Five members of a London gang have been jailed for a combined total of more than 30 years after kidnapping and torturing two French cryptocurrency millionaires who were visiting the capital. The victims, both in their 20s with a combined fortune of £50 million, were ambushed by masked, armed men after travelling to buy cannabis and were held captive for 52 hours, in an attack prosecutors said was driven by their lifestyles of excess making them targets for extortion.

The pair were held at Rathbone Apartments in Canning Town, bound with cable ties, beaten, gagged with socks and doused in boiling water, with threats made against their genitals and one man's girlfriend unless $150,000 was handed over; one victim said he was forced to drink toilet water. Police tracked the gang via a phone belonging to a friend who had travelled with the victims, rescuing them after officers coached the woman through stalling tactics during a call with her captors. Julius George, Adel Sineen and Isaac Bakoya were arrested following a high-speed car chase, while Gerson Borges, Mohamed Osman and William Adebisi were detained separately; Osman received the longest sentence at nine years, while alleged mastermind Ibrahim Mohamed, who directed the plot from abroad, remains at large.