A BOXER has been convicted of kidnapping a drug runner who was held captive in a shipping container where he was threatened with torture and death.

Christopher Burton is now facing jail along with three other members of the gang - Anthony Cooper, 30, Damian Mottram, 29, and 25-year-old Jonathan Lockey.

The 34-year-old heavyweight fighter - known by the nickname HighTower - was found guilty on Monday of kidnapping David Foster, 27, in Darlington in July last year.

A jury of eight women and four men cleared him of a charge of false imprisonment after deliberations at Teesside Crown Court on the trial's fifth day.

Cooper, of Bamburgh Place, Mottram, of Teesway, Neasham, both Darlington, and Lockey, of Bullamoor Road, Northallerton, admitted false imprisonment.

FROM THE ARCHIVE: Christopher Burton in training ahead of a Prizefighter event at Newcastle Arena in 2008

They will all be sentenced on a date to be fixed, but were told by trial judge, Recorder Tahir Khan: "You must prepare yourselves for going to prison."

Burton, of Brierton Lane, Hartlepool, admitted being there when Mr Foster was bundled into the gang's car, but said he did not know what had been planned.

The prosecution's case was that he had been taken along as "muscle" to help the others when Mr Foster said he wanted to stop selling drugs for Cooper.

The victim told the court during the trial that he was warned he would be "sliced up" in the lock-up and his body would be disposed of in a double duvet.

He said he was frightened for his life and "cried like a little girl" when he was inside the container on the town's Albert a Hill industrial estate.