No prison over dungeon plot

The girlfriend of a Black Country rock 'n' roll singer who kept a Willenhall schoolgirl captive for 42 hours in a makeshift "dungeon" during a sinister kidnap plot avoided jail this afternoon.

Victim Katie Peters, a former head girl at Willenhall's St Thomas More Catholic College, was bound and gagged in the dungeon created in the cellar of a music store.

She had been lured back to the Bilston branch of the Soundmasters store by ex-boyfriend Tony Boden, a former pupil at Shire Oak School in Walsall Wood.

His girlfriend Sarah Marshall, now aged 21, was waiting at the store when the pair returned and acted as Katie's "jailer".

Marshall from The Crescent in Bilston, admitted false imprisonment and was today given a three-year supervision order and told to live at a Probation Service-approved address.

Katie, now 18, only managed to escape after befriending Marshall and managing to set off an alarm in the High Street building where she was imprisoned.

Judge Martin Walsh today told Marshall he did not believe she represented a risk to the public, unlike 23-year-old Boden, who masterminded the plot.

Boden, who also previously ran the Soundmasters store in Day Street, Walsall, was previously given an indeterminate prison sentence for public protection.

At Wolverhampton Crown Court, Judge Walsh told mother-of-two Marshall: "If it was not for the control exerted over you by your co-defendant you would never have got involved in this.

"A young woman was detained in horrific conditions and ordinarily such a serious offence would have resulted in a significant sentence of custody.

"But you were a vulnerable person under the control of your co-defendant and showed some mercy to the victim of this horrendous crime, releasing her from her bindings and offering some comfort when the co-defendant was not present."