Gang threatened to destroy Leonardo da Vinci painting

By Auslan Cramb, Scottish Correspondent Published: 4:53PM GMT 01 March 2010

Madonna of the Yarnwinder

The Madonna of the Yarnwinder painting, that is estimated to be value some-more than �30m, was stolen by axe-wielding robbers from the Duke of Buccleuchs home at Drumlanrig Castle in south west Scotland.

Alison Russell, 25, who was operative as a debate guide, pronounced dual men appeared in the castles Staircase Gallery only after opening time on Aug 27, 2003, and told her she would be killed if she did not distortion on the floor.

The inhabitant art treasures Britain cannot means to lose Art experts strife over Da Vinci portrayal that cost �150 Summer celebration of the mass The American Leonardo by John Brewer: examination Michael Jacksons tip emails

She told the High Court in Edinburgh: "One of them put his palm over my mouth and asked me to get down on the ground. He came from behind, put his palm over my mouth and told me I had to distortion down on the belligerent or they would kill me."

Sarah Skene, 73, a emporium partner at the palace who was additionally operative as a debate guide that day, went to the art studio after conference "a commotion."

She said: "There was a masculine station in front of the portrayal with an mattock in his hand."

The pick man pulled the Da Vinci portrayal - one of the main attractions in the noble home - from the wall and as the warning sounded the span transient by a window and down an outward staircase.

The jury saw CCTV photos display one of the men in a white, wide-brimmed hat and tan jacket, and the pick in a dim coupler and ball cap.

The five men on hearing repudiate conspiring to extract �4.25m and an pick assign of attempted extortion. They are not indicted of the robbery.

The hearing centres on a explain that they were holding the portrayal to ransom in a bid to get members of the family and their insurers to compensate for the protected return.

The charges embody allegations that they are guilty of reception stolen products and that income used when the portrayal was recovered somewhere in England was embezzled from the customer comment of a solicitor"s organisation related to Marshall Ronald, one of the accused.

The 3 men from England and dual from Scotland are purported to have hatched a plan in between Jul and Oct 2007 to get the income from the ninth Duke of Buccleuch - who died weeks prior to the portrayal was recovered - his son, the 10th Duke of Buccleuch, and their insurers.

The five are purported to have menaced the dukes with threats that the portrayal would be shop-worn or broken if the income was not paid.

The complaint claims that they met in the offices of the authorised organisation Boyds in West Regent Street, Glasgow, to determine their plan.

Ronald, 53, of Upholland, Skelmersdale, Lancs, is purported to have contacted a franchised loss adjuster behaving for the insurers in a bid to set up a assembly and to have claimed that the portrayal could be returned in 72 hours.

The complaint states that he thought he was in hit with people behaving for the count when he sent e-mails and done write calls observant "volatile people" would "do something really silly" to the design if military were brought in, and perfectionist that �2m should be deposited with a solicitors" organisation and an additional �2.25m should be put in to a Swiss bank account.

Ronald was unknowingly that the people he was traffic with were clandestine officers, according to the indictment.

He is purported to have paid for special acid-free paper and a folio box to ride the portrayal and to have upheld �350,000 to Robert Graham, 57, of Ormskirk, Lancs, who along with John Doyle, 61, additionally of Ormskirk, is pronounced to have picked up the Da Vinci portrayal from somewhere in England and delivered it to the bureau in Glasgow.

The complaint claims that at a assembly there on Oct 4, 2007, Ronald, Graham, Doyle and Calum Jones, 45, of Kilmacolm, Renfrewshire, met clandestine officers with the goal of returning the portrayal if �4,250,000 was paid in dual instalments.

A second assign alleges that the five indicted - together with David Boyce, 63, of Airdrie, Lanarkshire, attempted to better the ends of probity by removing one of the officers to pointer an agreement that the military would not be told.

The hearing continues.