 This week's episode is sponsored by Change. Change is an online mentoring program that teaches people with no experience how to create a real profitable online business and e-commerce. I have been working with Ryan at Change for a few years now and attended many events and got to meet the amazing community of like-minded people. These guys are the best of the best. The support these guys offer is personal, no bots or employees. There's no experience needed but like anything in life it takes time as it's a real business with real results. For more information go check out Ryan on Instagram at RyanGybe and he will guide you through the steps to help build a successful business. You can now follow me on all my social media platforms to find out who my latest guest will be and don't forget to click the subscribe button and the notifications bell so you are notified for when my next podcast goes live. Well we're on. Today's guest we've got Russell McVicar. Russell how are you? Nice to meet you Jax. Yeah good to see you. Another fascinating story. My big. Your father who was very well known in Underworld best-selling book Fullham out about McVicar, played by Roger Daltrey. Unbelievable Fullham. Probably one of the best crime Fullhams out there, especially in the UK. Yourself, you kind of followed in your father's footsteps. Bank robber escaped from prison. Nearly over 30 years in prison. Mad story as well. 20 years in prison. 20 years alone to be sentenced. 20 years in prison. Yeah I sentenced about 35 years and 10 years on the truck. Escaped a few times back in. Now you're here today. Good to see you. Great honor to be on your show. And you know a few people who's actually been on the show. Paul Ferris was a good friend I mean. Paul Ferris was a very very funny man. Brilliant badminton player and very good at chess. And it was like a war when I met him. And the other guy who I think a lot of is Paul Doyle. I was away in two years. Tough bastard. When he gave me for the Picasso painting but Doyle was very quiet and very subtle. And an odd bastard but a lovely lovely man. Them two I think a lot of. So if they're on the show then it's good enough for me I can tell you. I've got a lot of respect for those two men. Yes I have. I love them. I love them, care for them both. And I'm pleased they've done well with themselves now. Before we get into it I would like to go back to the start of my guests. Get a bit of understanding about them. Where you grew up and how it all began. Well I'll sort of tell you what I can remember. I remember sort of my dad. So I'll tell you I come into being my dad basically was wanted in around about 64, 65. And what happens is he escapes with a guy called Roy Nash. He was one of the Nash brothers. They were in the tourist gang from North London. You know the craze would not step over and they'd drop him out sort of thing. So he breaks off the coach and from that as I believe it he then meets my mum. And if not before he gets nicked he meets my mum. But the point was this he meets my mum and with Roy Nash and they both wanted to sort of talk to her. So they flipped a coin and my dad won the toss. My mum told me this. My dad talked to my mum and Roy talked to my mum's mate. And so I didn't get born about 65. So that's how I come into being right through them two guys at the same club but my mum was out. So from that the first memory over with my dad would have been when he was on the trot. So he gets an A, breaks out, gets a 15 on top. He's doing 23 years. Right. And then he breaks out the maximum security unit where they say most wanted, public enemy number one, wanted Dada and alive and all them sort of tags. So I now meet him. I remember he had a moustache, a fit moustache. He's kind of like, my mum's very warm but my dad's very sort of cool. I'm a bit laid back. He went, I like Russell. And I remember looking at him and I had to call him Tommy. Because I never asked my mum why but I had to call him Tommy. So the first time I remember him as my dad was when he brought a dog back to our home. And the dog's name was Fred. It was a mad dog that was going to be put down. So my childhood memories with my dad, I grew up in East London in Manor Park. My dad, I don't, I never played, I never played with him there. So I think he used to come and visit and get off. So my early part of knowing my dad was over Blackheath where they got him. So in the film, that's the actual flat where they arrested him. So what happens is, when I'm five, he teaches me chess. We do running races, football. And when we should play to ten, he always used to let me get to nine, but he would never let me win. So part of my competitive nature is probably through him never letting me win. So one day we were having a running race. I'd cry, get to nine, he'd nick the ball and ten, nine. I'd come and come and come. And he's on the truck, don't forget. He was looking at her back, he was looking at her 26 years. So one day we were having a race and he always picked me on the line. And my mum said, don't you ever fucking let him win. Don't you ever let him win. And I said, oh, I'll race her. So my mum races my dad. But I've seen my mum over all the school from three onwards. When she races other mum, she kills him. And she slaughters him in a race. We don't slaughter him, but she beats him. So that was a good memory. So that's really basically the memories I have of my dad because then he's nicked, right? So when we used to meet my dad, my mum would just say, come on, we get on a bus and we get off and we'd run and we'd always be looking around. And I knew it was a joke, but I was picking it up that it was more to it than that. And we went on holiday to Devon. And I said to my mum, you know, this is vivid. I said, mum, there's a police car behind. I didn't know that he was wanted, but I knew they didn't like the police. And that's that. But when we used to meet my dad, he sometimes said, lay down, lay down, and lay down. Because if my mum had been followed and then they've lost that flying squad, they wouldn't see the kid. My mum was always putting scarves on, taking them off. So when we used to meet my dad, we was very careful. And that's really what I remember about my dad. So I get, between five and seven, I was a pretty well-behaved kid, but I used to gamble money up the wall. And this is significant for probably what leads me into crime a bit. I said, sometimes mum used to arrive and say, he took my kid's money. And my mum would say, he'd take his money. I said, no, I won it. Sometimes I lose, mum. I always had an articulate answer from my mum to, you can't just take all someone's dinner money, give it back. So I grew up gambling from an early age and in football, running. I used to get in trouble between three and about five and six, but then I'd never gotten in trouble fighting and stuff like that. But I can remember seeing a big stash of money, maybe five grand in all five of us, because there's only five pound notes there. I just took 35 quid. I nicked it. I was only five and I nicked it. And I wouldn't do anything like that normally, but I nicked it. And I'm going to school and there's about 20 quids. I'm in the shop after, I'm waving this five around. It's all 20 quids, all buying sweets. I didn't buy none for myself. So I go back to my house and my dad must have been there. So I remember my mum saying, I don't know where that money's got. I said, no, I don't know. So when I went to school next day, I threw it. I never told my mum. I never told my mum that, sorry. So that is kind of what I can remember. And when I get to about, before my dad's arrested, I would say I was football mad and always running races with people and that sort of thing. And then I get to seven, my dad's arrested and then my mum sort of fell out with that a few years later. So I never grew up with my dad. Did you know? Sorry? What did you know? Seven, what he was getting in jail for? No, I didn't. I didn't, but when I knew he was an armed robber, I was made up when I was a kid. But you were buzzing with that? When I knew, yeah. I don't know what age I was, maybe 12, 13. But my mum, part of the, I got a fascination for escapes and like cowboy films and gangster films and all that sort of thing. I used to watch on a BBC one and BBC two, all the films. And my mum used to say, watch this film. So we'd watch a gangster film, Edward G. Robinson, Cagney, but the films I like were like things about Jesse James. So when you're a kid, you play with pretend guns. And from five to seven, I was obsessed with, you know, gun games. And I was very good at them. So we used to have this way of playing where you start off all alone. Whoever gets killed first, you then become a gang and generally it would be 8v1. And what I learned, I had a little trick, I would hide better than everyone else and come up onto them. And this is significant later because the one time I got caught, I came out early than what I would though and I went around some bushes and all these guns come out. And you know, you pretend you're shot. And what I was thinking was afterwards, I always remember being more patient. I'm an only little kid now, I remember about six, seven. So I always had quite a lot of patience as a kid. And determination. I can remember marbles with a kid, an older kid. And I always remember, you had to play your best marbles if it was their best marbles. And he comes especially to do me because he knew I was doing all the kids my age. And I didn't really want to play, but he kind of, I can remember feeling awkward so I played. And when I played him, I wanted to do an away shot. But because I felt embarrassed, I did a shot and I hit it. And it doesn't sound important this, but what it played on my mind was what it taught me over the years. You get like one shot or you get one chance, take it. That's what it taught me in a peculiar way. And if it's up to me, I can always remember clearly thinking I would have thrown the marble away like a defensive thing. But because I've done the shot, I realized you could be lucky if you went for your luck, all right? So from five to about ten, I was a clever gambler. I used to always have money. I used to wash cars with older kids and get money and buy my mum a present. So I was a good kid. My mum said I was always happy, but if there was a dispute, I could be awkward, I'd sulk. Or once I run away from home for about 12 hours, I'd hit in the bush. It was freezing. My mate Guilford said, he said they're going to call the police. I said, well, go and get me something to eat. I made him go because I knew he should go around the shops where I go. And he got me some Kentucky and I remember the beans. I was only six or seven, remember? I'm a little kid. I was eating the beans and I remember the warmth of it. So I knew about hardship in a funny way, but not through my mum so much, but through experiences like that. By the time I get to 10, my mum split me from all the kids I want to school with. They was going to what I call a very violent bad school. But I had about five proper girl friends and five or six mates. It split me. So I went to an old boy school in Stratford, which was a very good football score. And when I got there, I wasn't good enough for the football team. Now, when I was in infants, I was very good at football. I played a year above. And I mean, I used to go football practice. And basically on the Friday, I don't think I got beat for 18 months. I used to write down all the scores. I remember a kid saying, Russell's been beat. I remember that. I remember saying to my mum at five, Mum, will you time me? I'm going to run around the block. And these are unusual things for kids to sort of do. I was sort of... I was a normal kid, but when it comes to anything competing, I really wanted to win. So I'm pleased that it didn't transfer into fighting because, you know, it's been like that now, you know? Because you're always bumming to someone better. So I was a determined kid and I was a sporting kid. And when I get to secondary school, basically what happens is... I'm a good 800-metre runner. So Newham is a big area in London. I didn't get beat and I won the Newham Championship pretty easily. I get beat in the second final in the following year. I come fourth. Kid run out in front. I followed him. I said to my mum, it's the only race I run wrong. But I said afterwards I don't feel to beat the winner. So I wasn't sore. In the third year, I got beat in, I think, the first race. So I never run after that. But my school, for football, they won the London Cup the first year, the second year and the third year. I could have been the sub or in the B team. So I was the B team captain and Adam, which is Fred's uncle, he used to play at the back and I used to play at the front. We basically would win every game. But I wasn't quite good enough. I knew, oh, you know, as you're a kid, you want to be a footballer. Maybe it boxed up. Maybe a runner or a footballer. And by the time I got to the third year, I knew I wasn't quick enough. And when it come to football, I knew I wasn't good enough. The four guys in midfield, they were better than me. They had more quality. They had more speed. And so I played for them a couple of times. Like I played in, I forget what year, but I've got a hat trick playing for them against the London squad that were a year younger than us. So the London squad were a year younger, that's as good as what my year at school was. So I then start bunking off. Now, I don't remember you're younger than me, but if you wanted to take your old levels, you had to take your mocks in the third year. So by now, that's the other thing. When I'm about six and seven, we're a shoplifting gang. We're basically going in places and shoplifting six-handed. And what this taught me, a lot of it's to do with your central nervous system and sport strengthens it, I think. And it teaches you to be daring because you get frightened when you do something wrong. You should do anyway. And if you don't, you're not wired up right. You know, when you do something wrong, especially as a kid, you feel it. So to Nick Sweets, you've still got to have that bit of nerves. And if you do it enough times, you're used to the nerves. And I think as a criminal, you have to control your nerves. If you're not nervous, then it's not wrong for you. The nerves are good, but you have to be able to control them. And I think stealing the Sweets when I'm a kid, it taught me, if you're like a bad habit, for crime later. So moving on, I'm about 13 and I get caught bunking. You get canning. I'm in a smasher. It's a real bad pain, the cane. And I think you're twice on the same spot as you were. So they put me on report. So this again would be significant to my criminality later. You have to go on report. You have to just give you a bit of paper and every teacher you go into has to be filled. He has to sign it. So all I did was copy the signatures. Now I was no good at art, but I knew how to copy a signature. I just used to practice. So when I become a fraudster later, I knew I could copy signatures. What ones I couldn't do, my mate, who also ended up a check for all stuff, he was good at copying the signatures. So I should never go to school. So I was in a top class or second from top class at Euston every day. And that's all pretty normal. So the signatures helped me later. But now what happens next is a kid, a very good sportsman, takes me to the gym. I used to get all the Arnold Swarks, the Muscle Books, Franco Colombo and all those guys from the era, just before the Hulk guy. He was about, but he was a little bit younger than them, I think. Franco, I can't remember his name, Luther Endo, right? So these guys were like, I wanted to be like that. So I would have been an 18 stone, by the time I was 22, 23. I would have gone on the road this one. So I would have been a meathead. I was just fascinated by it. But what happened was, when I'm 14, going towards 15, my mate Stephen Granger, he takes me to a professional bodybuilder's gym. And his uncle, like, he's a champion, he's fourth in, fifth in Europe. And he says, right boys, and show you how to, you come in the gym, you do an hour, you do loads of reps. Right? That was it. So I used to go to the gym. I was only a skinny kid. I wasn't that strong, but I used to play pool, and this would change things for me, without me knowing it. So the guy who run the gym, was a geezer called Mick, and he was about, it's smaller than me. All the guys in there, are like 18 stone from all the hardcore doors in East London. And I used to play pool with him and other people, after I've gone to the gym. I'm bunking off there. I noticed there was something, I couldn't understand, I couldn't understand why something was so big. I was worried about this guy. He talked judo there. There was a thing upstairs, and he talked judo. And he was Andy, because if he teaches it, and he wasn't always polite, and he was wary of him. And I was impressed with that anyway. I used to play him, and I didn't pay for the games, and he knew I was bunking off. I'm at Vickersund, no one knows I'm at Vickersund. So what happens is, it's my instincts. I come in one day, I said, so I'll play you for money. So we've played for a pound, and I'm doing for a tenner. And they can't believe it. He beat me eight times, or nine times out of ten. And so snooker, I'm crap. But pool, I'm good at. You could snook with me at snooker. You still might beat me at pool, but you beat me by much, regardless. So I know we're out to play, because this guy was very good, and so was his brother. His brother was a karate kid, about 21, 22, mixed about 35. And he had stories of where he looked like he couldn't fight. He's just smashed people. And they used to educate me how to play pool. So what happens is, I win a tenner off this guy, and they're all looking, but only one of them had the bottle go like that. Bob Easton, he went, well done, boy. So I look at this mic, he goes to me, because he's moody. He was giving me three quid. So come back tomorrow, so I'm expecting him to hustle me. He didn't. He went, there's your seven quid sound, well done. So, the other thing that happens about this time period, no, when I'm a bit younger, I'm playing poker. Now, about that age, I'm playing poker, and I'm playing a postman. But what do postmen don't know? Ten, because I'm gambling obsessed. I'm not a great reader. I see a book called Holds Thing of Gambling. It tells you the probabilities of everything. I read the whole book. And what I learnt was poker, if you've got skills, you can win. You can't win in a casino. You can't win with a bookies. You can't win on a fruit machine. And I learnt this show. And I knew a little bit about poker. So when I play, I win. So I was getting 20 quid a week off him, and I got one five grand off him. I was winning a few hundred quid. So as a kid, I always had money for then. You've got to remember, it's not like now. If