Detectives face jail for kidnap and torture plot

Two corrupt police officers are expected to be sentenced to long jail terms today after admitting helping criminals in a plot to torture a businessman into paying a £680,000 debt.

Detective Constable Martin Morgan, who is thought to have been on a criminal's payroll for years, used police records and confidential information to trace the debtor to a hotel room. He also enlisted the help of another officer, Detective Constable Declan Costello, 36.

Robert Kean, a property developer who was owed £600,000 and his associate Carl Wood, who was owed £80,000, waited in the room for two days for Mr X, a financial adviser and launderer of drugs cash, who cannot be named for legal reasons, the Old Bailey was told.

Kean and Wood had planned to torture Mr X after taking him away handcuffed in a car boot, and talked of how to dispose of a body, including placing it in a mechanical crusher.

Morgan, 39, who served 21 years with the Metropolitan Police, visited the hotel room with a pair of plastic handcuffs to restrain Mr X. But the men did not know the conspiracy was being filmed by Scotland Yard's anti-corruption team, the court was told.

Officers had learnt that Morgan was trying to track down Mr X and they contacted him and placed him under protective custody. They set up an elaborate sting, codenamed Operation Greyhound, to trap the men. Morgan, who had worked in the south-east regional crime squad, had long been suspected of being corrupt, with allegations going back more than six years.

The detective, from South Woodford, east London, was based in the robbery squad at Barkingside police station. He illegally used the police national computer to try to find Mr X's car, the court was told. Costello, who has been in the Met for 17 years including service in the diplomatic protection group, made an illegal search of a security box in north London belonging to Mr X in an effort to find the missing cash.

As part of the sting operation an anti-corruption officer telephoned Morgan at work in March 2000 pretending to be Mr X and left a phone number that was traced to room 179 at the Post House Hotel, Guildford, Surrey. Within 12 hours Kean, 54, and Wood, 45, arrived at the hotel and tricked staff into allowing them into the room. The police had left Mr X's passport and other belongings there to look as if he would be returning, but they also hid a video camera and recording device in the television and set up a surveillance point in room 181.

The men were taped discussing murder and the possibility of putting Mr X in a crusher. During their long stay Morgan was filmed arriving and passing over the handcuffs. He gave the men instructions on how to use them, saying: "After we have got hold of him, we will think about what to do with him." Kean is recorded praising Morgan, saying: "He thinks like us. That is why he is so good at his job."

Wood was taped telling how he would attack the debtor when he walked through the door. "I'll just go smash, straight in the head," he said. "He ain't going home, don't worry about that."

Morgan and Costello acted as lookouts in the hotel car park. Part of the time Morgan was supposed to be on duty 70 miles away. After the men gave up waiting in the hotel room Morgan pretended he was investigating a crime to get hold of Mr X's credit card details from the hotel in an attempt to trace him.

Morgan is thought to have been on Kean's payroll for at least six years. Detectives found he had no debts but failed to find any large sums.

Morgan, Kean and Wood all pleaded guilty to conspiracy to imprison Mr X. Costello, of Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, and Wood pleaded guilty to conspiracy to cause actual bodily harm.