Businessman taken hostage and killed after ‘gang robbery’, court hears

Published on 13/11/2012 00:00

THREE men have gone on trial accused of killing a businessman who was allegedly attacked and taken hostage as part of a £5,000 robbery.

Alexander Ormiston, 63, ran a haulage business, Ormiston Transport, based at Leith Docks, the High Court in Edinburgh was told.

Brian Kennedy, 31, Paul Breslin, 41, and Ian Oliver, 26, deny a charge of culpable homicide which alleges they assaulted, abducted and robbed Mr Ormiston on 19 May last year, and inflicted injuries from which he died two weeks later in the Western General Hospital, Edinburgh.

It is claimed the men had their faces masked when they forced their way into Mr Ormiston’s home in Rosyth, Fife, and brandished knives at him and restrained him with handcuffs or something similar.

Repeated demands were made for money, it is said, and knives were held against his neck and a firearm or imitation firearm was presented at him.

According to the indictment, Mr Ormiston was repeatedly punched and kicked, and was taken in his car over the Forth Road Bridge to the Bank of Scotland at Newkirkgate, Leith, where he was forced to withdraw £5,000.

The trial continues.