A MAN who was accused of being a "police grass" was tied to a chair and beaten before being threatened with a knife, a jury has heard.

Graham Jackson told a Preston Crown Court jury that he was bundled into his Morecambe flat, secured to a chair with chord and clingfilm before being hit with fists and a snooker cue.

Mr Jackson said four men and a women were "calling me a grass" for implicating them in a criminal investigation.

They were telling him to go back to police and retract a statement. Mr Jackson said he had never named them and that the woman, Karen Owen, put a knife to his mouth.

Later he said he was taken to Owen's flat on Euston Grove, Morecambe, where Peter Gallagher was sleeping. Mr Jackson said he was ordered to sit down in the living room Gallagher, who had been woken by Owen, joined the others in hitting him.

He was then taken to a toilet in the house and beaten again, with Owen trying to force a knife into his mouth, Mr Jackson told the trial.

Crown Prosecution Mr John Wishart told the jury that Owen, Christopher Latimer, Dean Maskrey, Brian McGowan and Andrew Scott had all pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to assault in August of last year. They will be dealt with at a later date. Mr Wishart said the prosecution accepted that Peter Gallagher, the single defendant in this case, had nothing to do with the assault in Mr Jackson's own flat.

Gallagher, 22, of Union Street, Morecambe, denies a charge of assault causing actual bodily harm.

The case is proceeding.

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