A father has spoken of his disgust at his son’s treatment by police after the terrifying armed arrest of three innocent men.

Joe Taylor had been travelling to Gravesend on business on Tuesday last week and was on his way to get a meal at Bluewater when three police 4x4 vehicles swooped on the taxi he was in with two colleagues.

He was on the phone to his wife Emma and two young daughters when an officer reportedly put a machine gun to his head and shouted for him to drop the phone.

It was the last his wife and children heard from him over the next 12 hours as he was locked in a police cell without explanation.

His father, David Taylor, 60, chairman of the company, Allied Lighting, said: “Joe and his colleagues have never been in trouble with the law. They were scared for their lives and they were confused.

“They had machine guns pointed at their heads. They were pulled from the car, thrown face down on the ground and handcuffed from behind. They were given no explanation at all other than they were being arrested under some section of the Firearms Act.”

The three were taken to North Kent Police Station in Northfleet at 7pm by Kent officers under the direction of Essex Police.

In the meantime, their rooms at the Premier Inn in Wrotham Road, Gravesend, were ransacked and Joe Taylor’s car was impounded. They were left in separate cells until 3am the next morning, when an officer came to release them without charge.

David Taylor said: “They had no idea where they were or how far their hotel was, they’ve never been to the area before.

"They had little money on them and Joe had dropped his phone in the cab when he was shouted to, so he couldn’t even make a call. They were turfed out with nothing. Not even an apology.

“My father was a senior police officer, as a family we’re very supportive of the police and understand them needing to take action on information they have.

“But you’d have thought when they ran checks on the three smart young men and they came back whiter than white, alarm bells might have started ringing.

“The way they were dealt with was disgusting. If a senior officer had come out to them and said, ‘look guys, sorry about this, we obviously had a bad tip, let us give you a ride home’, this whole situation would have been over.

“But common sense flew out the window. Nobody will take any responsibly – Kent Police are saying it’s Essex, and Essex say it’s Kent. It’s all bureaucracy, passing the buck and trying to make the whole situation go away. It’s terrible.”

A Kent Police spokesman said a complaint had been received and “the elements of the complaint will be reviewed and dealt with as appropriate by either Kent Police or Essex Police”.