The owner of a venture capital firm and a director in a security and surveillance business have been jailed after a former stockbroker was abducted and assaulted in an extortion bid.

Former bank manager Steven Green, 43, and Alan Dambrosio, 51, were warned to expect "significant prison sentences" when they are sentenced next month.

Green, who ran Pentland Capital and held an interest in Glencairn Risk Solutions, which was co-owned by Dambrosio, had denied assaulting their 55-year-old victim following a business meeting at a farm steading in West Lothian.

The pair had been on bail throughout their trial at the High Court in Edinburgh but after a jury convicted them of the offence on majority verdicts a judge remanded them in custody.

Lord Uist told them: "The jury, who were not taken in by your obvious lies in the witness box, have convicted both of you of a very serious crime of violence.

"You should be in no doubt that when I come to sentence you, after having received the appropriate reports, a significant prison sentence will be passed on each of you."

The judge rejected defence pleas that both men be allowed to continue on bail ahead of sentencing next month to "put their affairs in order".

Keith Stewart QC, for Green, said that he had business interests abroad and disruption to them could be minimised if he was given the opportunity to make arrangements for them.

The court heard he had interests in Ethiopia. The pair were found guilty with others unknown of assaulting the victim on April 25 2014 at West Philpstoun Steadings, Philpstoun, West Lothian.

He was repeatedly struck on the head and body with a weapon and forced into a van.

He was bound with tape and hooded and repeatedly hit on the head and body and had bleach poured on him and was robbed of items such as a wallet and threatened with violence if money was not paid to Green within seven days.

Advocate depute Jim Keegan QC asked the victim what he had thought was going to happen to him during the ordeal and he told the court: "I didn't think I was going to come back out of that, quite honestly. I thought I was going to die, quite frankly."

He had turned up for a morning meeting with Green at a garden centre but it was closed and hewas invited back to Green's office at the steading buildings and updated him on a meeting he had held in the Isle of Man. He said: "When we finished he shook my hand."

The former stockbroker, who had been involved in a pounds 800,000 purchase of a bridging loan firm from Green, made his way back to his vehicle but was attacked.

He said a van had pulled up near Green's vehicle with three people round about it. He said: "I thought they were going to wash Steve's car. I thought it was a mobile valet." "I walked past it and then the next thing I knew I had a very large hit on the back of my head," he said.

He added: "I had two guys on my back trying to pull me back to the van, hitting me with a billy club or truncheon."

The attack victim estimated he was hit 30 to 40 times. "I was getting basically manhandled into the back of the van," he said. He said he was trying his best to resist and remembered he kicked out at one of his assailants, but added "It was quite overpowering." He was trussed up and said: "Then we went for a drive. They taped my neck and my mouth." "When I got to look at them they were all dressed in black with black balaclavas," he told the court.

He said he was feeling "pretty sore" and was told he had "seven days to get the money" and was warned that they knew where his family was. The victim said he thought at that stage they were going to release him because he had been told he had a week to get the cash. He was let go.

Witnesses had seen part of the assault and police were contacted and mobile phones from the accused were examined during the subsequent investigation. The man said the purchase of the bridging loan business previously owned by Green had been completed in November 2013 with a price tag of £800,000.

He said the money had not been paid and it was agreed to settle once some of its loans had been redeemed and the fund behind it was back of an even keel.

Green, of Kirkliston, who denied any involvement in the assault, said the prospective purchaser was "broke".

He told the court: "There was no reason for me to be aggrieved. By February I had another buyer."

Dambrosio, of Edinburgh,denied he was involved in the assault at the car park at the steading.

He said that prior to police questioning he did not know anything about the ongoing financial transaction between Green and the former stockbroker.