directing” a crime group.
In its submission, COPFS acknowledges that “drug trafficking remains the largest criminal market in Scotland, with 69% of organised crime groups involved in this type of criminality”.
It added: “There are currently 112 known organised crime groups comprising 2,417 individuals being investigated by law enforcement in Scotland.
“As of June 2021, the most recent figures available, there were 173 organised crime group nominals, then 9% of the total, incarcerated within 14 of the 15 prison estates in Scotland.
“13 of the incarcerated nominals were ‘principals’, namely those deemed to have been directing the activities of organised crime activity in Scotland.”
Last year, of £1.75 million confiscated through proceeds of crime laws, COPFS confiscated just over £1 million related to drug-related activity.
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