A man and his fiancée were held up at gunpoint as masked robbers stole £9,000 from them in an eBay car sale which went terrifyingly wrong.
Jamie Hallam, 48, and his fiancée Georgina drove from Norfolk to Manchester to collect a car they had arranged to buy through the website.
Prior to the sale, Mr Hallam, a driving instructor from south Norfolk, had been in regular contact with the seller, checked the car's documentation and paid a £100 deposit through Paypal.
But upon arriving at the address from which they were due to collect and pay for the car on January 17, Mr Hallam received a call from the seller.
Seconds later a van came screeching around the corner and the couple were ambushed by two masked men, one of whom was armed with a gun.
Mr Hallam, who was standing in the street when the men appeared, said: "At that point I tried to get back in the car but our car automatically locks the doors and I couldn't get back in."
He said one of the masked men approached him and the two become involved in a struggle while the other approached Mr Hallam's fiancée, who was still in the car, and threatened her with the gun.
"The other [man] was pointing the gun at my fiancée asking her for money. She was obviously panicking... At that point when I saw the gun I just froze and said 'just take the money'," he said.
Mr Hallam said he was then pushed to the floor and repeatedly kicked by one of the men while the other was in the car looking for the cash the couple had brought with them to pay for the car.
After the men left the scene with £9,000 in cash, Mr Hallam and his fiancée called the police and then went to hospital, where Mr Hallam was told he had a fractured nose, eye socket and cheekbone.
He said since the events of January 17, he had gone over the day in his mind again and again.
Greater Manchester Police issued a warning earlier this month relating to armed robberies in fraudulent car sales through eBay, with 10 reported between Tuesday, November 19 and Wednesday, January 22.
They are being linked, and a further six are being investigated.
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