Bannatyne offers money to catch Twitter blackmailer

A hapless thug took on the wrong man when he tried to blackmail the Dragons' Den star Duncan Bannatyne, after the Scottish entrepreneur responded with his own extraordinary threat. Police are now investigating the blackmail attempt, but Bannatyne initially took matters into his own hands via Twitter and offered £50,000 to anyone who could hunt down the stalker and break his arms.
 
Bannatyne offered the bounty after he received a message on Twitter from someone calling himself @YuriVasilyev. The blackmailer said he would "bring hurt and pain" into the TV tycoon's life by harming his 25-year-old daughter Hollie unless he stumped up a £35,000 "investment".
 
Vasilyev then sent a longer message via a website that has now been taken down. It said: "I'm looking for a £35,000 investment to stop us hurting your Hollie Bannatyne. We will bring hurt and pain into your life. We are watching her. She is very attractive. Want photos?"
 
He instructed Bannatyne, who is estimated to be worth £430 million, to: "Tweet using the hashtag £4money to confirm payment will be made."
 
An outraged Bannatyne responded by enlisting his 372,000 followers on Twitter to track Vasilyev down. He offered a £25,000 reward "for the coward who calls himself @YuriVasilyev. Double if his arms are broken first". He then added: "I am serious btw. I think he is in Moscow."
 
Some of Bannatyne's followers claimed they had located the blackmailer on Facebook as well as the popular Russian social networking site Vkontakte. Vasilyev is thought to have been using a Moscow-based IP address.
 
Bannatyne later withdrew his original tweet after several other Twitter users pointed out that the offer was illegal. He has since replaced it with a new tweet, upping his original offer to £30,000 and clarifying that the money is "for information leading to [Vasilyev's] arrest".
 
The 62-year-old entrepreneur's attempts to track down the blackmailer via "crowdsourcing" sparked a huge debate on Twitter yesterday. His actions drew comparisons with Mel Gibson's character in Ransom, in which an angry millionaire goes after the kidnappers of his young son.
 
One Twitter user, mattmusic78, said: "Horrible that some loon is threatening his family but report it to the police." Others, inevitably, poked fun at the Dragons' Den star, who describes himself on Twitter as an author, philanthropist and entrepreneur. As one tweeter put it: "Perhaps Duncan Bannatyne should have just put up half the amount for 20 per cent of it and asked [Dragon's Den co-star] Theo to match it."
 
Bannatyne has now called in Durham police to investigate the threats. He said in a statement: "My family is well protected but I take any threat to them very seriously and will do all I can to ensure the person or people involved are caught." ·