it had been now, it would have probably been a runner for an older game on bikes and all that, guaranteed I'd got roped into it. Because the money, you know, I loved it. And my pal, when I was 10, I could just quickly go back to 10. I was a money head. My best mate, he was getting a tenner for looking out for the police and living in the West End for the ice cream vans. Right? So it was a wild culture. It was looking out for the police, stray dogs up the road, all over the place. If your mates weren't out, you'd go and play, you'd stop a bunch of kids, say, can I join in and play football? So what happens is, my mum goes down the ice cream gaff. This is about the time that dad had been nicked. She said, get everyone out in there. And the head traveller come out. She went, no, I'm not fucking all right. She said, get them out. She said, see him, no one. He don't look out for the police for no one. I come back to the tenner, you know what I mean? She went berserk. So I got roped out of that. But when I'm a little bit older, I've got a mate called Matthew. And he's got a brother who's about, I might have been 13, he's got a brother about 17, 18. He can play 79, which I knew how to play. And I said, I want to play him. I want to play him. He said, if you want to play, you've got to ground us. So what he used to do, if he only had 100 quid, I'd go and get him out of bed. So I was obsessed with gambling. He'd come down big, Jim. And he's a funny guy with a 22-star deep voice. And smoke a cigarette. And he'd do me. I'd lose 20 quid, 40 quid. And he went to me. He went, son, you've got to pay for your education. And I never forgot that it was like such a a beautiful line, you know. And he's right, you've got to pay for your education. So, but what he don't know is I can play poker. So I must have lost about 200 quid to him. But he knows I get money and it doesn't matter to me over the months. So I'll play him poker. And he's doing money to me. But he's a ticketer. He's older. He's a spiff. He's a hot cookie. So his brother is giving him treatment with a verbal. Big time fucking spiff. Fucking ticketer. Getting his ass back. But I can score. So he attacks him. So he makes the noise. His mum comes down and gives him a slap. She says, you're barred, Ross. You're not supposed to be here. I'll sneak around about 12 at night. This is four in the morning. I had to give half the money back because he can't win back his money. I said to Matthew, what did you do that for? So I was battle-hardening from all these experiences from a small kid in gambling. So what happens now? I want to rob. So I said, I'd I'd 8 quid, 100 quid. I've got a mate in a pub. My mate's a driver. I said, do you drive? I'll rob. I'll do the robbing. So I'm 15. So the geyser come out about 22. He went, I'm gonna figure something. I said, yeah. I think my tape was out then. So I knew it was a rob. I knew it was a scape. You know what I mean? I can fucking believe it. But like, it's really more to do with Jesse James and watching the films as a kid, right? Something to do with me, old man. I love Jesse James and the great escape and all that, Steve McQueen character. He just marches off to the block with the time every time he's caught. I'm like, whoa, you know what I mean? My mum say, what do you think of that? She was a really enthusiastic mum. So anyway, the kid says to me, how old are you? I said, 15. He said, Russ, I can't give you a gun, mate. I said, why? He said, what's it for? I said, I'm robbed. He said, no. He said, all your dead sites. I can't do that. I said, give you 80 quid. He went, no, ain't no money. And I knew, you know, I went, okay, fair enough. And that was it. So now I sit to my mate. We're going to get a replica. Then I knew the West End by the back of my hand because my mum used to take me down there. I knew parts of the West End, so on and all that. I've been down there when the IRA you give out warnings, you have to run. They take the police and you have to run, you know. I can remember the couple of bombing campaigns, you know what I mean? You know, you was frightened. You had to be careful. So anyway, we go down to where I knew because of my mum. And we're looking at the guns. I've got the money. I'm looking at guns. And all of a sudden, these have come over and he went, come here, you. Police. He went, what are you looking at? It was not uniform planes. So I rung it. So I'm looking at the the flick nice. He went, why aren't you at school? I said, because I went to school with my mum. My mum said, I go to the rest of the day off. They never checked or nothing, right? Took our names. He said, if I see you down here again, looking in here. He said, I'll take you back to the school until you had master. So that was the end of the robbery game, thank God, because I would have been away, or something, or I'd have been in trouble. I wouldn't have got away with it. We'd have got caught eventually, you know. So that was the naughtiest I ever was. There wasn't nothing I would say that was more serious than that, but as serious as you want it to be, sort of thing. Yeah, but get one. They're still bad to the average person. I'm pleased I wasn't thinking, but it's to do with it's to do with the want of money. Was it to feed the Jabba gambling addiction? I've got to be honest with you, it wasn't nothing to do with it. I did, by the time I got 16, but on the way to 16 I never actually lost. I used to win. I had something to show from the gambling, but I used to bet on horses and dogs. I used to give, not dogs, I never bet on dogs, football, and I used to give the money to older kids. Or I'd put the money on myself, and if it won I'd get someone who's older sort of mean, because they may not pay. I can remember always being lucky, but when I get the 16, my dad introduces me to his girlfriend, Bonnie, and she'd become like a second mum. She's a Brazilian woman, she had loads of energy, loads of love and generosity, and what happened was, she says what are you going to do? I'm 15 and a half. I don't even go to school now. There's no more of the, they give up on me. I was the only kid they give up on, and I was quite clever, but they should have made sure that I couldn't fill in the things, really. But anyway, so she says, you want to come and work for me? You can be a runner, you can do the office work, make the teas. So I met people like Ben Elton's French and Saunders. I met all of who would go on to be famous comedians. I met maybe seven of them. I met Joanna Lumney for Jennifer Saunders. So while I'm getting between 16 and 17, I sometimes see them and say hello. I mean, add in faith on them. I knew a few of them at that time, a little bit afterwards. And what happens is, I'm a straight guy and I'm happy and I was a good office boy and people used to go into the office and say why don't you come and work for us? Or when you leave there, you'll get more money here. But I was loyal to the lady, but in the end I thought I'm going to do booking cards. So I made a conscious decision. I've got no excuses when I've ever done because I've always been determined to do things. I've never, I suppose to do drifting to things, but I wanted to, I've had enough of working for 60 quid a week. So I was getting. It doesn't sound, it sounds impossible now, but when you're 16 then that's all you've more or less got. So anyway. She said, I'll give you time to create your show. You can go and buy your first set of booking cards, which I did. I'd find someone who knew someone. I said, let's get me have your booking card. So I'm getting 50 quid a day now. Right. And this is what happens. This is, this is, so I'm only a part-time criminal and I believe if you're a part-time criminal, it's a good thing. But a full-time criminal you'll go to prison and you might go to prison for a long time if you're a robber. So I didn't understand the difference, but I couldn't get enough booking cards of the method I had. I was getting 50 quid a day. And what happens is now what makes me a professional criminal. What happens is, my dad when I'm 14 or 15 introduces me to a guy called George. But on George, he was a brilliant TC man. Great fraudster. Very generous. I befriended these two boys who were my age. Right. But they've got this I should play tennis. I was a good tennis player. I was a good tennis player as well. I should play tennis with them. Football and that's it. Anyway what happens is, they've got a mate called Lawrence Sweet. He was a brilliant tennis player. I couldn't beat him. Skinny, Jewish kid but a mad gambler. And one of the things he'd done, he was one of the best in the country when he was 10, he would tend the other stomachache, climbed out the window, run down the betting shop, had a bet, he also used to come back and then comes out after like a 10 minute break. Right. So he's a lunatic gambler. He's auntie manages a gambling that's in Albany Street, just off of Regent Street in the West End with a big face called Mickey Falco. And if you read about the Falcos, they're from the 60s when the craze were about. He's the young brother. My mum used to go out of him. Right. I've got a picture of him even now today. My mum's still got a picture of him. Right. I said to my mum, he looks like, like, he looks the best dress. He looked the best out of everyone I've ever seen photos of. Right. So my mum said all the women liked him. He was like the heartthrob sort of thing. She went out of the room for like six months or whatever. Right. So anyway, so when she was younger. So I go in the gaff. He says, how's your mum? I says, right, Mickey. You know what I mean? He's like he minds the gaff. Loads of gamblers. It's all building. And I'm sitting here as I'm sitting here with Lawrence I might have 80 quid in the 100 quid and there's a geyser here. Right. He's got loads of curly hair biggest face I've ever seen and they call him Mad Mick. Right. Now this geyser is not violent but he's verbally very sharp. He's a pro gambler. Right. He's 26, 28. So we're talking away. He don't know I'm a vicar. So he might have swerved the issue. Right. So I said, you played pool. You know. Yeah. I said, I played for money. I said, how much free quid? I said, no, I've got money. I've got my reddies out. I've got reddies here. Right. So he says to Lawrence, what's your hotshot fucking play? It won't make no difference. I could be twice as good. You'll get my money. So Lawrence says he'd be close. He says you're better potty. He's clever. He puts the ball. He says something like that. Right. So he says, I'm going to play. So he's coming in. So we go downstairs into a basement. It's dingy. And it's six o'clock at night. He says, I've got to have an edge. I don't understand what he's on about. Well, I do because the casinos have got an edge, haven't they? Everyone, you know, there's an edge. There's the little tax thing. I said, go on in what? Right. I've got the gift of the gab. I'm not shy. Right. I'm, I harrowed. I must have been 18 now, maybe, you know. So he said, you played for every game. Now each game is 20p. I said, I'll pay for the game. My problem. It starts at six o'clock. And it finishes at six o'clock in the fucking mall. So basically what happens is everyone in the building sort of, now the verbal's gone around the gap. I mean, look at some downstairs with fucking Curly Mick. Curly Mick will slap my ass for my money within two hours. So all these people coming down and it's really close. But I'm always in front by ten or something. Right. And they're coming down. And after about eight hours of me with the thing, I need a break, mister. You saved me, mister. I need a break, right? He said, there's 50p. You can't have a coffee, right? But drop me out for the fucking verbal rustle. Like, well, when he comes back down, he goes through, oh, it gets worse. I'm with you. He said, you're my flicker. So I can't fucking believe it. He said, I might just pay you now and fuck off. He said, I don't want your dad coming down and slapping me because I'll take your money off. You're right. All that. It's the very last game we've had 12 hours. We can't take no more. He's got a shot. He said, look, instead of me taking the shot, take the tenor. You can say you've beat me. And really, I should have took the tenor because I was that sort of kid. You know what I mean? But I thought, nah. I said, you make the show. He said, well, good decision. He said, because I'm on five zombie. He said, I'm two zombie. I'm not five zombie. So he said, well done for working it out. He pops the shot. I give him back 30 quid that I was in front. I said, we're level. He went, we ain't. He said, check your pockets. I said, I'm a tenor short. We played about 50 games. Five times ten. So a pound, you get five games. And I've done a tenor. And he went to me. That is what I mean by an edge. So all those things understood. Jimmy San, you got to pay for your education. Other things. Because I was better-wired than to go to 12 hours. What happens is, he likes me because of that. Otherwise, we go separate ways. And now this is how I become a professional. Check. For all of that. He said, I'm not gaffing Denmark street. Opposite, it's the phrases. I've got to gaff. Young Frank and Jimmy. And it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a ten of thieves. There's the pick, the four card, the three card trick. And that's another trick. I knew how to do the three card trick. But not the way they do it. I know I used to win money at that. If you see it 50 times, you get the card. But if I only do it 10 times, you won't see the card. All right? So I used to get money at that as well, all right? So what happens is, you could buy a booking card, a page for three quid. So I start buying booking cards and I can copy the signatures because I learned it when I was bunking off and all that, yeah? And what happens is, I just went to everyone. I pay a five or a page. I get a lot in the West End. So all of a sudden this young kid, I was about 18, I'm getting 200 quid a day. But what happens is, I get nicked during this time and I get nicked on a booking card, charge. And I would have got bowed and I wasn't going to go to prison for it, but this cousin hated me. He knew the name and all the rest of it. And he stopped, he did everything to stop me getting bowed. So I'd do four months while I'm away. What was that like? I hated it the first day it killed me. If you want to stop your kid getting in trouble, all right? This is what I would do. I'd say, come on tough guy, all right? I'd say, do what we do there, we'll have a bet. I'll give you a tenner for every hour you can do in your bedroom on your own. No TV, no fair. And the kid won't last two hours. So if you'd have put me in a room, I did have patience though. So maybe this trip won't work, but the point is this, if you go to prison, you're acclimatised. If you're done and you said to a kid, come on boy, I'm kid, go in the room, see how long you last. You might last three hours. I'd say, would you like to do three years? The kid would be frightened. There's two late months they go and they take and they adjust. That's the problem with crime. So, if I was a judge, I'd say, you know, he'd just come off the street. I'd say, bang him up for a week, or a day. Put him in the cells for a day, see how he handles it. And I think they'd put a lot of people off. I hated the first day. I had murders with what he had to score and sir. I couldn't believe it. You know, they'd come every on me, right? And they'd know my dad isn't all that right. I was using his name, but it was on the probation reports. They knew. Is that a disadvantage in there because of who your dad was? Yeah, a massive disadvantage, right. But it may not fancy beating me up. Do you know what I mean? But you say, sir, and if not, we come down here, son, do you understand? I was 19 then. So what happens is, so I'd last you a while, maybe a year with a kite, getting a good living. And now I'll do the four months. I come out, and when I went to court, they moved me from a cell and I slammed the door. Like terrible loud noise. I wouldn't move cells, that's right. And that was my first nicking. They'd come from me, mob handed, 15 handed. I mean, I was like that. Walk me down to the block. And my mum visited me. She said, listen, always stick up for yourself. But be careful down here. Because like, for instance, my dad, when he was at the scrubs, my grandmother told me, she said, they stopped us seeing him. Because he carried on fighting with them to such an extent when he was 24. They smashed into pieces. He'd come out on a stretcher. And my mum knows all this, because she knew all the stories. She said, be careful down there, boy, okay? Just be careful. Try and get back on the wing. So a week later, a week, for slamming the door. Then I chin a kid. They kept me on the up, they put me on the up plate then. So anyway, when I go to court, as a screw, they put me on the up plate, so I don't want you on here. You're only on here because the governor's to give you a chance, all right? But when I went to court, he went, Grant, that was my name, he went, good luck. And I appreciated that, do you know what I mean? I've got a ballcat. So what happens is, I've got a six month of bender. If I commit an offence, they can give me six months arguably. What happens is, I was doing betting shops. There was a guy called Murray the Head, and he introduced me to doing betting shops. I never come close to getting caught in the banks. What happens is, I carry on doing the betting shops. I only go and do the same gauge I've done before he recognises me. I never recognised him. And when I go to court, to finish my bender, I walk in, I had a cashmere overcoat, a really smart one, walked in like this, if I'd be a gangster. And the coser had to give me, he had 700 crid of mine when I was next, right? And he's looking at me, but he's got a big smile on his face. I'm thinking, why's he smiling, right? So, Barrister said, they're saying about extra charges. Oh, fuck it now. I'm going to do six months. So I skip out. He said, don't go through. Don't go through. He said, because you'll get bowed. He said, but then you might get a little bit of bird. But he said, you should be all right today. The coser's coming running down. I go back up. The judge says, you should have come here last week. Never mind about leaving on a day. So I come out and hated this coser. He came out of the money. He said, you won't keep it. He said, you're off to Islett and Police Station now. So I go to Islett and Police Station, right? And they say, you're probably going to get charged, but not today. So you come back in a month. And I come back in a month and they charge me. So what happens is, I do two or three months and I said to my mum, I didn't say to my mum, I said to my mate, I'm going to not go on the last one. What happens is, in the meantime, a kid called Strawberry Mick, he's working, so now I go up to the next stage