Violent carjacker bit £38k Audi driver’s ear

But brutal thugs Christopher Mann and Declan Weston were soon caught after driving away in the luxury motor as their victim knew one of them and the vehicle was fitted with a tracking device.

Bolton Crown Court heard how, after clambering into his Audi A5 Mann asked Ryan O’Callaghan: “Do you remember me?

“You f***ing pr***. You think you’re summat now you’re doing well.”

Then, as Mr O’Callaghan clung onto the steering wheel, Mann, Weston and another man who has not been identified, attacked him.

Sarah Johnston, prosecuting, told Bolton Crown Court, sitting at the University of Bolton Stadium, how Mr O’Callaghan was sat in his lease car outside the Go Local shop at the junction of Morris Green Lane and Hurst Street, Bolton, at 3.30pm on March 11 last year.

A group of people spotted the vehicle and three men, including Mann and Weston, clambered in.

“He [Mr O’Callaghan] was punched and bitten before he was pulled out of the vehicle and the vehicle was driven away,” said Miss Johnston.

But she added that the victim recognised Mann, from their childhood days in the local area.

The four-month-old Audi had a tracker fitted and within an hour police found it, five miles away, parked in Primrose Street, Tyldesley.

Weston was arrested after officers saw him returning to the vehicle and Mr O’Callaghan picked him out in a video identity parade.

Declan Weston

The victim needed hospital treatment for a cut head, bruised ribs, swollen face and a bloody ear.

Weston, aged 25, and Mann, aged 36, both of no fixed address, initially denied committing the crime but then pleaded guilty to robbery.

Paul Becker, defending Weston, who has previous convictions for violence and a long-standing addiction to cocaine, said he is remorseful.

“He understands, on reflection, that it was a serious offence that has has a significant impact on the victim and he apologises,” said Mr Becker.

Colin Buckle, defending Mann, who has served seven previous prison sentences, stressed that it is 10 years since he committed a robbery and stealing the Audi was not planned.

“Mr Mann and his co-accused simply came around the corner, saw the complainant and then made the horrendous error of becoming involved with him and committing the offence,” said Mr Buckle.

Christopher Mann

Mann had tried to claim that the incident was a vigilante attack, but Recorder Andrew Thomas QC told him: “Mr Buckle has wisely advised you that any suggestion that this was a targeted vigilante attack would not be in your best interests and I treat this as a street robbery.”

Mann was jailed for four years and Weston for three years and nine months.

Recorder Thomas told them: “You physically attacked Ryan O’Callaghan in order to steal a high-value car.

“You used significant violence, at the very least, to commit the offence.

“The degree of violence escalated because he refused to let go of the steering wheel.

“In your case, Christopher Mann, I treat the biting of the ear as a significant aggravating feature. I consider doing that to another man to be a deliberate act of degradation.”