THREE young passengers threatened to “slash” a bus driver’s throat before taking a cash bag from his cab area.

Robert Wilkinson, 24, and 18-year-old Liam Hunter approached the driver on a number 22 bus, heading from Peterlee to Shotton Colliery, County Durham, on the evening of Friday March 3.

Durham Crown Court heard that threats were made that his throat would be slashed, although he did not see a knife produced.

A cash bag, containing £16, was grabbed from the cab, before Wilkinson, Hunter and a 17-year-old accomplice, got off, in Friar Street, Shotton Colliery, at about 7pm.

Appearing via video link from Holme House Prison, Stockton, Hunter and Wilkinson admitted robbery, as did their 17-year-old co-accused.

Sentence on Wilkinson and Hunter, both of no fixed abode, was adjourned until May 12, and both were remanded back to custody in the intervening period.

The case of their co-accused was remitted for sentence to the youth court., and he was remanded to a detention centre.