of crime. He's working with a travellers checks guy. So you know what travellers checks are? You might get a grand a day. You might get two. You don't get no money. So for a day's work, you can get two grand. He said, Russell, I'm getting six months in three days. He said, I can't get out of. He's a creeper. He said, why don't you take over? I said, yeah, I'll take over. And he said, you know what I'm going to do? I said, you know what I'm going to do? Signatures. So I meet this kid, he's in a posh South London face. He's got a massive ass swimming pool. He said, oh, you're a good kiter. So I'm all right. So what happens is, I think I start getting two grand, a grand, 500 quid, a grand. So when I go at the first table of this guy, I have an up. But this is what the problem is. If I had your Travis checks from Scotland, they'll be on a list. If they come from America, they won't go on a list. The stuff never comes back. But what was happening was, he had a connection for unsigned gear and it was hundreds of grand with a gear going missing. So what happens is it was going into, say, the 10-pound attic. You get it given to you for half way. Right? There was some money in there who was in charge. I didn't know it was. I didn't know who I was. One person can only get 20 grand down over two days. But it goes to other firms. You have to all start on the same day. So you all agree where you're going to start. So what was happening was, if you lost a photograph, they was getting like the odd photograph of me. They didn't dab it. They was going, who's this kid? They didn't know who I was. No one knew sort of who I was, right? But someone said, like, they know about you but they don't know your name. Right? Fucking, you want to be careful, son. Right? Anyway, what happens is, I speak to Blonde George. He says, you've got to be careful. You mustn't lose photographs. You can't lose photographs. But what you can't do is use unsigned. They put all their work into it. So what happens is this. It's lucky, but it's unlucky. They get my dabs. They go, it's fucking McFicker son. Let's go and get him. I'm on the... I don't go back on the check thing that I get charged with. It's three months in, but on about the third month or the second month, I never go back to the court proceedings, you know, because you go every month and it goes to the crown or it goes wherever. So I'm on the trot. So when they go to my mum's, I'm not there. When they try and find me, I'm not on the grid. I ain't got driving license. I haven't got a bill in my name. So what's happening there? I think I'm just wanting for a 50-quid check from a betting shop. I've already probably got eight months. So shrewd nuts are saying you shouldn't be doing that. You're de-unsigned. They'll kill you for it because it's part of like a million-pound fucking swindle over months. I've joined the firms throughout London, but I'm a little bit naive. I'm game. But I'm losing photos. So people working on it with no photo probably don't get caught. But anyone with a photo, you get caught. So what's happened is I'm now living in the Cotswolds. Right? I didn't have much money and I just think I'm wanted for like a small amount of thing. But someone sold me. If you're doing unsigned and you've lost photos, it'll come on Tumblr, right? So I'm open. I go into a hotel to have a shave. I had eight grand worth of travellers checks. And I've missed the door to have the shave and I've gone into an office. Guys, what are you doing here? You think I'm a creeper? There's a lot of creepers about it. So I say, I'm sorry, but it chases me. I get nicked. I go to the police station. I give a mood in that. Back in the day, it didn't matter if they took your prints in there to send them to Scotland Yard to do them. They didn't do them at the station. It wasn't possible. They didn't do them at the station. But what's happened is my girlfriend wasn't on the flat at the house. She was similar age to me. She wasn't there. So when you have to get bowed in the morning, I know I can't get bowed. That's it. So when I got caught the next day, I'm hoping no of the travellers checks have come back. But what happens is there's a cosy there. He's wanted for hundreds of grand worth. So I'm off. So I go go into custody and they said we've got about 300 grand worth to show it. So you had a choice. You could either go into... When you go caught next, you could either go into the check for all the things and this is how it works. One of my scrubs is a geezer called T.C. Clay. Doing a seven. And this is what he said to me. I said, can I escape from the station? I go to the station. He said, fucking hell. He said, what it is? There's two sides to the jail and this is what they'll do. They'll show you loads of gear. Some of it will be you or some of it won't. If you lie to them and they know you're lying, then you're going on trial for the bits you've done. He said, this is what happened to him. He gets a seven when he could have got a five or a six. But he went guilty on some but run a trial on others so he is advising me what to do. So I said, okay. I said, can I escape? He said, yeah. He said, but there's two sides to the thing. On this side is where they show you all the kites. He said, when I got there, I was going across like that. He said, and then they kept me on this side. He said, so you need to be on that side. It's the only way. I'm going to custody on a three day thing with a brief and all that. And the first day they put me here, which is the wrong side. So without all this information, what I do next don't work. So I said, it's too noisy. I want to be on the other side. You've been no problem. Right. So that night I'm on this side. I said, I want to I want to hours exercise. So they cuff me to talk. So I said, what's left? He went, that's Parliament Square. So I can't run that way if I get the chance. I said, what's right? He said, there's a bridge and then there's an estate. So it's got a long story. Next day, I'm cuffed. I'm cuffed coming back. I'm cuffed. Right. On about the third, on the next trip, I'm not cuffed. Right. You've got no chance of me, trust me. If he don't grab me, he ain't got a chance. I was going, I thought, fucking hell. Now, while this is all going on, there's people in the tin pan, talking to each other. He's down the thing. He's going to make one. Make one. They're all fucking drinking. There's about 50 people know on the street, right? I'm going to make one if I get the chance. But they don't really think it's going to work out, right? So what happens is, I bolt. I'm gone. There's no causes coming in. On other days, there was cars coming in and things happening. I could have been unlucky. I get away. What happens is, I run and I thought, I've been running there for over a minute. I thought I'd best go up. So I've gone up some stairs and I've been running. Because most kids don't like coppers, right? So I thought, I've got to hide. So I'm knocking the door, knocking the door, knocking the door. A woman says, who's that? I said, it's Mills on Wheels. She went, what? I said, it's Mills on Wheels, man. I put on a funny voice. So she went to me. I showed her the door. I kept the door open. I get on my knee. I said, lady, please. I said, I'm drumming at Vickerson. I just escaped from the thing down the road. I was on my knees like that. I said, please. All right? I could hear a cause of shouting. You could hear them shouting. I'm thinking the kids might have even knocked on all the doors. She rang my dad. She said, he said, he said, yeah, come and get him. He said, tell him I'll be an hour. He said, let it die down, all right? Her husband, come on. I said, I'm so sorry, mister. I said, I'm so sorry because I frightened the woman. You know what I mean? But I got on my knee straight away. I said, I'm so sorry, but it's all right, son. Anyway, I had a cup of tea, some biscuits and when it was time to go, my dad rang. She went, oh, no, he went down and checked. He said, your dad's there. I said, thank you so much. You know what I mean? For your kindness. So I was lucky. I go downstairs. I go to get on the floor. He just said, there's no one here. Who are you worried for? So we drive off. He gives me a hug. He says, look after yourself. So I'm now banging trouble. They're looking for me all over London. But I was slippery. So I'm going to go down the road. I was slippery. So I'm at the first gaff. I move out. They missed me by two days. It was my girlfriend's gaff. I'd know where to go. Then I had somewhere to go. And while I was doing the travellers checks, two people showed me what the undercover vans look like over South London. There were squads in these gaffes and the TC guy was a pro who used to get the gear. He said, that's what the vans look like. That's what you're looking for. So I'm one of the gaffes over Stoke Newton. I see a van. So I don't go back. Then I'm crashing it. I'm getting money again. But I won't do unsigned because I know it'll come back. So I was doing checks for cars and I would have got nits. But one of the causes in charge of the case where he took a car from someone who we've sold it to for four grand worth seven, he said, we'll get them. He said, you get your money back, mate. He said, we'll get this little firm. We're working out of one magazine. We'll get them because of that. I stopped doing that. So I was getting money. I had different girlfriends standing in hotels and basically I had a Swedish girlfriend. So I'm going to Sweden. I'm going to things. So I was here there and everywhere and I was doing well. They kept missing me in certain places like they go one place. I come back from Sweden on one occasion and I thought I'll go home. So I didn't go home. I thought I'll ring first. I rang my mate. I said, go and check if where I am is all right. I can tell you now it ain't fucking all right. They've been here a week. I went on holiday about two days before they arrived and when I've come back, I've checked and the reason it must have been because I never had a phone but I had a phone at MacGath and about four people had rung and I knew that was dangerous. People in the T.C. game. Then I'm over in the angel. This is months later. I'm still getting money and I'm staying in a woman's Gath. All right. And what she says to me is, all of a sudden I'm staying there. She goes on holiday and I stay with my Swedish girlfriend. All of a sudden a big heavy gangster comes around from the plot, right? So I see him out of the window and I thought what the fucks he want, right? So I go downstairs. I said, sweet, he went, yeah, sweet. He said, come in, listen. He said, I'll build on the plot. It's either you or me, all right? So I went, I think it'll be for you. He said, I won't tell you what I know. He said, someone's seen them. They're plotted up around there. He said, they're plotted over there. He said, my Gath's there. He said, your Gath's there. He said, one of us. So what I do, I move out to a friend, this woman's friend next door, two along. So what I was doing, I was checking everywhere. There's no police following me. So I thought, it ain't for me. What I'm doing still, I'm going in the front door, the downstairs door, going out the back and I'm going into the house. I'm now staying in. On about the 10th day, one morning, they smashed the door off, run upstairs. No warning, smashed the other door off and I'm not there. So what are you doing to my door? It's Carol. I know his ear, Carol. Don't start all that. He must have gone up there. The ladders are there. He might have drawn up a pair of ladders. They go upstairs and they think I've gone along the building and got out over there. I'm in bed next door, right? So I slipped in there. So now we're getting up to about two years. So what happens is, I end up at another Gath and so I decided to go past Carol's and one of the things I was told they used to do illegal taps. They'd put up a tent outside a BT tent and they'd hook it up. It's illegal. It's never a legal one. I run it from the west down. I said, listen, I said, I've been past your Gath. Be careful what you say on the phone. Cut a long story. I met another Gath and I'm using a call box and one day as I use a call box, I see the same sort of tent and I thought, you go cold. I thought, I bet it's on me. So I say what I'm saying, put the phone down. I go in and I get on them. I thought, fuck me, they're going to do me. They won't do it at night, do it in the morning. So I come out, I get a taxi to Island where there's a massive estate and I walk in to the estate. I hide, I look down and I see them looking for me. But they go off. They think I must be in their house. So I don't go back there and I think that was the last time I slipped them. So what happens now? My options have all changed. I can't get travellers checks. When I go on a meet to get some travellers checks and my idea, kids said to me, I can't believe it's you. He said, that's why they've been around. He said, you must have someone who's knowledge of you. He said, because they're all around here. It's only a bit of an idea. He said, I didn't notice for you. He said, he said someone's name. He said, he introduced me to meet him. But he didn't say to him it was me. He said, you're being a car. So he said, Russ, you must have someone who's no good. He said, because I'm telling you I'm not. So what happens is I didn't really think I would get caught. But what happens is this year I must have been trusting someone from the West End. Not a proper pal but from travellers checks or ID. So what happens is, my very last day I'm now going to South Africa. I'm going to go to Tenerife and I'm going to go across on a boat. So what happens is I said to a kid, I said, I don't fancy him there in his cafe. I said, I don't fucking need to be on you by now, right? I said, fair enough. So what happens is I go to Windsor. I go to Redding, put four grand or eight grand travellers checks down, cut it up with a kid. We're now going to Sainsbury. We're now driving to the airport. And I said, I don't fancy the van. He said, Russ, he said this van's everywhere. I said, I don't fancy it. I said, go straight and then suddenly have the van come with us. So he goes twice round and round about. And I said to him, listen, I don't fancy it. I fancy a swerve. I'll go back. I'll drop out the aeroplane to Tenerife. What happens is I get to the airport. It gives me a big hug, right? Keep this kid's not the grass. It gives me the hug. He says, it's over. Now I've already gone to South Africa and worked in someone's company, building company or something. I can't do that, but he's taught me. I go through the airport. I say, I've something to eat. A glass of water, a coffee. And I enjoy Sims on the thing. I walk him through the door opens, shuts. As I go like that, the the six corsets, I fit their customs. I didn't think that was police, right? You know, because I thought maybe I'd been recognised fucking sitting in the gaff. It opened up. What seems to be the problem? He went, the problem, Russell, is about a million pounds where it would travel his checks. It wasn't that much I'd done. He went, you're nicked. So they nicked me. Put him in a room. They couldn't get clearance to take me straight out. So I'm sitting there for five minutes like this, right? Like that, sorry. So what happens is we're walking through and they're chip and charging. They're making a joke. We thought you'd be out in Hollywood now or all little jokes. They're saying all names that I've used in hotels or for properties where I've rented. So that's it. I get charged. Right? I get, um, they don't, they don't keep me there. I go caught the next day and you go to Lambeth, right? They hadn't put me, I was on the elixper. I went to Lambeth with everyone else. What happens is at the time everyone, the police was having, it was overcrowding. This is 1986. It was over, 1988. It was overcrowding. So what they've done, I think they dug me out on purpose. Not the police, but the the court mob at Lambeth. They've put six of us up towards Halifax. Other places are going into different police stations. So it's like three or four hundred unlucky people or lucky people going to the police custody. So what happens is I I'm cuffed to another grime. I said, do you want to try and make one if we get a chance? He went, no. So what happens? I'm on the coach outside Lambeth. They remember I've only been nicked after two years I was on the trot. He's got the door open and I've got like, um, I've got like a thumb that I can put my thumb in. What he's done he hasn't put it on as tough as what he should do. And I'm going like that. I've got it till the knuckle and one of the causes got up to check the cuffs. I had to push it back and it caused me a bump. Right? It's coming back on like that. I couldn't get back up. I get to, we now go to Halifax. I think the door shut and we went. So I missed my chance by about a minute. If I'd have been a bit quicker I would have got out. So anyway. I now go to Halifax after an eight-hour journey and they all know the kids I'm with they go, fuck, you know, two robbers there. These geese have salt. The other geese are cutting someone. Two, two, two harm robbers here, right? She was unlucky. So anyway, what happens is I go in the Halifax station and when I get off the coser he didn't even cuff me. He had it like that and I thought I could have chinned him but I'm only looking at about a free stretch. Right? Maybe three and a half years. But I'm only in Quidsworth? It wasn't a million quidsworth, no? But they had that, don't they? They say that but what you've got to understand, right? They just do it so that you go guilty and explain what's yours because if you're done it's a lot of headache. So it's a bit like saying go guilty is really what it is, right? So anyway, what happens is I have murders with the police. Right? So they fucked me off to some other gaff. He said you're going to a hard gaff now. It's made, it's a big police station and they're expecting that. They're not having your bullocks. How long have we got? How long have we been inside? Right, so what's happened this year? I get there and so there was this sergeant, right? He said you can play football here. Six handed in that yard. He said you've got a skipping rope. He said you can get nice and fit for your next escape grant. Right? That was his thing. He never stopped saying it. Right? That was his little friend. So while I'm there, we're about 20 handed. He let me have a visit with my Swedish girlfriend with a closed cell door and there was murders with some DI. He said you can't fucking trust him in the cell and you know, but he didn't tell me a favor. Right? You know, there's a causal but he done me a favor. So he's always saying about your next escape. Your next escape. So it's my turn to now go. It's two weeks later. I've now got a court appearance. Right? And I might go back to the scrubs. I might go to the scrubs, sorry, or