Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s former first minister and once one of Britain’s most prominent politicians, is no longer being investigated over allegations of embezzlement at the Scottish National Party, which she led until two years ago.
The Scottish police, in a statement, lifted a cloud that had been hanging over Ms. Sturgeon since her arrest and questioning in June 2023 plunged her party into crisis.
Her arrest was part of an inquiry into financial irregularities at the S.N.P., which campaigns for Scottish independence and which has dominated the country’s politics for most of the past two decades.
The police investigation, code-named Operation Branchform, led to charges of embezzlement against Ms. Sturgeon’s husband, Peter Murrell, former chief executive of the S.N.P. Mr. Murrell appeared in court in Edinburgh on those charges on Thursday but did not enter a plea.
In January the couple said they had separated and were in the process of ending their marriage.
Police Scotland said in a statement on Thursday that both Ms. Sturgeon and Colin Beattie, a former treasurer of the S.N.P. who was also arrested in 2023, “have not been charged and are no longer under investigation.”
In line with standard British police protocol, neither Ms. Sturgeon nor Mr. Beattie were mentioned by name in the statement but were referred to as a 54-year-old woman and a 73-year old man. But speaking to reporters outside her home near Glasgow, Ms. Sturgeon said she had been told that, after an investigation of the evidence, there would be no action against her.
“In other words, I am completely in the clear,” she said. “That is the outcome I had always expected.”
Ms. Sturgeon was the first woman to lead her party and her country, and was the longest-serving first minister in Scottish history until her surprise resignation in 2023. At the time her reputation was high, with Ms. Sturgeon renowned for her formidable communications skills, which proved particularly effective during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Operation Branchform was launched in 2021 and was reported to have followed complaints about the handling of donations worth about 600,000 pounds, or $780,000, raised to campaign for a second vote on Scottish independence. (A referendum on the issue took place in 2014, with Scots voting to stay within the United Kingdom by 55 percent to 45 percent.)
After Mr. Murrell’s arrest, Scottish news media reported that the police had seized a luxury motor home that had been purchased by the party and was parked outside his mother’s house.
The drama rocked the S.N.P. as it was coming to terms with Ms. Sturgeon’s unexpected resignation. Her successor, Humza Yousaf, held the post of first minister of Scotland for little more than a year before being replaced by John Swinney, a party veteran.
In the British general election last year, the S.N.P. won nine of the 57 seats in Scotland, a stark drop compared with the 48 of 59 seats it secured in 2019. However the party’s opinion poll ratings recovered when the Labour government, led by Keir Starmer, stumbled in its first months in power.
Earlier this month, Ms. Sturgeon announced that she would not run in 2026 in the next elections for the Scottish Parliament.
Representing Glasgow Southside as a lawmaker was “an honor beyond words,” she wrote on Instagram before adding: “However, I have known in my heart for a while that the time is right for me to embrace different opportunities in a new chapter of my life.”