TWO robbers who carried out a violent carjacking in Hampshire have been jailed.

They were part of a three-man gang who used a knife to steal a £30,000 Mercedes from a man in Stanmore.

Jermaine Ford, 22, was jailed for five years and Richard Bonsu, 21, for four years, after a jury found them guilty at Winchester Crown Court.

A third man, James Mamali was remanded in custody for a retrial after the jury was unable to reach a verdict.

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The trial heard that the gang snatched the car while the owner was parked in Thurmond Crescent, Stanmore, last April.

The Mercedes E class Kompressor was being driven by Mohammed Akter, 35, a chauffeur from London, who had driven to Thurmond Crescent to meet an 18- year-old girl he met on the Internet weeks earlier.

Mr Akter was threatened with a knife and punched to force him to get out of the car. It was driven to Farnborough where it was abandoned.

Police traced it by a tracking device.

Sentencing Judge Keith Cutler said: “Mr Akter was left in a state of deep shock. The physical injury was not great but the emotional scarring may be longer lasting.”

Ford, a labourer, of The Valley, Stanmore, Mamali, and Bonsu, of Chingford, Essex, had denied robbery.

Katy Thorne, mitigating, for Bonsu said his partner was about to give birth to their second child.

His mother was also terminally ill with cancer and may only have two months to live.

David Reid, mitigating for Ford, said his client had a bad record but had used well his time on remand to study for qualifications. “He is slowly coming to the view that the life he is leading cannot continue.”