I might go back into the police thing. It depends on the luck of the draw or what they decide at Lambeth. So I'm on the coach. It's about three in the morning. We traveled eight hours. Right? I said to the kid here, if we get a chance to escape, he said I don't want to escape. So they said who wants to go for a piss? I said me. So one kid gets off and they was all scuffing me around and I was thinking to myself, you're not really concentrating. It's all of a sudden there was a bunch of obelisks going to the coast. They don't realize I've got someone desperate over here. I will take a chance to go. But am I going to get out of the cuffs? So what happens is because it comes over and he cuffs this hand to his appropriate, let's say it cuffs me to he turned around put me there and what I don't, I went like that. I don't know what I've done it. I put my hand like that. So the kid, the kid sit going like that and he put the cuffs over. So now it's on a bigger sort of wrist. And he went, it's dirty. As I put my thumb away I thought I'll slip that easy. There's no trouble at all. So I get up. I like to wait for some other kid. I get up. Now they should have been too handy with me because I'm a scapey. But they didn't follow the procedure that they should have would have been in place. So we're walking as the M1 now it's three in the morning. And as we walk shall I go now? And I should have gone then the reason being when I get to the ever-piss there might be because of the way it comes the way outside. Anyway, I go in the toilet with me. If you want to go first with me, I should do go first, right? He turned around right in the corner I went like that. It was easy. I went like that. And as I went like that I seen go. I'm gone. I go across the M1 and I'm off, right? They didn't have the bottle to come across. They wasn't going to do that. So I run and I see a railway line. I thought, well my dad's he only runs along a railway line but I thought, no, knit that out. I fell into a river and it gave me pneumonia. I got a water on the lung. I find a park like a, where they had lorries. I get on the lorry, undo it and I get into, there's two big things I climb up and I hide. I'm there for eight hours. About seven in the morning lorry driver comes and we're driving. I'm thinking this is it. I'm sweet. All of a sudden he's got a stopover like a road block. He says, eight hours later. So the cause I say, could anyone have got on this lorry? Now he should have said, yeah, because it was open but he didn't say that. He went, no, no one could have got on this. What's the problem? We want to look in the thing. So I'm thinking I'm fucked, right? He said, you've got a torch. So he gives him a torch. I open the things and the cause I climbs up, puts a light down on that side, climbs down. Now he's got to come this side. There's only one more thing. I couldn't have got that. I'm shivering. It's really freezing. And because I'm soaked through where I'm falling in the river or a canal. Only swam from here to over there. So anyway he didn't bother looking in the thing. So I'm, I'm thinking I'm double sweet. So I went to a lorry park and I climbed there. I said, I'm just gonna fucking he said, fucking it was on the thing all the time. I went, yeah, I said, would you give me a lift where you're going to next? He said, yeah. He said, but I've got to load up for an hour. I said, I can't wait. I've got to go. So I go, I climb out of this place and I go to remember my mate, Big Jim. And as I ring him, I couldn't remember the number. My mind went blank. I couldn't remember the fucking number. So some kid walked past about 18, 17. I said, mate, I said, would you live around here? He said, yeah. I said, who do you live with? He said, mum. I said, who do you live with? He said, yeah. I said, do you like the police? I've escaped from, he went, you'll escape it. So what do you mean? He says, I want to fucking news mate. I said, would you mum let me stay? He went, I think so. I said, I'll give us some money. I said, I can't remember my mate's fucking number. But I swerved for whatever reason. I said, have you got a cab number? And he did. I said, ring me a cab. So this cab driver comes. So what happens is I get a taxi. He's going somewhere. I said, do you want to take me to Cambridge? And this would be an error. And he said to me, I said, how much? He said 50 quid. I had 25 quid on me. He said, take me in town. So he says, well, there's roadblocks here, police. I said, can you avoid the roadblocks? He don't know I'm the guy. But he suspects I might be. So he voids them and I get out. So I get on a coach to Cambridge. And on the way, I thought it was something in me that I thought, get off the coach. I didn't. So anyway, I'd get fucking pulled in on the way to Cambridge and it's police there. And they get on the coach. So I went. Fuck it. I'm going to swim pool and I put a jacket over my thing. I should have got rid of my top. And I didn't. The reason I didn't get rid of it. I probably wanted to fucking say how scapes in this some ego shit. I should have got rid of it. So he's come up to me. He said, where you come from? I said, I just can't read my grandma. What's the problem with you? I put on a fucking man. I said, what a problem. He said, he looks at me. He said, you look like someone's a scape. He said, you look like someone's a scape. What color are you? I knew what I knew. What color eyes have I got? Yeah, what color eyes? Blue green. Well, they said blue, which I guess right. So he said blue. I said, my eyes are green. My eyes are green, but they look kind of blue. So I knew that. So anyway, he fucks off. And I thought, I've done him. I've been in loads of banks over the years and you judge this to body language. It's a bit like a box you can tell before it happens. I thought I was sweet. I knew to get off early. I had it in my head, get off, get off, get off. And I didn't. That's what I'm talking about. You get an opportunity and you don't take it. And this is all through my life. I always get the first opportunity. So he come back. He said, let me see what you got underneath. He went, it's a yellow top. It was like a rugby thing. She said, you have to come down the station. So as we get off, I'm going, I said, fucking hell, man. What the fuck are you on a problem on? He said, don't bother. I run down the dead end and they dumped me. So I go to the station and they bang me up. Because I come in, he said, there's been a burglar saying, you're getting an internal surge. I said, go and get him. I'm freezing there, right? I'm like that. I'm gone. My temperature's dropped. They called the doctor. He leaves the cell right? He's gone three along, gone into another room. I just bolted out. I've gone, gone further down. I could see there's three people there talking. I couldn't go there. I go into the back room and I do the prints. There's only a skylight. I couldn't find the thing to do it. So I stood on the center thing and I'm going like that. I had about another three minutes. It was going like that. It's really slow. It wouldn't go up. Another two or three minutes I'd have been out anyway. I heard him come in. He said, what are you doing acting silly for? Come on. I said, I'm not having no internal surge. He said, no, you're going to the hospital. So I go to the hospital and what happens is this. I'm down in the hospital for a three-day thing. I've got something on the lung, water on the lung and there's a cosy there. So there's now an argument. Some woman gives them tea and biscuits but not me. So excuse me. I said, can I have tea and biscuits? I said, see what you can do. I said, they're not ill with pneumonia. I said, so why can't I have tea and biscuits? She said, well, I'll get you some. I said, yeah, but you give them some. Surely you should have. So because of when it ain't the hilt one or whatever. I said, what would you know about the hilt one? So that's an argument. It comes back to the tea and biscuits and he went to me. Anyway, he didn't get far on this escape. Did you? I don't say nothing. So where did it cuff me? There was a thing behind me and I think I could have unscrewed it at night. Got it off. You might have to crash one. So when my my girlfriend came with my mum and we were spinning it. I said, I'll be on second floor on the first floor. She said, you're on the first floor. I said, is there stairs? I said, I've got one more go. What's happening is my pal has come and got me or tried to come and get me. A guy called Tony was a fire and someone else who was a bit of a knife man. They've come down. I don't know this. I'm a kid, right? But I'm thinking to in the morning I want to try and undo the screw thing. They've come down. Couldn't find me and the police have been called. So in the morning they said, you're going back to the station. I said, I've got fucking pneumonia. It doesn't matter. So they take me back to the station three in the morning to police arrive. Take me on to the van, small ground. Put me on there. I said, what are you doing? I said, you're fucking joking. Put me on like this, right? I said, small green pan with fucking things like that. I said, there's rules. I said, you can't do this. He said, rules for you Russell. He said, do you not know the trouble you've caused? I said, if I give a fuck. But he went, do you not know the trouble you've caused? You think the rules apply to you? I thought, I mean, it's right, isn't it? It's sweet. And as we were driving through London, I was thinking of people in their pets, like with their missus, maybe the dog on the bed and all that. It was a vivid thought. And I remember thinking, and the streets were all empty. It was just empty. So we arrived at this gaff now and cuffed me. Put me in a cell. He said, no, he has to be at the end cell. And no one's to open him. This is too handed. I've had three escapes now, yeah? No, not yet. I've had two. I've had two. So in the next day, I've got my food. I said, my food's not good enough. I want to eat it up. It's because I'm old and me. We can't eat it up. I said, don't tell me you can't eat it up. I said, you would want your own food to eat it up. I know what you like or what you see. I said, you'll have a... one of them things, the microwave. I said, you'll have a microwave here. He fucks off. He eats my food up. I said, we do my tears. He said, why am I arguing? The kids see he's gone cold, right? He's taken a piss. I said, mate, you even look after him, mate, so you don't. We're 20-handed in the cells, because he's all overcrowded. So I'm back in the... with kids here, right? So anyway, 10 of them, 20 of them. So I didn't have biscuits. I said, where's my dessert? I know you get a dessert. So he's got the ump. So he's gone back and talked about all this. Nine in the morning, an old school kick-it-the-death slag-o comes. He pulls down the thing. He's about 45, 50, Sergeant. He went with his... with his... He said, let me tell you, right? He said, you're in South London now. Not fucking Alifax or whatever. Because they've also got your report on my myvering cum. I mean, I'm always moaning about something and driving them mad, right? So he's got the report when he knows that I've driven him mad. He said, see you. One more word out of you, son. He said, you'll get the hiding of your life and then we'll take you to the hospital. He puts up a fucking thing or something. So now it goes by. So... So it goes by. So... I get on a buzzer. Because it comes... I said, get the Sergeant in here, please. He said, what's it about? I said, I want to apologize to him. So he comes down, opens the thing, piss in his face, the next guy's up. I don't get him in the boat, I get him there. So now I'm expecting to get killed, right? It wasn't... I was the toughest kid. It was just, I'm arguably the most determined, right? I don't know what I've done it, but I've done it. So I've called it on, right? They don't come from me. So I had a pen in my hand. I'm like that. I couldn't sleep. All of a sudden, door opens. I think I'm going to get bad. They threw piss. Like what, they're pissed in the earth. Missed me. But I couldn't sit, come through, I've been down on the floor, which is more vulnerable. So they come the next day, they went, listen, you can behave yourself. You can go on association with everyone else, but you've got to behave yourself, right? So I come out on association, that was it. So now they come for me for the scrubs. I'm in a van, and they cuff me like this. So I thought, fuck it. Oh, well, I can kick that door. So all the way, when we get to Chelsea, I start kicking the door. They say, don't do that. Don't do that, Russ. Don't do that. Stop kicking the fucking door. Right? They don't go. When I get the scrubs, they're all lined up. McFlickers, son. There he cunt, scapes. Get the thing. They're all lined up. So I go on the win. They didn't batter me or nothing, but it was like, they're looking at me. When I come out, my first court appearance, next court appearance, right? I have murders with the screws on reception. They said, you better not come back. I said, I'm fucking coming back. When I come back, they battered me. Right? Go back to the wing. Didn't get nicked. But they battered me, right? Go back to the wing. Nicky Dunford's there. We've got Nick with the most wanted robber in the country at the time. He was there. There was a couple of murderers. Winston Silcott was there somewhere, lifed off on the other wing. And my dad had done a book with him. So I start getting nicked on the wing. Verbal abuse, all different things. I'd go to the block, lose my TV. Didn't get the TV. You had no phone calls. And you had no toilet in your cell then. It's like that. So I was always in trouble. So on a visit, I said to my mate Gary and Kevin, I said, I can escape. I said, I need to know the exit from the court. Left where it goes. Is that on your mind? This is on your mind, right? I've worked something out which I'll get to. So I said, what goes right, what goes left? So the next visit, they said, you go across. You need to go left, right? You're walking to loads of police and all this, right? You need to go left. So I said, I'll explain to them how I would do it. So what was happening and what was this? When I'm going to court, they put you in cuffs. And the squad would deal with the e-cat. I don't think I was a cat. Then I was potty. They put you in the van. They have an escort behind and one in front. They drive you to the court. So as we're going there, because we've got all fucking stories about if we nearly had you here, we nearly had you in here. He said, we was first handed, son, right? He said, you fucking walk past us over and out and a fucking pair of glasses. And he said, it was only when you got in the car. He said, but our car's all facing the wrong way. But whenever I go somewhere, I'll let it face the way that it's not, can't get caught in traffic. Or it's further away where it's, you've got a chance of driving us straight away. He said, one of us got in here. He just drove off to the thing. He said, we had you that many times. He said, we couldn't believe how lucky it was, right? That's what he said to me, right? So anyway, when we go to the court, it's a shut up. All right? You come out, I'm cuffed, but if you was on a normal routine, you walk up and you just walk to your cell. They just go go to the cells there and you choose any cell. But I'm on an E-list. So when we get to the top, he uncuffs me. I can hear the thing going like that. It's open. But he shuts the door. He shuts the door. So I can't run, so I fall. So then they say, what cells are you going? They've got to designate a cell for an A or an E, man. So I'm standing by the door. Whereas if I was normal routine thing, I know now the van goes out and it's waiting for more sweat boxes and the same routine it drives out. And another sweat box comes here. All different kids coming in, about 20 kids. So my sister must have visited her, produced me every week. She said, Mr. Grant wants to be produced every week. So what happens is, I get produced every week and I said to my pals, within 10 weeks that door at the top will be open. But there's two causes that I couldn't work out or I would barge two causes out of the way. And you run about the third week, I go and I take my dad sent me this booking called the unbearable likeness of being, right? Because he's an intellectual. He sent this booking. So this is, we get to the top are you the thing going shut? The door is open, which they should have shut, right? And he uncuffs me, right? I'm standing here. But there's two of them. So I says, I've got a book in there. I said, have a look. So he's gone, he's gone over to the book and he's gone fucking hell. It was on top of my property, like my gear that I had. He's gone over. He said, fucking hell, that's the thing he bought. But I said, yeah, my dad sent him, right? So he's had a little thing like that. I said, I'll just show you something. So as I walk across this cause of staying still, I bolt, shut the door, shut the door. And there was a screw there called Nobby. It was another sort of screw, right? And he knew I was a cheeky cunt, right? He was about 50, but he was like in charge of the gas, right? So I bolt. So I'm running down to see if they panic like kids. Shut the door, shut the door, shut the gate. But it don't matter the fucking gate. It's like that. It shuts like that. First geezer, bang. He hits the deck. Second geezer. This is not a punch or anything. I barge him out of the way. But the third geezer had a little bit more class than the other two. I got past him. The door is like three quarters open. I'm free. I can see the street. I'm free. And what he'd done, he was 60, he was 20, he was twice as high as his other guys. He didn't stand in front of me. He put his foot out and I caught his foot. He bashed his head and got four stitches, right? I didn't punch him. He fell against the van. His head fucking wavered, right? I fell into the street. And as I hit the deck, because he was coming in perfect, he was over there, he wouldn't have got me. If he was there, I would have held onto him. I wouldn't have fallen. He just kicked me right in the fucking, like, perfect. So I'm like that. They jump on me ten-handed. And they can't believe they was like that. I'm fucking sick because I swear to you how I fell over. I didn't fall over. I stumbled. It was a stumble. So that's how I get caught. So basically cut the long story. Go back to the scrubs. And I'm getting nicked for things all the time. It's a naughty block. So the most violent screws I ever come across was at the scrubs. Twenty of them get extra charge. Twenty of them go to court one day, three years later. And some of them go to prison. Those nice, violent, horrible cunts. So I've gone down the block about six times. I've done two months block, blocked unbother me. It's escalating. But on one of the nickings, this is the funniest, Nicky. My mum's