A BUSINESSMAN was kidnapped and held for ransom after being cleared of involvement in a £20m drug trafficking conspiracy, a court heard.

Former soldier Mark Chamberlain, aged 38, was grabbed at knifepoint in his own car then kept hostage while members of a gang demanded £60,000 for his release, it was alleged.

He was freed after several hours when the kidnappers were given £3,000 cash and two cars, a jury was told. But police had already been alerted to the kidnap and were secretly taping the gang's demands.

Armed police later stopped one of the two cars and recovered some of the ransom money.

Five men - including two from Bolton - are accused of kidnapping and blackmail.

Aaron Rouse, aged 20, of Pankhurst Walk, Rusholme, Manchester, Marios Baama, aged 25, of Embla Walk, Great Lever, Bolton, Antony McNally, aged 29, of Westbourne Avenue, Bolton, Andrew Beckford, aged 22, of Lloyd Street South, Fallowfield and Ian McLeod, aged 40 of Winnie Street, Moston, all deny kidnap and blackmail. The jury at Minshull Street Crown Court, Manchester was told the abduction took place four months after Chamberlain and other men were cleared of conspiracy to supply cocaine and heroin across the North of England.

It was alleged that father-of-one Chamberlain was a distributor of drugs and stored heroin at his former home in Manby Road, Gorton.

After the trial Chamberlain and car dealer Les McKitty, aged 33, - a co-defendant acquitted in the drugs trial - set up an ironing firm.

The court heard that at 5pm on November 14 last year Chamberlain was returning from a trip to Liverpool when got a call on his mobile phone and went to a petrol station on the East Lancs Road in Salford.

There he was met by two men on the forecourt who asked if had come to collect something before he drove them to another car parked 500 yards away.

Chamberlain told the jury: "I was then grabbed from behind and from the side. A blade was put to my throat from behind and I was dragged between the two chairs into the back of the vehicle. By then there were two males in the front and two either side of me in the back." Martin Walsh, prosecuting said members of the gang then began using Chamberlain's mobile phone to call McKitty and make a ransom demand for £60,000.

But McKitty alerted police and officers taped various calls at Stretford police station in which the amount of ransom money was negotiated.

Eventually it was agreed the gang would get £3,000 cash, McKitty's Volvo car and Chamberlain's VW Golf.

The Volvo, its keys and the cash in marked £20 notes were then left by police in the car park of Fatty Arbuckle's restaurant in Salford Quays.

Chamberlain was taken to the back of garages in Bolton where he was transferred to a Rover car. Later at 2am the following morning the Rover and Chamberlain's Golf were driven in convoy to pick up the Volvo and it was driven off.

Chamberlain was allowed out of the Rover in Salford and was picked up by police.

The trial is expected to last two weeks.

Proceeding