Monks living in an English abbey have raked in £8.8 million ($11 million) thanks to sales of a tonic wine that has been linked to violent crime in Scotland.
Buckfast tonic wine, commonly known as Buckfast or "Buckie", is a sweet caffeinated wine produced by monks at the Buckfast Abbey in the English county of Devon.
Popular among drinkers in the west of Scotland, the drink – which has an alcohol content of 15 percent - has become notorious for its association with late night violent crime in Glasgow and its surrounding areas.
Last week a Scottish sheriff (judge) was reported by Scottish media as saying there was a "very definite association between Buckfast and violence." In response the abbey is quoted in several media outlets as saying it was "saddened" by the judge's opinion that a "small number of people in Scotland are not enjoying Buckfast in a responsible way."
Sales of the wine account for almost all of the record £8.8 million pounds of income reported by the Buckfast Abbey Trust for the financial year to the end of October 2015, according to a report placed on the U.K.'s Charity Commission website in August.
In January 2010, a BBC investigation revealed that Buckfast had been mentioned in 5,638 crime reports in the Strathclyde region of Scotland from 2006 to 2009; equating to an average of three per day.
Scottish fans of the drink have given it nicknames such as "Wreck the Hoose Juice" and "Commotion Lotion".
One theory over why Buckfast is popular in the west of Scotland is that Catholic supporters of the soccer club Celtic enjoyed its similarity to communion wine.
Scottish European parliament member, Catherine Stihler has previously claimed that Buckfast "causes untold misery in communities across the country."
The tonic wine contains 375 milligrams of caffeine per liter bottle, as much as eight cans of cola.
In 2015, one party of Scottish lawmakers tried to fix the limit of caffeine in alcoholic drinks but the bill received no support from the Scottish National Party-led government.