given me some clothes. There's a 50p in the thing. I just left it on the side. I get nicked for it. Go down the fucking block. And the P.O. in charge hated me. And he used to almost shake at looking at me. So he's standing behind the governor. And he's going on about the red writing on me, like this trouble, that trouble. And he went 50p. What's your explanation? I said, what happens is the two for that governor. So put it under the pillar. He went, I said, the two ferry left the 50p. Right. So they've all got the screws. But the governor found it funny. He went, all right, grind. He said, look, go back. So I was going to give you three days. I said, but I'll tell you what, go back. He said, but please don't be down here in the next fucking week. He didn't swear. Off I go. I take a lot of nickings. I do about three months block. Right. I'm only a kid. And I never got dragged to the block. There's only three times. I said, I don't need the cuffs. I'll walk. I'm 24 and the biggest trouble maker on the wing by far. So this is my plan. Scaffolding coming. So I said to seven, eight men. We're climbing up on the scaffold on the roof and I'll smash the roof off if we don't get our demands met, which is basically less brutality and other things. Right. So they're all robbers. Murderers. Murderers. Murderers. This, that, and the other. So I swear. So we're getting ready with it. And the day before we're about to go on the roof because it was just scaffolding. You had to pull some metal framing away. This is on the prison yard. Right. I sorted someone who was a bad, bad fucking. I don't want to say what he's done to someone who was terrible. I bashed him on the yard. The screws went, didn't drag me off. Right. I've had incidents. So Mickey, who's a robber, as I've come up with my dinner, we're 12 hours away the next morning when we're going on the roof, the screws going, fucking, he's given him the every trim. So I've gone up behind him. I nudged him. And we're getting there, you cunt. I said, go and fight him. So he's jumped out. He's going to fight you, Grant. Right. So I've gone up to him. I've just kicked him here. Is it the penny? And now the worst screws I've ever met are now on their way up. Right. So I jump in the thing. You could move your beds over and you could get the end off. The end of things like a stick, like a metal thing. We smash a few things in the thing, me and Mickey are behind the thing and they come up. And then my band is, we're now going to get killed. You get killed there for giving them cheek anyway. But I sort of got away with it a bit. And I see the PO like that. And I think we're gone. So there was a screw there who was in charge of the self-defense. He was a judo or something champion. He was a polite man. He wasn't a bully this man. He comes to the front of the thing all behind him, on the other side. He went, Grant, he said, if you go now, I promise you can walk. I said, if me or him get done, I said, you have my word, I will never ever leave it. I will come back. He went to me, man to man, you can walk to the block. I threw the thing down with the bed. I come out. They marched me along and they put me in the downstairs cell. They come in 15 hands, you know what? So I was nervous. You know what I mean? I thought, I didn't think they'd do me, but I thought, if they're going to, and the PO went to me, if you ever come on this wing again, he said, I will have you. Now what he'd done at the Lambeth, he cuffed the kid round a post and beat him with a trunger for 20 minutes this cunt. So I called to the block and I'm there on good order and discipline, being subversive and I can't go on the wing no more. That's it. There's people in the block on the circuit who basically are in for more, not more serious things, but so what they said was, he was going to smash the roof up, right? There must have been a grass somewhere, not on the amen, but other people, about 50 people knew, you know what I mean? We were going to go up. And he was going to take prison hostages, start hostages. Well, that's not right. How would you take hostages onto a roof? A load of bollocks, right? But that keeps me on what you're called. So the governor comes down, he says, before this had happened, when I come down on one of the occasions, he went to me, this governor, when they come around, they open the door, I say, good morning, morning. He went to me, why are you here? I said, what had happened? Not that incident, something else. He went, he said, when you go on the nick, and he went, you come in here all the time. He said, you're mixing with, because you go on the yard with other inmates who was on the block, IRA geezer on there, who'd done 28, he was a warrior. I met some real, proper people, right? He said, you're probably looking at three, four, five years. He said, you're gonna end up on a circuit on a four stretch or five stretch. He said, why are you putting yourself in this situation? Now in my back, he's just giving up on me now. There's no fucking hope. So someone in the thing I wanted to have done, he was a mobile fucking rapist or something. And I'm giving the orders from bits of paper. They intercept a bit of paper and they've had enough, right? So what happened was they said, listen, you're going to fucking Brixton. Now, Nicky Dunford said to me, they log up, log up, it's all you up. And you sort of go like that. You end up very, you end up fucked up. You're not like a fucking spastic for a couple of weeks. They've hung a geese out there and all that. So the taffy screw come down to me. He said, Russ, please listen to me. Please don't carry on there like you have here. He said, they will fucking kill you or do something to you. You won't be the same again, son. So when you go there, please don't get in trouble like you have here, right? I said, sweet, gov, yeah? The van comes. I'm off. I'm off to a fucking bad gaffe, all right? And I'm not coming out of the block, I'm fucked. So I go to the thing. I'm only a kid, you know what I mean? 24. He says, I'll get to the block. They arrived 12-handed. They're over there. And I looked up. I was cleaning my plate or something. I was doing something. He went, all right. He said, listen, I'll give you one chance. So he said to the government, you can go on a wing. He said, because we think it was only the ones on the wing using conflict with, all right? So we're going to tell you this. If you come back here, you will regret it. So he said to me, go in front of the governor, go on a wing. So I hope I don't see you down here like all this. I've had about 10-12 niggas, 10 niggas. I've done three months block, all right? Block done, done, done, bummed off with me, mate. With a radio, without ability to give you a thing. But what had happened was, they should take your mattress out and I should sit on a pipe. And by the time I've done so much block, it's really tiring. I've got piles. And the pain that you would get sometimes is excruciating. I've had it for about two years. So it was dangerous. So don't sit on a pipe. And years later, if I sat on wet ground, it would hit me. But the pain, the sharp pains, it's like fucking unbearable. So that was a mistake. I didn't know that. So I go on a wing. And the first night, the light wouldn't turn off. I thought I'm going to smash the fucking light. You don't get many chances in prison. You have to take it because... Yeah, it's best if you're escaping and have the chance you get. Is that soul stolen remand? Yeah. I haven't done it. That's why this is all the first nine months of my jail. I ain't done, I've done four months before. Right? And this is like, all in nine months, I've escaped three times. And I've had all the ag. Right? So I was going to smash the thing, but I thought, you know, don't. So I didn't. So the screw's coming along. I said that red light. I said listen you. Don't. Don't. Don't. Don't turn off. I said you've put me here on purpose. I smashed the light. I said just flash the fucking light on my face. So you went okay. Next morning, it was the best gaffer in the world. It was so chilled. So anyway, Gary Wilson, who was at the scrubs, used to work with Fraser. Right? He'd never go on him. He was a bit like, very, very small guy, polite. I get to, when I get there, he's, he's, things are sealed off. Right? So, Ron Easterbrook, as I'm going to church, he knows my, what I call, my uncle, Billy Gentry. Billy Gentry is not my uncle, but he married my dad's sister. He does 18 years out of 18 years. Right? He does six out of 10. No, 10 out of 15, and afterwards, he gets the fucking, does six out of 10. So he's hardcore. Right? While I'm on the trot, I meet these kids. They call Ron Easterbrook. What do you think he's done? He's got Semtex. He's a double A man. No, he's single A man. He's got Semtex. And when the, he put it at the thing and blown the, the top of the, you know, you get a thing that opens an emergency hatch. Yeah. Like a sunroof. Like a sunroof. I know someone who kicked it out. So he had long legs, but he could kick, he kicked it, kicked it, kicked it. He got it out, and he got it out at the scrubs as they pulled in. Right? And if you kick things, they can go. Right? So anyway, Easterbrook has blown the thing, but he couldn't, he didn't do the bolt. So he's now double A. As I see him, I see him in the, I'd had a late night with him. I was at seven in the morning. He went gentry. Right? I remember when we come out of this gaff, he was driving, I was thinking, fuck it now. I hope we don't get stopped. There's no way we've just gone to jail the previous, you know what I mean? Right? So anyway, I said, I've run. I said, I was, I was in awe. You know what I mean? Like, I said, fuck it now. I went like that through the thing. I said, love this here. He said, good luck at court, son. So when they take me to court, I go with a geyser called Gigi. He'd done the, he'd done like a 20mm out of the, the, the, the, the safety deposit gaff. He was Wilson and I'm here. So I'll give Gigi a pen. I go in the court and it's 96 grand, I've got it down to 96 grand, right? It wouldn't have made it it's 200 grand for the underground, the underground is all the same thing. So what, what, what he said, he said, you're going to do four years. Oh, he liked my, my, my girlfriend. She spoke for me. He didn't like my mum so much because he knows, my dad and all that. You know, he was polite. So what happens is, I says, look, he says, look, he says, you're going to do four years. Right? He says, he went, this is what he said to my barista. He said, I'm not, I said, it's not the, it's not the traveler. He says, it's not the unsigned travelers check because they say this is all part of a million-pound thing and he's part of a firm. I wasn't part of the firm, just me and one geezer. But they made it sound worse than what he was. He went, nah, he was right. He said, what concerns me is the, is the booking cards. He said, he's been going out every day since he was whatever age. Over a two year period, religiously, he said, he said, this, I'm very concerned about. He didn't care about the unsigned and the big thing and all this and he wasn't thinking the fuck about that. Right? And the other thing about travelers checks is you pay half way and I was giving half of the profit away so it sounds like it's a lot, it's not. I've probably done about quarter of a meal's worth in reality. But, booking cards, I've done more or not with more but as much and it's all my money. You know what I mean? The booking card stuff, he knew I was going out every single day to a bank and he didn't like that. With the travelers checks, he might go one day there a few weeks and another day there. It's not every day and that's what he got the hump about. So anyway, I now go to Wandsworth and everyone said to me, you must be careful at Wandsworth. They will kill you. Right? So I arrive at Wandsworth and I had my top button done up on my stripy shirt. I thought, I fucking need this geyser. Right? There we go through. A little fella coming. He went on a grunt. I got him. Right? I didn't want no trouble with him. I was told that was worse than scrubs. They wasn't, but they was. He pulled out a little blade like a little, like a, not a flick knife, but a pen knife. A couple of inches long. He starts going into the wood on the side. He's saying, one visit a month, food is terrible. And if you fucking around there, they'll bat it out here. Like proper beer. He said, you ain't been bad. Yeah. Something like that. I've only taken two baths, but he was letting me know. Right? And I'm looking at him. He's doing this thing. He says, I wish you a happy journey. Grunt. Fucking. Now I need this geyser. It's a short guy. Yeah. I go on the wing. All of a sudden, old screw comes. He says, do you want some slippers? He says, yeah, size nine. He put me these brand new slippers. That was the only bit of kindness I got. When I go on the wing, I'm in a cell near the office. I'm eat, I'm eat up. You're always in the yellow fucking suit. Oh, that's right. The next morning, two screws come in, strip search. You get strip searched once a week. It took all my photos. Looking at my gear. He says, hey, bird, is it? I said, yeah, you've been good looking. I said, yeah, right. I fucking knew I was going to hate this guy. I hate it. Right? It's like, I hate them straight away. It's anyway, but it wasn't as bad as the scrubs. It's anyway, I go on the wing. P.O. I said, see this? He said, any of this year, we're coming you like a ton of bricks. You understand? I went here. I had one secret weapon, really gentries on the, on the food thing. And they knew, they called him, they said he's his uncle. He's not my uncle. He's my aunt, he's ex-husband. The two boys said, I heard one of them say, do not spin ground when gentry is on the wing. So they, they, they won't fancy it with me. Done 18 hours. I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I would be done 18 out of 18. You talk about Charlie Bronson. God bless him. Yeah. I don't have respect for Charlie. But this was the first, where they hosed you down with a trophy at the back at the scrubs of a gentry. And it, what he was about is got two daughters. One is not, he's not the father of the my auntie's daughters. And the other is, is a, it's real daughter. They wouldn't let him see the other daughter. And he fought them to the death. Got smashed to pieces, smashed screws, but it went on forever. So he's the equivalent of Fraser. So, Fraser's in the jail doing free and half-stretch, right? So... Frankie? Yeah, he got free and half. When he come out, he got a free and half-stretch or something, right? While I'm on the trot, I meet him at Gaff and I say, oh, I said, Frankie, it's just in someone's office, like a manager of a nightclub. I said, you know, my mum, he said, what's your mum's name? I said, she's the Mavica. He went, yeah, he said, oh, boy, he said, there's your dad, I said, all right. I said, I still got the mum, he gave my mum a tenner, which was a lot then, when I was born, and she bought some, some bonds, like what, numbers type things, and we still got them. So, I said, we've still got the bonds, my mum bought the tenner, I said, did you give my mum a tenner? He didn't really like my dad too much, right, but he had mutual respect, won't my dad say it was gay, it was gay, but he was like, Richardson gang, my dad don't get on the Richardson's anyway. So he's there, I speak to him, and I have a shower. So I also have a shower, and I'm pretty quick in the shower, I love the shower, I just got all the suds off me. All of a sudden, the shower goes off after three minutes. It's a kid with all suds, like suds, screw it, no, wipe them off, so that's the gaff you're in. The food was terrible, right, you had beans, curried beans on a Monday, and a paste, like a paste thing, it was terrible, it was awful, awful gaff. I never really got any trouble there, I got Nick once, and I end up next door to Mickey Adams, alright, when I come off the book, I end up north, he's always getting Nicked, and we become pals, so what happens, we get sent to, where do we get sent to? Is that still again on demand? No, I'm just, I'm on my first two months, I'm on my first five months as convicted. Where did you get? I got four years, maybe two and a half, it depended on if you got parole. And then you remained, you're still thinking of trying to escape instead of just... No, not then, because... Did you just accept it, leave it, and then...? There was no point, Gentry was going to try and make one from 1-0, and I said, well, I can come with you, but you'll probably get the parole, so why go? And my door was near the office, the kid said to me, that's the worst sale, he said, they come here, if it goes off, they come in this right away, he said, don't get in trouble here, he said, they come straight away. But you're still looking to do it towards it, anything after being sent? No, there was no point, there was no point. What was your mum saying to it when she sees a boy getting sent for four and a half years, four years later? No, my mum's up for it, my mum always said... Did she say that at Zembulance were you and your dad with kind digging down the same path? Well, she couldn't have dreamt what was up ahead, because of the ups, yeah, you know, she said to me, look, if the screws do sound to you and all that, they're brutal, doesn't mean you say, you've got to be brutal back, she said, but stand up to them, but it doesn't mean to say, because they take it a little bit, you should then do something violent back, she said, because just because they're a bad man, don't make, so you've got to become a bad man. My dad has smashed screws and everything, I mean, he's a fire, he's a tough cunt, and he hates them. I didn't hate him in the same way, but I'm more happy to go lucky than my dad, my dad's like more sort of shallow and sort of, he's cold, I'm not like that. My mum must have said, don't be, don't turn into, she didn't say an animal, but don't stop smashing screws on the head with torches, that's what she meant. Did she say that was a possibility you can down that route though with all the escapes and... No, she didn't see all that, but she knew as a kid, like, I could be a bit of an animal sometimes, like, very young, but I was pretty good from seven onwards, but she always sensed that with me, she didn't think I'd be a criminal, she didn't know I was such a... I only got caught shoplifting once, I cried, because my mum was really upset. She was an honest woman, I had a nannan granddad nearby, honest people, my granddad was a window cleaner, we're not a criminal family, but my mum's going out with John McVicar, before that she was going out of Falco, so she knew proper gangsters, she knew Frankie Fraser, Frankie Fraser likes my mum, my dad don't like Frankie Fraser, but he respects him, he said he's very brave. See, when you were in prison, was your dad in contact with you, was he tearing you to