A POLICE force yesterday agreed to pay £9,000 damages for arresting a 13-year-old girl at gunpoint during a hunt for a Yardie drug gang.

Samantha Broughton, now 17, sued Cleveland Police after four officers with Heckler and Koch MP5 machine guns burst into her bedroom and carried her off in handcuffs.

The teenager was strip-searched and held for three hours before she was released without charge, a court heard.

The police were hunting a four-man Jamaican Yardie gang, two believed armed, who arrived in Middlesbrough with two kilos of crack cocaine and were trying to recruit female students at Teesside University as drug mules.

Samantha told the jury trying her claim at Middlesbrough County Court: "I was frightened and scared. I just wanted to be with my mum."

Inspector Mel Ashley, the armed team's advisor at the scene, told the court: "I thought, and I still believe it was right, to make that arrest.

"I had reasonable suspicion to believe that she had been involved in the supply of controlled drugs."

The raids on three addresses led to a 14-year jail sentence for Yardie Alvin Clark.

Samantha, of Middlesbrough, sued for damages through her mother, Vera, for wrongful arrest at their home in Egerton Street, Middlesbrough, on June 14, 2000, false imprisonment, wrongful search and pain and suffering.

The £9,000 settlement was agreed following a four-day hearing.

Samantha said after the case: "It's too soon to say what I will do with the money, but a holiday somewhere sunny and warm would be nice."

Councillor Ken Walker, the chairman of Cleveland Police Authority, said after the case: "Officers have to work under great pressure in this kind of operation, but this case should underline the importance of protecting the rights of individuals who may find themselves caught up in such incidents."