Blackmail gang kidnapped teenager and tied him up in woodland overnight to demand ransom

A kidnap gang have been jailed for almost 20 years after they admitted abducting a teenager and tying him up in woodland overnight.

Three men admitted targeting a 16-year-old boy after they heard that his brother had received a £2,000 ($2,640) insurance payout after a car crash.

Manchester Crown Court heard how Morgan Clarke, 18, Anton Thompson, 20, and Declan Andrews, 17, abducted the boy outside a takeaway, in Moston, Manchester, in December 2016.

The Manchester Evening News reported that the victim was taken to Broadhurst Clough, in Broadhurst Park, Moston, where he was beaten, and they called his mother.

The trio threatened the boy with a knife and machete and demanded cash from the woman who offered them all she had, £1,400.

The gang told the victim that he would be raped and killed if he told anyone of what had happened and was left bound to a tree by the arms and legs.

The court heard how the gang threatened the boy with two well-known gangsters and said they would return with them in half-an-hour.

But the court was told the boy then spent 12 hours in the woods before he escaped back to his family at 6.30am.

Although the victim only suffered minor injuries the family left Manchester for Scotland and when they arrived back in the city three month later, the trio struck again.

In a raid on the family's home they stole two bikes, worth about £3,000 in total, after smashing windows, reported the Manchester Evening News.

Judge Suzanne Goddard QC said the trio's offending was "despicable and serious" when she jailed Clarke and Thompson to seven years, and Andrews to five years and six months in a Youth Offenders Institution (HMYOI).

In a series of victim impact statements read to the court the boy's mother said she continues to suffer from flashbacks.