Graeme Dott Jailed for Seven Years: Conviction and Snooker Fallout

Former snooker world champion Graeme Dott was jailed for seven years at the High Court in Edinburgh for sexually abusing two children, as reported by The Guardian.

Judge Lord Harrower imposed the backdated sentence on the 49-year-old. Backdated means time Dott already spent held in custody counts toward the seven years. It followed a five-day trial at the High Court in Glasgow in August. The jury convicted him by majority verdict on two counts of lewd, indecent and libidinous behaviour. That is the Scottish legal term for sexual offences against children, and a majority verdict means most jurors agreed rather than all of them.

The offences covered two separate periods. Dott abused a girl on multiple occasions between 1993 and 1996. Years later, he abused a boy on multiple occasions between 2006 and 2010.

Dott had denied two charges of lewd and libidinous behaviour, as reported by BBC. Earlier reporting said the two children were understood to have been around 10 years old at the time of the alleged offences, as reported by BBC.

The court ordered that Dott be added to the sex offender register, an official monitoring list with strict reporting rules. He was remanded in custody, meaning held in prison.

Dott turned professional in 1994. He won the 2006 World Snooker Championship, defeating Peter Ebdon in the final at the Crucible in Sheffield. He lost finals to Ronnie O'Sullivan in 2004 and to Neil Robertson in 2010. After the August conviction, World Snooker removed his name from its hall of fame.

Looking at what this means for the institutions around the case, the sequence is instructive. Conviction came first, through a criminal trial with contested evidence and a majority verdict. Sporting sanction followed. The removal from the hall of fame did not anticipate the court. It responded to it. That order matters for due process, and for public confidence in both systems.

The broader context here is time. The offences found proved run from the early years of Dott's professional career to the period when he was an established world champion and finalist. The trial in 2026 therefore asked jurors to assess events from the 1990s and the late 2000s. Cases built that way turn on memory, consistency and corroboration rather than on recent forensic evidence. They also test how sporting bodies keep honours current when the facts behind a reputation change.

Looking ahead for snooker, the practical questions are now administrative. Custody, registration and exclusion from formal honours are settled. Any future questions about eligibility, coaching, licensing or commemoration will be addressed within the legal limits that apply to a registered sex offender serving a custodial sentence. The history of titles and finals stays on record. The honours attached to that history do not. That difference, between record and recognition, is likely to shape how the sport discusses this period.