Blackmail-case businessman admits telling lies to police over tycoon Simon Morris

Hedley Manton has accused his former business partner, Simon Morris, of sending a 21½-stone bodyguard to intimidate him into repaying a £100,000 loan.

A jury at Newcastle Crown Court has heard Morris was facing bankruptcy over creditors’ claims totalling £3.5m and wanted “revenge” against Mr Manton after their partnership ended acrimoniously.

But, under questioning by Morris’s barrister Guy Kearl QC, Mr Manton yesterday admitted having told lies in his account of an encounter he had with the bodyguard, Johnathon Ashworth.

The court heard that, a day after Ashworth visited Mr Manton at his office in Headingley, Leeds, in March 2009, the businessman reported the incident to police.

Mr Manton told an officer the man, whom he did not name, had claimed to be visiting on Morris’s behalf.

He said he had never seen the man before and the visitor left no name or contact details.

But the jury has heard that Ashworth left Mr Manton his mobile telephone number and had given his name as Mark Ash.

Mr Manton admitted in court he had recognised Ashworth as being Morris’s bodyguard.

Mr Kearl asked Mr Manton whether he accepted that he had lied when he told police he had never seen the man before.

“Correct,” Mr Manton replied.

Mr Kearl continued: “You also lied when you said the male left no details. That was untrue, wasn’t it?”

“It was, yes,” Mr Manton replied.

The barrister asked a third question: “You lied to the police when you said he had never mentioned his name. That was untrue, wasn’t it?”

“It was, yes,” Mr Manton replied.

The businessman later added: “When all this came about, it was just frightening and I did not want to implicate the man at the time because I believed that I could hopefully deal with it.”

Mr Kearl asked Mr Manton why he did not simply tell the police he did not want to name the man.

The businessman replied he did not know he could do that.

Mr Kearl reminded Mr Manton that, although he had not named Ashworth in the statement, he had decided to name Morris

“Your first thought was to implicate Mr Morris in this, wasn’t it?” Mr Kearl asked.

Mr Manton denied this.

Mr Kearl continued: “You saw a way out of this, didn’t you, out of the fact that you owed Mr Morris £100,000?”

Mr Manton replied: “How would I get a way out of it?”

Mr Kearl said: “By making up this false story of threats being made on Simon Morris’s behalf.”

The court has heard that Morris and Mr Manton were Leeds businessmen who ran property companies together, but they went their separate ways after Morris got into financial difficulty.

Their dispute arose after Morris agreed to sell an £800,000 home in Syke Lane, Scarcroft, Leeds, to Mr Manton and loaned him money to use as a deposit on it. But Mr Manton believed he was entitled to keep the money and refused to repay it after a company the pair owned went into administration.

“Money is really very important to you, Mr Manton, isn’t it?” Mr Kearl asked.

“Not as much as it is to Mr Morris,” Mr Manton replied.

The court also heard from one of Mr Manton’s former employees, Daniel Fisher, who described how Ashworth gave the businessman a “menacing” look when he visited the office.

“When he came through the door, I knew he hadn’t come to look for a property…He had come to see Hedley and Hedley alone.”

Asked how Mr Manton appeared, Mr Fisher replied: “Frightened. He was as white as a sheet.”

Morris, 34, formerly of Ling Lane, Scarcroft, Leeds, and Ashworth, 51, of Kestrel Close, Hyde, Cheshire, each deny a charge of conspiracy to commit blackmail between March 1 and April 1, 2009. Ashworth also denies an alternative charge of blackmail. The trial resumes on Monday.