try and screw the head, or was he just kind of... No, he don't say screw the head, but I can't remember if we was talking then, he sent me a letter, he got stopped in a car, drunk, and he just run off, and he gave himself in the next morning, and because I said, because if you, my dad knows a few little tricks like this, right, because he went, if that's what you can do, drunk, Mr McVicar, I wouldn't like to see what you can do so, bro, he said, we're not going to waste our time with interview, if they talk to you, if you let them talk to you, you're in their custody, but if you just get out of the car and run, you're not, so there's nothing illegal in it, right, and I remember you saying that in the letter to me, right, so I was writing to him, but I can't remember what happened after that, and I certainly wouldn't tell him all the things, I wouldn't tell him all the trouble, he would, he wouldn't like that. So, I know me and Mick Adams go to a gaff, so when we get there, he's being split up for me, but they give him the right act because his brother, Patrick, on a seven, he smashed the screw on the nose, broke his nose, and he was on the wing holes, so he's gone the other wing, I'll see you later, Mick, you all right, anyway, they said, I said, I've got a single cell, I said a single cell, I've got a booking on all the rules, well, I'm down the block, I'm meeting all these fucking older people, and I've got a booking on all the rules, I nicked them over, not hot enough food, not hot enough in the cell, not getting a timed hour, there's all different rules, I learned all these rules, and when I got the booking, which was through a guy who my dad knew indirectly, they went, down the block, oh, he's gonna take us to the next level, I drove him mad, down the block, all right, so everywhere I go on this act, so I get to this thing, I get my single cell, all right, which was nice of him, and I remember the bit of fish, it was like fishing chips, and I remember the fish, I'd never tasted fish in a year, roughly, like that, it was no grease, no grease, big portions, I couldn't believe it, it was unbelievable, if you knew how bad the food was at once, I think it was terrible, and if you've got six slices, you've got to take the first three slices off, take them off, you've got to throw them in the bin, because you needed them to make your peanut part of sandwiches, anyway, me and Adams get split up, I said, no, I'm allergic to dust, he went, I'm allergic to you, you're going maximum security, he says, you're not gonna drive, he says that to the words, you're not gonna drive as mad here, so, I'm there, there's an old boy screw, but he sort of found me funny, I'm cuffed to the screw, and we're off to Albany, Johnny Dunford's there, Winston Silcott, the cop killer, you heard of Winston Silcott? Yeah. Yeah, he was innocent, you know what I'm saying, right? So anyway, he'd been down the block, so I'd never seen him, he was next door to me, but he was at Albany, Jimmy Dilda Robber, Ricky Peters, the drug dealer, the IRA geezer, he was one of the Guilford, or one of the, something for? Guilford for? Or the other mob. Bum in on sex? That was the Guilford for, I think, right, so he, Jimmy Dilda said to me, never get out, he got out that year, he won the appeal, and he went on to marry one of the Kennedys, so he was there, I said, running, I said, so first thing I get there, there's a fucking, a rapist or someone on the spur, so I said, mate, you can't be next to me, so you go tomorrow, you go, you go to the hospital, someone had been there a day, this geezer's gone, right, tell me where he went, numbers probably, right? So, I mean, only there a day, but what was funny, it was really cosy, like a beautiful atmosphere, really positive people, and I'm a breath of fresh air, because I'm doing a full stretch, they're all a little bit heavy, you know, with it, right? Good football, as Jimmy Dilda was a brilliant football, a real class act, like, he was a great football, a real classic, Winston Silcoe was a good footballer, I said, running, races, chess matches, I weren't the best chess player, but I used to have me and this Ricky, so anyway, I, when I arrived, the governor said to me, he said, look, he said, we don't want you here, he said, you're doing four years, so I've got one other inmate, right, who's doing four and a half years, or three and a half years, he says, the only person doing less than you, he said, one step for me is to drag to society, and he pointed to Parkhurst, he said, do you want to end up there? He said, you're 20, I was 25 then, he said, he said, you're probably going to get pro, he said, but, do you really want to end up there with the dregs? I went, nah, I don't, right? I said, come and kick me head down, I said, I'm allergic to tusks, you ain't got to go in the workshop here, you're going on the fucking gardens, so I'm on the gardens, so me and Giza called Lenny and someone else, we used to drive them mad, we used to call ourselves the T-Party, right, and it become the tourist with everyone, the screws didn't want to be on the T-Party, we'd do 10 minutes work, and when we was in the most public area, we'd get out a blanket, get out our tea and biscuits, and the screw would go, what are you doing? We said, we're having a tea break, and we'd have a tea break, right, and this is how we carried on, like, and some screws would come on, I'd go, I've drawn the short straw review lot in the fucking T-Party, you know what I mean, but some of them found this funny and would give us biscuits, right, but we did graft, but we had a lot of tea breaks, right, so they called us the T-Party, so after a few months, I get my pro, so he calls me in the office, he says, I've got your pro, I said, can I come back? He said, you wasn't wanted when you're coming, he says, you're not gonna come back, he says, I wanna trust you coming back from a visit, he said, you're not coming back, he said, go to your cat D, keep your head down, and go home on home lose, and maybe get a job where you're working outside the jail, he says, you may not have time, he said, but, he said, you're about to get the best chance, some men here are gonna wait 10 years for that, so make the best chance of it, it's the only way. I said, thank you, go back. When it's time to go, my two mates come up, come and get me, I don't go down to the gate, I'm saying goodbye to everyone, it was really emotional, you know, these people are doing such a long time, I felt really hurt for them, you know, it wasn't like people you live with, you kind of know, and they was all gentlemen anyway, get to the gate, P.O. went to me, he said, I have a good mind that sends you back, he said, you see you, he said, your mates have been waiting here, he said, your mum's probably waiting for you, he said, and I'm thinking of sending you back, he said, there won't be no home visit, he said, you ain't at the jail yet, he said, you're giving it a big, and I said, I'm just saying goodbye to my friends, he said, never mind about that, he said, you'll wind up, he said, you should have been down here an hour ago, and I thought at that time, don't get no more, you can't keep strong in it, anyway, I go off, I go on a 10 visit, so first thing I do, I get my mate to see a doctor, so I got a bad back, so I go home, so I got a bad back month, and my mum said, fucking hell, can't you go and do your bird, what's the problem with you, right? You're only doing the four strokes, right? I said, no, I can't do my bird, man, right? So now this murder's right, the cause has come, man, I still got a bad back, right? My mate, I think Jimmy was there and he's missing, they're laughing, the cause has fucking just went. After a week of it, my mum went, listen, we started arguing, I said, I fucking go back then, mum, I said, but listen, I could have stayed here a month, so don't, she's just not the way to do it, she's just go and play football, do whatever you're doing, but don't, you're just taking the piss out of them all the time, right, so anyway, I go back to the thing, they were, ah, nice to meet you, Russell, we said, we've heard a lot about your son, he said, go on, he said, well, wish you luck anyway, I said, thank you, Governor, right, it was really polite, go on the wing, anyway. I wouldn't, Adams, he had a trick with the shoes, they was always getting his shoes off him, but he had a way of getting them through the doctor, so I'd done the same trick, so my shoes didn't have shoes, they put me in a potato factory, so fuck the fuck potato factory, oh, she's just bunk off, sitting in the sun, so this woman, Governor, comes down with her mates, she says, go on, what are you doing? I said, I'm sunbathing, she said, yeah, you're supposed to be at work, I said, no, I'm allergic to dust, she said, dust in a potato factory, I said, there's dust, I said, dust, it's all the same thing, I said, you know the trouble I've had over the thing, I said, so why are you putting me in a dusty job with a thing, all right, she went, you're not supposed to have your trainers, she went anyway, I'll sort out her job for you, all right, so she's with another woman, I said, who's she? They was both dressed up like it's going to a nightclub sort of thing, I said, who's she? She went, she's my friend, I said, you're an official, she said, no, I said, so why are you bringing her around, looking at cons for, like, condemned men, and you're in charge of us, she went, you've got a lot of yapp, and she walked, all right, anyway, get a job on the wing, cleaner, I have one incident there, he's the Nixma Waltman, all right, I couldn't believe it when I found out who it was, so I go on the thing, 10-handed, give him a few dicks, kick him out of the house, I said, leave the jail, so the next day, there's someone who's still there, so get a shovel, I said, listen, you've got a go lad, I said, you can't, Nix, people's gear, stay, see if it's go one way or the other, and he went, that was the only bit of egg I had, but the kid who told me, I seen getting bullied by two screws, giving them a strip search for no reason, and I thought it was good enough to tell me about the Waltman who the kid was, all right, he didn't do it for the trouble, he just did, oh, he got my Waltman back, the kid, he went, there's your Waltman, I said, who did it come in, he said, I'm not gonna tell you that, he said, because I know your bathroom, I said, and he ended up telling me anyway, so I seen getting bullied, so I come into, so I said, fucking leave me alone and all that anyway, they nicked me, and they shagged me out of the jail, so I'm now on the way to Pentonville, it's a piss hole, so when I get there, I ain't got a single cell, so this is funny, there's a screw there, like that, long time care to here, right, and he's psychic, right, called Rambo, so you can imagine, all right, so I'm dealing with Rambo now, I said, I wanna face you this, and we don't care about you, I said, I'm doing four stretch, I said, it's people doing six months and three months, I don't know Roy's yours there, he's already got his single cell, right, he don't wanna be taking the single cell of him, right, he says, only two on a wing, you ain't getting one, right, he said, we don't give a fuck about you, so I just, as I go, I slam the door, he goes, nothing happens, so I'm down the next, on the Monday, with my book, my rules book, I said, yes, oh, I said, let's have a tea in there, you see, I said, the food's not hot enough, I've gone through six things that I spotted, I said, an old driver you made, I said, I'll get you a single cell, he said, but that book goes away, I went, sweet, all right, I'll get me a single cell, don't get nicked, it was very difficult to get nicked, I got nicked once at Wandsworth, I think they would have killed me, and the governor went, he's fucked, he hasn't been in trouble, all the time he's been here, when you kept your head down, he said, but if you come down again, and there was screws, there was screw there, like, shaking, right. To do you? Like, no grinding to intimidate me, when I go, this is quite funny, when I go to the Sea Cat with Adam's, when they take me for a thing, he was on the escort, and he shit himself, it was me and Adam's looking at him, and he was going, he knocked down, and all that, right, and two boys said to me, you want them to say something like, fucking help, right, and Adam's on the same escort, right, but we're both doing the four, if you use violence from the scape, you'll get more jail, you'll get two years more, so anyway, I'm there at this gaff, I've got my single cell, I had three months to go, what's happened, I've gone on a time visit, I've come back drunk, paralytic, and they've put me in the hospital wing, and then, a double cell, lost my single cell, raw shores there by this time, right, so I went over to him and said, I'm John McVickerson, it was nice to meet you son, right, so I used to walk around with him every day, right, so he, I'm trying to think what happened, where I was in the story. You're already sure you've had three months to go? Yeah, I've got three months to go, and I'm in a double cell, I haven't been nicked, but in my cell was a picture of a beautiful girl that I know, yeah, like, she was like a girlfriend, she wasn't my sweetest girl, she was someone else, right, and they'd ripped the photo up, and I just thought it'd been nicked by mistake on this place, so I'm getting my canteen one day, and the kid come out, like, I've only been back two days or whatever from the hospital, he went, look, I found that in the bin, I had sugar, I went, phew, I should do fucking slags, it was like really loud, I come to when he handed it all round me, he said, you're gonna walk to her block, I said, yeah, I didn't even say what it was about, they knew, but I didn't say it down the block enough, but three days choking, I come out, all of a sudden the PO comes up to me, he said, do you know he was going home in three weeks time, I said, yeah, he said, you're not going home now, you're going home in a year and three weeks time, I said, what are you talking about, he said, when you're nicked, we have to send the report off to the pro-book, he says, so it's up to them what they do, I get a letter back from the pro-book, it basically said this, we never knew you was nicked to the de-cat, you're showing the exact same behavior that we thought you was reformed from, right, if you start off bad and end up good, you'll get pro, if you start off good and end up bad, you don't get pro, he said, we're losing you three weeks, so I said, I'm going home on the first, I'm going home on the 22nd, so he said, one more thing, that's it, so I was gonna move into another cell, but I had to wait, a double cell, with a guy who played chess, and the guy I'm with, he does a pony, he's a bit insane, you know, like ill guy, he's done a pony and the gaff's done, so I'll kick the door, it was only five minutes before thing, I'll kick the door, kick the door, so I opened the door, he said, screw him, right, I said, let me get a mop bucket, he went, I'll be back, screw comes back, opens the fucking door, it's rambo, all right, I'm going home in about two and a half weeks, two weeks by now, whatever it is, so I give the fucking mop to the kid, right, don't ever get him in a bad way, and I go out, I said, what's this that night, I want another cell, he went, we're going back in there, I shouldn't have said it, I should have just kept my fucking mouth shut, so now I go to the end of the wing, and I wait at the end, and rambo comes down, and it's unlocked now, we've got 10 minutes, it's a Friday night, I'm standing there, and I'm thinking, if I can see him, he's going, no, this time I can see him, he's going, no, and his mates are going, they're trying to reason it, they don't want it, I'm thinking, I can't bang up, because I've said it, he can't say it and then not do it, so I thought, I shouldn't have said nothing, anyway. A taffy screw comes along, all right, biggest lump, bit of a, you know, there wasn't bullies there, all right, but you know, they was only dealing with people doing three months or six months, and like I see Rambo, and they're right handed, and I'm thinking, I'm fucked, I'm going to say to my mum, anyway, he went, come here, boy, I said, I'm not going in the cell, he said, you never mind the fucking cell, he said, come on, I've got you a cell, he went in there, saved me a year, even going in that cell there, he put me with another kid, they wouldn't have done it, but this taffy screw did. It's about a year later after I was out, I bumped into him, I was around, because I'm around the Angel a lot, I drove around the back, and I see him, I went in a small world, and he was a bit shocked, I should have said to him, thank you, I wasn't polite enough to be honest, I should have said, go thank you for that weird thing, but I didn't, I should have done. I don't know if I would have, it was immature, he saved me a year, but I said to him, small world, and I might have been with a girlfriend or something, but I should have said to him, listen, thank you, you know what I mean, I should have done that, it's immature, really, you know what I mean, so he saved me a year, so I come out, and Fred's uncle picked me up, my mum, oh no, I'm not finished, so on the day before the 1st of November, I still think I've got three weeks, they come and got me, they said, reception, what for? See the doctor, I said, what for? He said, you release papers, you're going on tomorrow, I said, yeah, thanks very much, I was like, go out, the three weeks they've added on, they forgot about it, so I've signed for the thing, done the medical thing, come back to the cell, said goodbye to my mates, I take the guest, I said, they're fucking muggy cunts, I said, don't tell too many people, so I'll just go in the morning, in case they tumble, so in the morning, I say goodbye to everyone, I go to the door, as I go, Rambo's right there, we were psychic, so I looked at him, bolt over, I said, I've grown, no, I said, yeah, I've grown, I said, I'm going home, he said, not according to this, son of a Rambo's done me, I'm like, I'm fucking, they would have moved it, they fucking set me up, I figured I'm going home, I ain't going home, right? I come out, Tony Dumford was there, good fighter Tony, yeah, I said, what's Rambo doing, he said, he's talking, I said, they've done me crooked, so I go to the SO's office, I said, I was told I was going home, I ain't going home, he said, when I find out who he's down to, he said, there be trouble, I said, no, I said, what goes around comes around, so don't worry about it, he said, well done for holding it down, I said, what am I going to do, I'm not going home for a year, right? And that was it, and when I went home, I went home on the 22nd of November, and I didn't know the upper head, I was going to end up, me and Kenny, nine of the most two wanted people in the country, and it would be for home robberies, and that was really the beginning of my criminal career. How long were you out for before you got the big one? I came out at 26, I went away at 33. So you went out for a good three years? But basically what happens is, I get nicked and I escape again. