A BRIGHTON pizza restaurant manager was left blind and brain damaged after he was kidnapped by a former employee and an accomplice, a court heard.

Adrian English was driven to Devil's Dyke before being attacked and left with severe head injuries.

Former Perfect Pizza employee David McLellan, 25, of Selba Drive, Brighton, denies kidnap, attempted murder, grievous bodily harm with intent and robbery.

Philip Hurley, 32, a bus driver, of Birdham Road, Brighton, denies the same charges.

The Old Bailey heard Mr English was kidnapped from outside his home in Montgomery Street, Hove, just after midnight on February 8 last year.

McLellan and Hurley are alleged to have driven him to a car park at Poor Man's Corner, near Devil's Dyke.

They are also accused of stealing safe keys from Mr English and burgling Perfect Pizza, in Church Road, Hove, stealing £620 from the safe.

The court heard Mr English was pushed across the back seat of his girl friend Natasha Banks' car after he had parked it while she unlocked the front door to their flat.

Philip Katz, prosecuting, said: "A man held a knife to Mr English's throat from behind. The car was taken to a fairly remote area.

"That was the last thing that Mr English can remember.

"In the car park he was savagely attacked, left with massive facial injuries - a broken jaw, a fractured skull - and left totally and permanently blinded."

Police found Mr English at about 1am in the car park at Poor Man's Corner.

Mr Katz added that an expert witness would give evidence during the trial that Mr English's injures were "the sort of injuries not uncommonly caused by the stamping by a shod foot."

CCTV cameras on Church Road later caught two men entering the shop with a key, staying a few minutes and then leaving.

The prosecution allege Hurley and McLellan stole £620 in cash from the shop safe and then ordered a minicab from Southern Streamline Taxicabs, where an assistant later picked out McLellan in an identity parade and a cab driver picked out Hurley.

The court was told Miss Banks alerted police that her boyfriend was missing about 15 minutes after she had seen two men walking by as she was opening the flat's front door and recognised one of them as McLellan.

He had worked at the pizza parlour but had left after a disagreement.

The case continues.

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