Kidnapped boy left in car

The boy and his father were taken from their Greenisland home

Police are appealing for information after an 11-year-old boy was kidnapped from his County Antrim home and held for ransom.

The boy was kept in the boot of a car for up to nine hours until his father handed over thousands of pounds in ransom money.

Both the child and his father, a postmaster, were woken from their sleep by a gang some time after midnight on Thursday.

They were hooded and bound before being taken from their home at Upper Road in Greenisland, just north of Belfast.

The kidnappers bundled the boy into the boot of the family's BMW car and drove off.

His father was put in the back of another car and driven to a house where members of the gang assaulted and tortured him using lighted cigarettes.

While physically the child is unharmed the ordeal he would have suffered being in the boot of a car for a period in excess of nine hours is beyond words

Keith Jackson
Police inspector

The men demanded money from the man for the safe return of his son.

The boy's father was released at about 0530 BST on Thursday at Trooperslane, Carrickfergus, and told to bring a substantial sum of cash to Ballyduff Brae, Newtownabbey.

He was met there at about 0930 BST by a man on a red and white scrambler-type motorbike.

Before leaving with the ransom, the man gave the father the key to his stolen car and told him to go to the isolated Knockagh monument overlooking the area, where he found his son still in the boot.

Although the boy was physically unharmed, police said he had been gagged in the car for up to nine hours.

Inspector Keith Jackson described those who carried out the kidnapping as "despicable".

"While physically the child is unharmed the ordeal he would have suffered being in the boot of a car for a period in excess of nine hours is beyond words," he said.

Mr Jackson added that he believed there were at least two or three people involved in the kidnapping.

They were hooded when they arrived at the house and at least one of them was armed.

Both the boy and his family have been left traumatised by the experience.