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. I'm surprised they even let you out the block of the amount of escapes you've done, and the successful ones. I was never double A, I never had any help. You know, it's a statement that you fucking, you're probing, so I've never had no help. You know what I mean? I said, I'm free, we're not seeing it, I said, fair play to you, I said, but, because he's the same, he said, you run in your eyes, like a couple of times I've been nicked, he said, you can run, he said, you hide, and they catch that, that was his little chip at me. So from basically then, I'm at Kilburn police station. This is two years later, and I go for a shower, and I say to this, they caught me with money from a robbery, probably looking at five. I didn't have a gun, I said I had a gun. I only got a small amount of money. Is that two years after you get out from the hospital? No, it's when I'm, yeah, about 28 and a half. So they come from me in the morning, and they say, they're free-handed with the cuffs. I said, where's my toiletries? Because I had the toiletries sent in. They went, Russ, I'll bring it down the scrubs myself. I said, no, no, I'm not moving from the cell, all right? Can't get someone on a small sweat box, it's impossible. I know because I've heard of a story where the guy just puts his foot up, disperser will do it, it makes him a security prisoner, they've got no chance. So they fuck off, they lock the door, they fuck off. When they come back, there's one screw there, you ain't got a cut, they're in a rush to get the call. So they haven't followed the procedure. So it wasn't really the fact that if you don't follow the procedure, someone like me who's lively would take the opportunity. Because I learned this as a kid who told you with the marble and things that didn't work out, you have to get a window of opportunity to take it. Same when they give you a chance, you've got to take it. I had John Estieron, they called him the mole. He escaped from everywhere. He escaped his brother out of prison and broke him back in for a protest. I don't know how people do it. I couldn't get out of a prison, I've got to tell you. When I went away, I thought it was going to be like the greatest escape. If you've left me in a prison, a bee cat prison, I wouldn't be able to see a cat prison, I could get out. Because you see a ladder or something, you'd need a couple of lads, but you could get a ladder and maybe get the workman to open to the wall. You get a fence, but there's more movement. But a bee cat, I couldn't get out. I'm not a, I can't, I wouldn't. A bee cat prison you won't get out of. So seeing you get out the first time, was it just straight back into crime? What was your first big robbery you'd done? No, what it was, I'll go into that. What it was, when I came out, I was very careful. So I'd done, I only done travellers checks, it was from abroad or certain things. But what happened to me was, I was very unfortunate. I got, I got, I'd done a check for all in a betting shop. I remember my mum saying to me after this, if you're gonna do something, make it worthwhile. My mate Scott Matt said, do you want to go and get some reddies? I said, fuck it, hell. I was tired, I was gonna stay in bed. I've gone down to Chelsea, two causes have arrived. I've hit one, it's gone down. I've got that, and the woman held on to me and a rugby player, I said, I've got a posh gauge, you bash me into the fin cause I come out and smash me. I've got all claret down me. I go back to the magistrates that I get, all through the road, I'm back to there. I don't get bowled. When I come back the following week, I've got all photos of me with all claret. They've said I was sought with the police woman. He said, well, where's the fucking pictures of the assault? That's the first thing. He said, he's about 13, 14 stone. She's fucking 10 stone. He said, as for the guy being knocked down, where's his bruises, right? He said, well, it ain't been produced yet. Anyway, he started arguing. He said, are you gonna listen to my bow application? He went, has he been in trouble since he's been out? He said, no, he went bowed, but he gave me on strict conditions at my mum's in the morning and my mum's in the afternoon and I was made up. I said to Nobby, I said, can I go back to the cells? He went, fucking no. He said, you're always trying to get out the cells, right? He said, Nobby, you've seen the escape from before there, right? Years, three years earlier. I go back and I give 30 quits to a kid in the cell. I mean, I'll see you later. Anyway, it done produced the things in 12 weeks and they're supposed to drop it. And the magistrate said, what I'll do, I'll give him one more week, but I'll drop your bow conditions. And I couldn't have committed a crime and I'd have probably gone away for about eight months or a year. I don't know what it was, but one check a second time around after being away, you'll get something, I think, right? Maybe four checks, just four benches, maybe. So, of course they bowed me and I'm now out here with the travest checks. I've got movement. I get nicked out in fucking Watford or something, right? Oh, one other story. We go back to while I'm on the trial, right? I forgot the story. This is significant. I go abroad, get some money abroad, crime. I come back and I'm in the West End with Big Jim. And as we're walking, we see loads of videos and we was off to steal a table and we didn't fault them amazons. We'd get a grand each, right? I'm on the trial. And he says, we might get a grand before we go. I said, go on in. He said, but it might be a radio. I said, well, don't do it. He said, probably not. He said, but he walked up to the thing, pushed the thing, they're into it. He said, run, I run. Loads of causes come out. It's an invitation to get someone to take these videos that you get about a hundred critter video, like video recorders then, yeah? We'd have got about, we'd have got about, he'd have got four, I'd have got four. We'd have got about three or four hundred critters. So I run, they, not one over, they get me and they're about to batter me, about to take us to the West End Central. They take me down a side bit and they start shouting. They're gonna do him, they're gonna do him, they're gonna do him anyway. So I go to the police station with Jim, I give him Moody name. And they said, there should be a soul. I had no soul with no one. I just knocked him over. He said, but you're nicked for attempted theft. He said, I'm gonna bow you. He said, you've been in trouble before. I said, never been in trouble. So I give him Moody name that stands up with an electoral list. So I don't think I'm gonna get bowed before this when the cell door opens. And Jimmy, who knows him, he's a ticket taker in the West End so they know him from all, all time, right? He said, Tom, so much birth and name, that's right. He said, you're gonna be able to do something. I said, yeah. I said, he bows me. Is he gonna turn up? And I said, yeah, of course I am. I didn't turn up, obviously, all right? I'm fucking most wanted fraudster in fucking London sort of thing, some scapes. You know, this is before the scape thing, you know, during the scape thing. And the next day or three days later or whenever the prints come through, they turn up at the court every day at the, sorry, the middle of the hour. My mate gets a cut of undercredit a day and they nicked him every day. But as they come towards him, my hand, and he went, what a fucking nicking me? They would be no, the other fella is. So I had that as well. So while I was wanted for all the fraud, I got out the police station that way because the dabs only get processed the morning you go to court. There was no way of doing it in the police station. And you had to go to the yard. So anyway, I'm there on the truck from, I don't know, a break out of Kilburn police station. Yeah. And two years before I'd gone to someone's house, I stayed overnight with some woman that I met. And when I come out at six in the morning, it was all like a flat park. So I go across and I think, oh, I'm at Kilburn. So the reason when I escaped from Kilburn police station, I don't do it right. It's because I know I'll get seen for distance. I couldn't get away. So I do it left, do it right. And I run into the train station. I get on the train at the front carriage which I shouldn't have done, a bit closed. And I heard, stop the, stop the train, stop the train. So I get the train door open. I run to the front cross and the train driver must have seen me. But I run along, climb up a wall, jump down into a kind of place where there's a guy doing repairs. He went, you're frightened. The life happened to me. I said, I'm sorry. He said, well, I said, I've just escaped. I said, can I have your older ones? He said, yeah. I said, you cut me in. Me in, it was quite long. So I cut it short as possible. And I basically walk, I give me a cut the quid. I get a bus, ring someone, gets my mum, gets her mate. And Bill, who's my first girlfriend's dad, he's a good street fighter. He's a lorry driver, a brilliant street fighter. And we're fucking hell. How many is that? I said, that's four in total now, right? So three weeks later, I'm down south end. Four less gaps? That's four scapes. This is scapes in total. I get out the police station, Horsery Road. I get off the escort, off the M1, when they catch me and take me, remember? I'm feeling the water. And I get out of the court. Then I've got out of Kilburn. And this is after you get out of prison after the first four stretch? After the four stretch, I get out of here. So then you're on the run for robberies? Yeah, one robbery. I only got room one, but they got the reddies with the dabs on. So it will come through. So what happens is, I'm on a phone, and I said to someone, I said, this phone's hooked up. I said, the money was going as fast as it would on a mobile. There was no mobiles there. You didn't bring mobiles, I didn't. It was going down. I needed to put money in. And I heard a siren in the distance. So before I said to them, we'll fucking put the phone down. I said, I put the phone down. I run to the beach and I hid. But I didn't look. I should have looked over. And what must have happened was they've come down. It must have been going round the block. I left it 15 minutes. So for some mad reason, I thought I was paranoid. I go back to the call box. And when I go back, I just knew it was a car. He's come up along. So I didn't go in the call box. He said, excuse me, sir. I said, yeah. He said, have you used that call box? I said, no. I wanted, but he wouldn't have a description. He might know he's coming to get me, but he wouldn't have a fucking photo. He just knew. It was like 11 o'clock at night. And I went, I was drunk, really drunk. He went, that's probably why the judgment was bad. And that's what I've learned. If you're not fit and you're not having early nights, if you make a judgment drunk in any way that you're in, or even tired, it's always the not the right judgment. If you're fit, you're going to bed early. I would say it's hard to stop you in anything. Anyway, I run. I run into the park, and I couldn't get out. They put lights on, and I thought, if I climb up this tree, I can get over the fence. I had an idea. I missed my footing, and I fell from some distance high. I smashed down, crushed him, broke my arm, broke my leg. I said, because I said, you're lucky to be alive. I could have broke my back, but I fell on my leg anyway. I go to the police station and I can't hardly walk. And they said, in the morning, when they come and got me, I said, you've got to go hospital. I said, I've got hospital, I've got broken arm and leg. That's the end of it, isn't it? I'm on my way to one arm now, right? When they take me to the court, I'm in a wheelchair, legs up, and they wasn't looking what I was doing. So I start going down towards where the lifts are, right? They wasn't looking. I wouldn't have got away. And I could see that the lift was on the upper floor, and I was hoping it would come down. And all of a sudden, one of them said, come on, you've got to go. And he come and got me. He didn't realize that I was going to try and go in the lift. The lift would have come over and I'd just go in. So bring me in. I'm now going to Onesworth. I arrive at Onesworth. I'm in the hospital wing. So I'm playing chess, right? So the kid says to me, if you bang your head, they take you outside the hospital. I said, they won. I said, I've escaped four times. He said, Russ, they've had loads of incidents. Anyone bangs their head now, they've got to do x-rays. He said, because people have died. So he gives me that night, two valium. I'm on the, you're on the wing on your own. Bang the head, or bang it properly. So there's a bump. All right, slash me head. I fell a kick. I woke up in the bed. Then when you're going outside, hospital, it's okay. Take me to the hospital. Well, I'm in bed now, right? And I've got in the bed and all that. I don't even know if I can walk. So there's a screw there. I heard him slagging me down to the nurse. Yeah, Jack the lead, fucking scaper, fucking this time, you know what I'm saying? And he's the two-handed. And he's like, when do you want to send me, do you want an issue on that to his pal? He's gone. So there was a kid over there. He'd come and see me. He said, I heard you for scapes and all that. He said, we're on the 16th floor. He said, there's a police station too below. You've got no chance for me, so I can't fucking walk anyway. So he was even lighting a cigarette or buying some chocolate. And I see him go like that as I stood up. The geyser at the end of the bed, he must have been talking to like a girlfriend or something. He's got his head down like this. And I basically walked past him. Now, this is all on like crime programs and all that. So there's no, you know, I was like, I was fucking big news at the time, right? So I just walked past him. And I must have covered my feet from the long blanket. I walked past him. As I go around the corner, the door just opened on the 16th floor, I go in the lift. One person called, I'm on the ground floor. As I'm walking out, hobbling, the door, electronic door starts a thing. Now what had happened was I'd met someone who'd escaped from, it happens a lot in hospitals, right? And he's in the building, they searched everywhere and they found him in the building. And I was gonna hide in the building, but I thought, no, they're flying me. So I'm on the ground floor in there. And the door was electronically gonna shut. Stopped it, it was easy to stop, but had it been locked, I wouldn't have been out of care. So I go, I said, excuse me sir, I said, would you give me a lift? Some old boy said, no. I said, big builder. I said, mate, listen to me. Yeah, I said, gonna knock me off, I've got a kid. I've got a Mrs. I said, they're gonna give me fucking. I don't know what they're gonna give me. I said, please help me. I said, I don't want to go to the brothel, please help me. He went, I've got to go work. I said, I know you've got to go work. I said, but I don't want to go. I said, I may never get out. He went, he went, come on in, mate. So I said, can I have the boot? Give me a pair of boots. I'm barefoot, right? Give me a top and a builder's that, right? He drove me out and now I started to hear the sirens. So I says, you've got no money. I've got no money to give me a tenner. I said, mate, I never, ever, ever, ever forget you. So Bill picks me up. So he says, fucking hell, what are you doing? You're taking a piss now, right? I've got broken on my leg, right? I think I cut the thing off, by the way. Like the plaster. He done it with a thing. I think I cut it off. Yeah, so it hurts as I'm walking, right? But prison hurts a lot more sort of thing, right? So I get to there and what I do, I go abroad, right? I had to wait for my arm to repair and my leg, but I go abroad. Otherwise it'd be all day. All different things happen, by the way, but I go abroad and I go to Paris. I got a job in a restaurant. I ended up the chef. But what happened was the inspectors for cleanliness come and they raided the gaff. And I chipped out. They had my details, but it was an American chef in this restaurant, near Notre Dame. And they said, he can't stare, it was a 20 grand fine. They said, who's this guy? He went, well, he was here, but he run off. They went, okay, fair enough. They closed us down, me and this American guy who worked there, we painted it all, right? I'm sharing a flat, a four-handed, one American guy. And in Italian, she was lovely. She did all miming and an actress from Slovenia who ended up quite famous, I believe. Anyway, when we do the place up, he's allowed to open, but they come again. And I go, I'm the chef in the gaff. Now, I learnt how to cook and 20 things on a menu. And I bolt again. So they said, la ingle, rapida. They didn't like that I'd gone again. So I said, why did you go? I said, well, I said, I'm not gonna stick around for people asking me questions and all that. I said, I don't wanna get in trouble. So I didn't fancy it. So I go to the south of France and I lived in a, I worked for this woman. But when I lived at home, it was doing my nose like really bad. Like I'm allergic to pollen and dust. Yeah, if you fall. I don't, but my dad gets it. But if it's high, I'll catapult. So it has to be very high. But there was something in the air that I couldn't take it. So she had this farm there and she said, go there, it's only way. I used to work the land, get food off her. Well, 25 credits used to give me, wasn't much. But I was living simply. I was running seven miles. I said, well, I should do a circuit, go for walks for three hours. I was super fit, right? Super fit. I'd run seven, 10 kilometers, get my shopping, hitchhike back. As I hitchhiked back once, the woman gives me a lift. And she said to me, oh, you're the Englishman living in a flat. Mate, we're six kilometers away. I said, how did you know that? She said, oh, everyone knows. I thought, fuck it now. That's not good. I had to ring home a couple of times with money to be sent. And it got there. But the kid I went through was Lawrence at the Spill and I had to ring the Spill and it would be a loaded phone. He goes to the call box. I think it come on from the Spill. Anyway, what's happened is, I'm going down the shop one day and someone stopped and said, asked me directions. And I thought, that's strange. You see one car maybe over there and back. I got to the thing. I see an helicopter. It flew really close. And I thought, can it be on me? So I buy some eggs from food and there's tennis courts at the end. And