A CORRUPTION investigation has been launched involving Cleveland Police after officers were accused of perverting the course of justice.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) is investigating after five people walked free from court this week.

The defendants were cleared of perverting the course of justice in relation to the Tony Pattison kidnapping and blackmail case.

But it has now been alleged that Cleveland Police officers themselves perverted the course of justice.

The IPCC managing investigation is being conducted by West Yorkshire Police.

The revelations are the latest extraordinary twist in the seven-year saga surrounding the kidnapping of builder Tony Pattison in 2004.

The 52-year-old was snatched at gunpoint from his car, bound, blindfolded and bundled into a van in an old fairground car park in Seaton Carew, Hartlepool, on March 8, 2004.

He was held in a lock-up then released the next evening after delivery of a £25,000 ransom.

Bronson Tyers, 36, of Low Lane, Yarm, near Stockton, was jailed in 2006 for 12 years for conspiring to kidnap Mr Pattison, of Hartlepool, and blackmail his family.

But he won an appeal against his conviction and was cleared after a retrial at Newcastle Crown Court in March 2008.

Three other men – from Middlesbrough, Hartlepool and Tyneside – are still serving sentences totalling more than 25 years for the kidnap plot.

After the retrial, police launched an investigation into an alleged conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

Five people were then arrested: Tyers’ brother Gareth William Tyers, 32, of High Lane, Maltby, Middlesbrough; Gary Hawke, 42, of Fairfield Close, Stockton; Angela Stewart, 39, of Burnside Avenue, Blackpool; mother and daughter Patricia Boyd, 54, and Cindy Deborah Anne Boyd, 33, both of Kelvin Road, Thornton-Clevelys, Lancashire.

All five denied the conspiracy charge last October.

Patricia Boyd was also charged with perjury in the evidence she provided for Bronson Tyers in the re-trial in February 2008.

In September this year, the Crown dropped its case against Cindy Boyd and she was found not guilty.

And Judge Guy Whitburn then said this would have a knock-on effect on the other four defendants’cases.

“After consideration by the Crown, we have come to that conclusion,” said Andrew Dallas QC, prosecuting.

“Accordingly, we have concluded that there is no realistic prospect of convicting any of these defendants.

“We therefore offer no evidence against them.”

Judge Whitburn entered verdicts of not guilty for all defendants on all charges.

An IPCC spokesman said “This investigation is ongoing and is being conducted by officers from West Yorkshire Police under the direction and control of an IPCC investigator. It would be inappropriate for the IPCC to comment further at this stage.”

A Cleveland Police spokesman said it would be “inappropriate” to comment on the ongoing investigation.