THREE THUGS joined a gang who terrorised children during a gunpoint robbery at a travellers’ site.

The gang converged from Sussex, Kent, London, and Essex to attack the site in Lenham near Maidstone in Kent.

After separate trials lasting more than two years, 14 men have been convicted and jailed for more than 200 years after using guns and baseball bats in the robbery.

Among them was Lee Baker, 29, and Brady Dewson, 26, from Eastbourne and Nyake Alieu, 31, from Seaford.

The judge at Maidstone Crown Court said: “It was a bold, even audacious, plan involving a mass attack on the traveller site by a group of armed, masked and determined attackers.”

Victims were bound with cable wire, and one couple had guns held to their heads in front of their young son, who awoke on hearing the commotion. He pleaded: “Daddy, please don’t let them kill me.”

Father-of-seven Moses Smith was battered with a truncheon and handgun and was then kicked and struck with a crowbar and baseball bat and stabbed in his arm and thigh.

But Kent Online reported that after the attackers found cash and valuables, they were forced to flee when other residents at the Wheat Gratten Stable Yards fought back.

They ran after the gang across fields, and rammed getaway cars to prevent the escape.

Two men were arrested after police were called to the area, while a third gang member tried to cover his tracks by calling the police and pretending to be kidnapped in the boot of his car.

Nina Ellin, prosecuting, said the masked raiders were clad in dark clothing and armed with weapons, including a sawn-off shotgun, a handgun, iron bars and a machete.

“They demanded large sums of money at gunpoint,” she said. “They terrorised the occupants of the caravans, which included women and young children. One man was brutally attacked.”

Detectives then set to work trying to identify the other gang members, and eventually 17 men were charged.

Forensics, CCTV, and mobile phone data led to the arrests of the other gang members, including the trio from Sussex.

Detective Inspector James Derham said: “These men subjected three families to extreme levels of violence which left them in fear that they would be killed.

“The level of violence used shows the offenders to be a very real threat to society.”

Baker, of Hoad Road in Eastbourne, was convicted of conspiracy to commit robbery, and was sentenced to 12 years in prison, reduced from 20 years after an appeal.

Nyake Alieu, of Church Street in Seaford, was convicted of conspiracy to rob and received a 16-year sentence, reduced from 20 years following an appeal.

Dewson, of Latimer Road in Eastbourne, admitted conspiracy to commit robbery and was jailed for 12 years.

Judge Julian Smith said the offence took “a good deal of planning and careful organisation”.

He said the gang was prepared to use significant force to get their way, and added that while it is not clear who came up with the original idea, evidence shows the action was “co-ordinated to achieve maximum impact”.