Witches of Scotland
Witches of Scotland is a modern campaign for legal pardons and historic justice for the thousands of people convicted of witchcraft and executed in Scotland between 1563 and 1736. In Scotland the Witchcraft Act remained in law till 1736. Witchcraft was a capital crime and punished by strangulation and burning at the stake. 84% of those accused, tortured and killed were women. The campaign group draw upon historical data from the Survey of Scottish Witchcraft and lobby the Scottish Parliament for a pardon, an apology and a national memorial. Led by QC Claire Mitchell and writer Zoe  Venditozzi, the campaign gained media coverage in 2021 and support from high profile writers who have researched or written novels based on historical stories. The podcasts published by the campaign include contributions from Carolyn Jess Cooke, Sara Sheridan, Julia Campanelli, Julian Goodare and Alice Tarbuck. The campaign website describes how King James the VI of Scotland considered himself an expert in witchcraft and wrote "Daemonologie." An estimated 3837 people were accused of witchcraft. Claire Mitchell QC provides evidence that Scotland executed five times as many people per capita as anywhere else in Europe. "We absolutely excelled at finding women to  burn in Scotland. Those executed weren’t guilty, so they should be acquitted." In the background to their petition the proposers argue that the convictions were terrible miscarriages of justice and that it is popular opinion now that the convictions ought not to have happened. Posthumous pardons and apologies can be granted to convicted and accused people. They suggest that a national memorial would better facilitate proper reflection on the stories of these women and men in Scotland. In December 2021 a bill to clear the names of those accused was supported in the Scottish Parliament. The campaign lobbied for  the First Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon to make a statement on International Women's Day 2022 on 8 March; she did so. The Scottish Parliament's Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee heard evidence from Mitchell and Venditozzi in February 2022.