A black man from Oldham has claimed police knelt on his neck after he was arrested for leading officers on a 13-minute car chase.

Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court heard Marcus Horrocks was spotted by officers in a Mazda along with two other men in September last year.

The vehicle was found to have no insurance so officers approached to make enquiries.

Horrocks, who was driving, led police on a chase which was captured on camera where he hit speeds of 60mph and forced other vehicles to take evasive action.

The chase only came to an end when he hit a van which caused his own vehicle to be damaged and the car then stopped.

Horrocks was shown on footage played in court to jump out of the vehicle before being caught by two officers.

The 28-year-old appeared in court yesterday to be sentenced for dangerous driving and driving without a licence or insurance.

Representing him, defence counsel Andrea Lock made a shocking allegation about what happened to him during the arrest.

She said: “He tells me the police were kneeling on his neck to detain him.”

She added that she had seen some “supporting footage” in relation to this.

Judge recorder Katherine Pierpoint asked for the footage which the court had seen to be played on in light of the seriousness of the allegation.

The footage did not finish the arrest, and the judge said: “I am not making any findings at all about how he was detained.”

The arrest came in September last year four months after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis when officers knelt on his neck sparking worldwide protests by Black Lives Matters about racial injustice.

Prosecutor Alistair Reid revealed that Horrocks had an extensive criminal record and which featured 27 convictions including for handling stolen goods and driving without a licence.

He said he had initially claimed to have been a passenger before changing his plea to guilty.

Imposing a sentence, the judge said there was no alternative to custody.

She said: “You could have seriously injured yourself, the passengers or other road users, or officers just doing their jobs, or other people about that day.

“Any of them could have been injured or even worse.

“This is so serious only an immediate custody period can be imposed.”

She jailed Horrocks, of Wellbank Close in Oldham, for a year and banned him from the roads for 18 months.

Greater Manchester Police declined to comment on the allegation.