Prison sentences cut
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• A Gloucester haulage boss and his two sons who forced a Bristol company director into a car boot and then a lorry trailer when he refused to return 2541 paid for a sunbed had their prison sentences cut by the Criminal Appeal Court in London last week.
Harold Williams, 55, of Parkland Lodge Farm, Moreton Valence, near Gloucester, had his three-year term halved.
Paul Williams, 24, of Tidswell Close, Quedgeley, near Gloucester, had his 12-month term replaced by "such a sentence as will secure his immediate release". Timothy Williams, 26, a transport manager, of Burlington, Abbey Mead, Gloucester, had his sentence reduced from 30 months to 12.
In such cases the prison authorities determine the exact sentence.
All three men had pleaded guilty at Gloucester Crown Court in March to kidnapping haulage boss Hewart Nash.
Justice Tudor Evans announced in the Appeal Court: "They took the law into their own hands — they had been told it would be wise to pursue civil remedies but the sentences were excessive."