A MAN involved in the broad daylight kidnapping of a fellow Polish national who was bundled into a car and beaten up in a row over misused rent money has been spared jail.
Carlisle Crown Court heard how the abduction victim was responsible for pooling cash from himself and two other men which he was then supposed to hand over to their city landlord. But under financial pressure from family in Poland, the man failed to honour the agreement and instead moved to another area of Carlisle without telling the two others.
But his troubles caught up with him on Carlisle’s Kingmoor industrial estate at around 2pm on June 12 last year. While biking to work, the man was boxed in by a Ford Fiesta driven by one man and with 24-year-old Sebastian Stec in the passenger seat. “They jumped out and grabbed him off the bike and dragged him into the back of the Fiesta,” prosecutor Brendan Burke told the court.
The kidnap was seen by two eye witnesses – one of whom recorded the car registration number – and police were alerted.
After the victim’s desperate bid to arrange pay day loans and cover the debt failed, the pair instead instructed him to buy a laptop on credit. But as police mounted an extensive area search, an officer spotted the car as the trio travelled to a city Argos store and arrests were made.
Stec, of Lonsdale Street, Carlisle, admitted kidnap and accepted dragging the victim but denied any punching or kicking. The car driver did admit beating up the man in a police interview but had fled the country after being bailed and is still being sought.
A man of previous good character, Stec was spared immediate prison today (FRI) after Recorder Ciaran Rankin noted his settled domestic situation, work record and what he called “the very unusual circumstances of this case”.
An 18-month jail term was suspended for two years, and Stec must complete a rehabilitation requirement and 120 hours’ unpaid work. “Effectively what you were trying to do was right a wrong that you had been subject to,” the judge told him. “You felt betrayed by this man, but you went about it entirely the wrong way.”
