AN 80-year-old getaway driver helped a couple "snatch" their children from a foster carer.

Cambridge graduate and retired teacher Christopher Lawrence Proctor covered his rear number plate with a rag to try and avoid detection.

But police were waiting for him when he got back to his home in Blackburn after dropping off the family -- and he ended up in court for the first time in his life. Proctor agreed to help the children's mother and her boyfriend after hearing that her two young daughters had been taken away from her under a care order, Blackburn magistrates were told.

He drove the couple to Darwen and waited outside the carer's house when the mother went to the front door.

She said she wanted to see the girls so she could give them presents but when the foster mother was distracted she took the girls from the house.

"The foster mother went out and saw the two girls being bundled into a car parked down the road," said Tom Snape, prosecuting. "She tried to prevent this but was assaulted by a male before the car drove off."

Proctor, of Pleckgate Road, Blackburn, pleaded guilty to two charges of taking a child from a responsible person. He was given a conditional discharge for six months and ordered to pay £50 costs.

When interviewed by police Proctor admitted driving the car. He said the mother had asked him to drive them to Darwen and she had told him it was her intention to snatch her two children. He also admitted covering up his number plate to prevent detection, the court was told.

Andrew Church-Taylor, defending, said it was almost unbelievable that a man should be making his first appearance in court at the age of 80 having undertaken the role of "getaway driver."

"He certainly thought he would live out his retirement in the same blameless way he had led the rest of his life," said Mr Church-Taylor. "He accepts he was made aware of what the couple were intending to do but he said it would have been difficult to extricate himself from the situation he was in.

"He hoped that seeing the children would calm the mother and she would desist from her plan to snatch them."

He said the only time Proctor got out of his car was to cover the number plate and he had played no part in actually removing the children from the house.

Mr Church-Taylor said Proctor had graduated from Pembroke College, Cambridge, before taking up a teaching post at a school in Accrington. Between 1958 until his retirement in 1985 he taught at what was then Blackburn Technical College.

"Until now he has led a crime free life and it is a shame that at this late stage he should have this blemish on his record," he added.