THE NUMBER of people who have had warrants issued against them for dodging court has more than doubled in Dundee, Dunfermline, Kirkcaldy and Forfar in the last five years, according to figures published by the Scottish Parliament.

Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court had the highest recorded rise in Tayside and Fife, from 1058 to 2422 (129%), next was Forfar from 130 to 269 (107%) followed by Dundee 1585 to 3218 (103%) and Dunfermline from 499 to 1005 (101%).

At Perth the increase was from 572 to 1042 (82%).

The Scottish Executive said this reflects the fact that courts have become much busier, and the justice system is not tolerating people who try to defy it.

Dundee East MSP Shona Robison is to write to justice minister Cathy Jamieson to ask the reasons for what she described as “this alarming situation” in the dramatic increase in the number of failure to appear warrants.

They are issued mainly against people who have been accused of crimes or have been convicted of crimes and have not turned up for their trials or to be sentenced.

There are also some witnesses of crimes who have not turned up to give evidence and a few jurors who have also stayed at home.

The figures show that across Scotland the number of failure to appear warrants issued by sheriff courts rose from 35,857 in 1999/2000 to 46,917 in 2003/2004—a rise of 30%.

In Aberdeen the increase was just 19% and in Edinburgh there was a fall of nearly 3%. In Glasgow the increase was less than 0.5%.

The figures for other courts in Tayside and Fife make interesting reading.

At Arbroath the increase was from 202 to 320 (58%), and at Cupar the rise was from 149 to 244 (64%).

Ms Robison said, “This is an alarming situation.

“Is this a failure of the system, and how badly is this impacting on the justice system when such a high level of people who are asked to go to court are not appearing and need to have warrants issued for their arrest?

“We definitely need to have answers to these questions and I will be writing to the justice minister asking why there has been such a rise and what the consequences are of this rise.”

The Scottish Executive has stressed its desire to be tough on crime and criminals, and to give the courts as much help as possible to administer justice.

An Executive spokesman said there may be regional variations for some of the figures but for Dundee the figures reflected the fact that its sheriff court is a much busier place.