Alex Prentice KC is a leading Scottish lawyer. He has held senior posts at the

Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service is the independent public prosecution service for Scotland, and is a Ministerial Department of the Scottish Government. The department is headed by His Majesty's Lord Advocate, who under the S ...

, the body which normally carries out prosecutions in Scotland. He became an assistant Principal Advocate Depute in 2009, and then the Principal Advocate Depute. After the office restructured in 2011, he became the senior crown counsel. Prentice qualified as a solicitor in 1983 and as a Solicitor Advocate in 1994, and practised as a defence solicitor for 21 years. In 2004 he became the first Solicitor Advocate from outside the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service to be appointed as an Advocate Depute. He was appointed as a Senior Advocate Depute in 2006 and became a QC in 2007. Prentice has prosecuted a number of significant cases including the shotgun murder at the "Marmion" public house in Edinburgh, the murder of Jolanta Bledaite,

HM Advocate v Sheridan and Sheridan ''Her Majesty's Advocate v Thomas Sheridan and Gail Sheridan'' was the 2010 criminal prosecution of Tommy Sheridan, a former Member of the Scottish Parliament and his wife Gail Sheridan for perjury in relation to the earlier civil case '' Sheridan ...

, the Murder of Surjit Singh Chhokar, and

HM Advocate v Salmond ''Her Majesty's Advocate v Alexander Elliot Anderson Salmond'' was the 2020 criminal prosecution of Alex Salmond, the former First Minister of Scotland. Salmond faced 14 charges, mostly of sexual assault. The trial began on 9 March 2020 at the H ...

. In 2012 he twice won a murder conviction without a body in the

murder of Suzanne Pilley Suzanne Pilley (1972 – May 2010) was a 38-year-old British Bookkeeping, bookkeeper from Edinburgh, Scotland, who went missing person, missing on the morning of 4 May 2010. Following a highly publicised appeal for information on her whereabouts ...

and the retrial in the

murder of Arlene Fraser Arlene Fraser was a 33-year-old woman from Elgin in Moray, Scotland, who vanished from her home on 28 April 1998 after her two children went to school. No trace of her was ever found, but her husband was convicted of her murder, upheld on appeal ...

. Further to this, Prentice won an appeal lodged by Fraser in 2013. In June 2013, Channel 4 screened Nat Fraser's second trial in ''The Murder Trial'', which heavily featured Prentice himself.

References

External links

article on his appointment
{{DEFAULTSORT:Prentice, Alex Living people Scottish King's Counsel Scottish solicitor advocates Year of birth missing (living people) Place of birth missing (living people)