I walked. I didn't see anything. I thought, no, I'm all right. And as I come back, someone asked me directions again. The chances of that is like, fucking, 1,000 at one shot, right? Or 10,000 at one. I thought, it's on me. So I go back. I'm sitting in this glass, this gap. I'm looking through the doorway. And I can see they've got the helicopters. They've got a set of like, they can go for a mile through the thing. And I see the helicopter in the distance. I was thinking, if it was a bit further over there, it couldn't see me. If it was a bit further over there, it couldn't see me. I thought, it's on me. Right? So I thought, you can't run. I know from different experiences of running. You can't run at night across the field. You'll fall over and do your thing. So what I do, I wait until dusk. And I thought, if the helicopter sees me, I've got to like, mood it a lot. I'm going for a walk and then run. So anyway, I run for about seven miles. I hitchhike, guy gives me a lift. And then it's pours of rain, but it was like a tropical rain. And the woman sees me. I go like that. And they give you a lift out in front. So I talked around. I said, there's only chance I could stay at yours. She said, yeah, I'll ask my boyfriend to go back to us, put me in a spare room, show him a passport. My passport's out of date. It's a one year passport out of date. They give me a tenner, give me some set of clothing. And she felt sorry for me. She didn't know my troubles, but she gave me a soft kiss in the morning. She said, I forget what she said, but she said, please take care. Anyway, it's freezing all of a sudden. It's October time. So I need it somewhere to stay. So I go to the church and I say, would someone help me here, please? There was seven ladies, like Catholic women, all older. And the priest said, this man wants somewhere to stay. So one of them said, yeah. So I went back to this mansion. She was very rich and her husband, they gave me a room, made me food, let me stay there a couple of days. Around my granddad, guess my mum said, mum, made an on top, send 80 quid, not buy a ticket. So I was going to go across to Spain, but I bottled it. You could walk across and they might stop 10 out of 100. And as I'm walking across, I didn't want to go back to England. As I walked across, I bottled it. I thought, I don't fancy it. I just couldn't do it. But while I'm going back to London on an out of date passport is ridiculous. It's a bad judgment, but that was the judgment I made. So I get on the, well, I'll get on, I'll get on the, I'll get on the coach. And what I didn't fancy doing, so I'm thinking if it's on top there, then I know my passport name. Do you see what I mean? If I'm right about the gaff, the 20 miles away, I'm thinking. So what I done, I bribed him, I said, take the money. He took the money, but halfway through the journey, he come and got me, he said, there's more people getting on. You need to find a place and get a ticket quick. I just managed to get a ticket. I get back on the thing, but I don't fancy it. I'm worried if it, let's just say, if this person had gone back to London, they put the name up. So I get to the airport, I get off first. I don't, I leave my stuff on the coach. That's what I did. I didn't, when we get on the thing, we're supposed to now get a bit on the coach and go through customs, which is on their way to London. I didn't get back on the coach. I didn't fancy it. So I thought, I walked through and I see lorries. I thought, shall I hitchhike, try and get on the lorry and say to him, look, can I hide? I think something like that. So I didn't. And I see some builders go through in front of me, walk through and they didn't get stopped. So what I done, I got a paper and it was a custom man just setting up and I walked through and I went like to him. I went, all right? And he went, all right? But he should have asked me from the ID and he didn't. It's out of date. He probably says, why is it out of date? Or it's on the list. I walked through. So I'm back in London, but now it's war. And suddenly we're not talking silly little fucking behind the tail, we're talking guards. Open the box, you've come, I've got a shotgun. I've got a gun, I've got this, you know, and it's like, it becomes over a two year period. It escalates and it's every crime programs, fucking papers, this guy's that thing, blah, blah, blah. It's just gone out of proportion. I'm suddenly probably me and Noy the most wanted in the country, right? But they're saying I kill ya. It's strong in it. It's gone like, it's ridiculous. And Peter Scott, the cat burglar, but he was helping me. He said, listen, if you can get a painting, a high value painting, I can get several and a half percent. So I said, let's go down, so where did I say? At Mayfair. And what happened? He stopped to have a piss in the thing. I said, well, be lively, Peter, because I'm on a trot. He comes up and when I was a kid, my mum had a print of a Picasso print. So the only artist I knew a little bit about was Picasso, because I knew he was like a famous thing. It wasn't worth any money, but I'd seen Picasso books. And as I walked past this first guy, I said, that's Picasso. I said, that's it. But when I go to see the geezer, I don't fancy it. I said, well, I might do it. I might not. I don't tell him it's a Picasso. And I left it. I've got money. Oh, that's right. When I went back, I'm denied. When I go back, it wasn't in the front window. All right, it's gone. I said, it must have been sold, Peter. So we'll leave that and I was going to leave it. So I said, we'll have to find another painting. So one day I'm in the West End for whatever reason. And as I walked past the gallery, it sealed my fate. I see the Picasso on the inside. What inside the gallery? It was inside, but not in the front spot. So George Chattano was the greatest cat burglar arguably ever. I was staying around this before I had the flat that I was at. And we go and see him. We said, what do you think? He said, if to get out of Mayfield, they can close it off quick. So you need to get out. So what I do, I say, I'm going to get a taxi. So on the morning of the Picasso robbery, I get a taxi into town. I had to get extra large doors because the frame was like the size of a 50 inch television screen. Anyway, I get, I get the taxi, go to an alleyway, park it, I go in the thing, right? The CCTV wasn't, I had a prop hat glasses and my hair was like in a ponytail. It was up. So you wouldn't know it was in the ponytail, it looked short. But what happened was as I went, it bounced out. And they called me the ponytail robber and my dad had seen me with a ponytail. All right, so what happens? I go in and say, how much did Picasso? She went, a million dollars. I said, I've got a shotgun, take it off the wall. She went, you want it, you take it off the wall yourself. So she said to me, posh bird. But she went, yeah, yeah, yeah, so I did. So there's a blonde behind me, a younger woman. She sees it go. And she, and the woman said, I got out. When I'll get the depth later, she says to the woman, don't, he's got a shotgun. But what she does, she comes out of the chase. So as I'm trotting across the thing, I put the Picasso in the thing. I look, rends the woman an obscurity guard. So I point the shotgun and they fuck off. The taxi driver said, what's going on? I said, it's a fucking robbery. That's what's going on. I said, I'm sorry, pal, you're gonna take me across London. Two geese has come to the thing, fuck off. We get to the bottom. I miscalculated the traffic going into Piccadilly. I said, no, you've got to go across. It was like a, he had to make a pavement that was very high, dump brilliant. He's made it in the pavement, we've gone. And we're now across London. So I'd seen something on TV where I knew they had an emergency thing. They could- They had Biden came to the thing. He's a computer cab. So I know they've got a satellite thing where they can track it. So while I was with him, I stopped. I needed to make a call. I know it sounds mad, but I stopped. I get out of the taxi and I said, I'm trying to make silly. He said, you've got a shotgun. How could I try to make silly? I said, mate, you'd be surprised what people do. Do not try anything silly. So we go in and just stand over there, please. Go in again, anyway. I come back out. We're now going back in the taxi. So from a distance, I saw the helicopter come in sort of my way. I said, see that thing? I said, undo it. I said, I want it disconnected. And he went, look, I'll do it. Disconnected. They was tracking it. Found out later when I'm next. They was tracking it. So they would have caught me, right? But I just remember something on TV. So what I would say is, from a kid and all the stories, I said, talk to all the robbers when I was at Wandsworth. I knew a lot of information about people on Iran robbers. And I had knowledge. It was the knowledge that I had that made it hard for me to get caught while I'm, and basically the rule is this. Once you end up on TV and all that, if you're going in a pub every day, the woman will recognize you. If you're going to a betting shop, if you're going to a restaurant, if you go anywhere, shop. So what I always did, I wouldn't go any one place twice in a week. You forget my face. And that was my method. And that was why they never got a call to get me for two years. I'm going to tell you, I was fit. I was more or less unstoppable. They had a 50 grand reward from the clearing banks and a 50 grand reward for the Picasso, for me. Right, so it's 100 large. I'm gone if someone fancies that, right? And what happens, we, when I dropped the taxes right off, I give them 30 quills. I said, listen, mate. I said, I'm sorry about that. And he was relieved. He was, I could see he was relieved. I felt bad, you know what I mean? Because it wasn't intentional. But along the way, I said to him, listen pal, yeah, I can't do a fucking 15 for you. So I'm sorry, but you've got to take me across London. I was trying to make him laugh with little jokes. I said, I'm going to get myself a bottle of champagne there and look at the painting. He didn't know it was a robbery. He might have thought it was an eccentric. The mob hunting for it originally didn't know it was me. But the flying squad knew because of the thing. And my dad had said to me before this, why don't you think about giving yourself in? They can't fucking get you. He said, you might fucking only do a fight or six. I said, dad, I might do an eight anyway. I said, so why give myself in? I said, no point. He said, he said, why haven't you fucking escalates? He said, you know, he said, you'll get shot dead. He said, what do you think? They're going to give you a chance to run off again. Which is right. So I'm narrowing leads. I've got a flat, I'm out clubbing, and it's all madness. But when I get this flat, I pay six months in advance. And the guy next door doesn't know that the flat is being rented. So I come back from a club and I'm drunk, right? I'm not a big drinker, but if I go to a club, I'll drink, I'll over drink. Not in a pub, I'll have two pies. I'm like that. I couldn't remember the code. It called the police. So this coser comes down and he says, I tried to run. So it's stupid, I had a shotgun in the thing, red is like 20, 30 grand or so under the bed. I run, they nicked me. He says he nicked for assault. When I get to the station, I remember that I, when I get to the station, I fall out the carriage. I've just felt, I smashed me head. And I got a glass out of me. And the sergeant, I said, I got my idea. I said, I didn't assault him. But because I got the injury, they want to cover themselves. So I give him the thing. I remembered the idea of me. If I had said to the coser, there's me out there. He would have been flat. So anyway, I'm now on the way to the hospital. I come back to the station. I think that's the end of it, right? Gastly, about nine in the morning. Door opens. So you've got to bow here, you've got to go back to the police station in a week. What you've got to understand is when they take your dabs, they cannot pros, if you, back then, not now. Yeah, it's all computer days now. Yeah, but back then they had to go to where the computer was. It wasn't in every police station. So they couldn't test your dabs. If you got bowed, they only made sure that who they knew he was by the time you went to court. That's how it worked. So when he said to me, you're going to be bowed, I know there'd be photographs of me in the fucking gaff. You know what I mean? There'd be photographs from every police station in fucking England, right? So he bows me, right? And I go. But I said, I want to know, I want to know, so I strong it now, right? This is the sort of thing you shouldn't do. But he said, well, I don't. So what is the name of your superior? What's the address? He wrote it all down, right? I should really just be walking out the fucking door. I said, what's the name of the policeman who said I saw with him, right? So when I get to the post office, the first thing I've done, right? I've got to go and get my fucking shotgun and my redies and I'm off. I write it out. So I just like to thank you, superintendent thing above, for all your excellence down your thing, right? The policeman who said I saw with him, I can assure you I didn't. I said, but if it wasn't through him, right? Allow me to fall out of the thing and bang my head. I said, maybe you wouldn't have given me a bow, right? So anyway, I sent that in, right? So I know they're gonna fuck it, hate it when they know it's me. So anyway, I go and I go to Southampton now. I go other places, but I end up in Southampton. And what happens is they find me. Why? You can never wear that out, but what it is, if you go somewhere once, don't go back there. On the run is a dead end road, but you've always got the first move. You can't, you can beat them if you're prepared to go abroad for a long time or never go anywhere twice and have a bit of help, but I wouldn't go abroad. It's really difficult abroad. And you miss London and you miss people and you always need a bit of help. Yeah, you need redies. And you can't get money abroad. Like you wouldn't do anything in Paris that kill you out there. Well, then I could have gone to kill you out there. You get ready. You won't get much jail, but it's heavy. So you just go straight, but it's not easy going straight. You've got tax, it's even more difficult now. So you were watching the cowboy films and your father who he was and the films that's been out about him, the reputation he had. Did you feel like a sense of power going through that as if you were loving your own sort of movie? On the run, making money, yeah. Yeah, what it is, it's an ego thing. The best moment was when I had the broken arm and leg. That was my, it was never the castle. It was getting out with a broken arm and leg. That was my ice moment in crime. Cause I was never about the redies. I was, as someone says around the angel, some girlfriend, a friend of mine, she's a girlfriend. She said, you always like the provider. And I did. I love nothing, but always, there was someone really wanted in London. And I used to love saying to my mum, he's still on a trot. And it was a geezer out in Australia. I had mates from Australia that say he's still on a trot. He lasted seven years. They've got him. And what I noticed was everyone gets caught and it hurt me that everyone gets caught. And I just wanted to be the one person who never got caught. So when it come for me, I woke up in the morning and I didn't fancy it. I felt not good. I go into the city center and all of a sudden, I see a car whizzing past. I thought I was reading something. It's article on me, right? I go like that. I thought, was that the fucking fries? Cause as I went like that, I'd had a late night with someone, right? She'd had me up three nights and it was late. And I didn't think quick enough. It made a difference. I should have bolted. As I look, I look there. I'm police move. I blow your head off. Like, right? And I thought you can't run. And they come behind. They went get on the floor, I wouldn't get on the floor. Right? So smashed me on the floor. Dumb in there. I said, think about me. They got this silly ass. That's why they called it a pavement when they nick you, they nick you on the pavement. Right? Cause I said something. I said, I'm in a fucking hotel. And he looked at me and I said, come on, Ross. You know, we've bottled you off. Cause that's what they do. They don't just come on the first night. Have a little look for you. And I remember the van down the road. I remember other things and I remember a case and I thought, was that fucking, could that be a surveillance camera? I didn't go. I had the chance. I didn't go, but I wasn't sharp enough. So I've got a 15th stretch. And what broke me out? When they took me to court one day, this is how lucky I am. I could have escaped again. Ha, ha, ha, this is what happened. I go into the court, it's halfway through, but I'm one on my way and meet Paul Ferris. Right? So me and Ferris used to have wars, badminton and chess. He's a practical joker. Yeah, black. Black humor. He's funny. I love him. One of them. One of them, he, he, he, it's just all different things. Like, I can't tell you how funny it is, but I'll skip forward, yeah? So me and him as good pals and we had a badminton war. And on this last day, it was boiling up. And afterwards I couldn't move my arm up. He looked like a boxer who was gonna fall over. Right? He was sweating. I do him. Right? So make sure you're in your CM's, Hades and Russell said, you know what I'm saying? Right? And the chess, once I got to 15, he didn't stop beating me. He said, hey, I think we're about 11 on games now. I said, yeah, only because of fucking me, it's gone, getting the 15 thing. But anyway, he helped me with everything. And it was about even shot. So what's happened to Van before me is hit the shutter that goes down. Yeah, it's hit, it won't go down. So we go further in and they've got to open the door and then you put your hand through a little slit. I'm four time escapee. What was it, five times there? Five, I've escaped five times, right? I know I haven't actually got away, but getting out of the court was an escape because it was outside the court. And I supposed to put my, I went to go like that, the door open. And all I wanted to do was jump down. I never took it. It was one cause you're at the front up there. I could have jumped off the van and run up. And I never took it. And when I went to court, one person found me not guilty. I had no chance of beating it. One person found me not guilty. She was crying. And I went on way back and the rest of them found me guilty. He went, when he's some day, he said, listen, he said, you do things, what he basically said was, you do things in a basic way and it looks common and vulgar and this that now. He said, he's done it with some panache. He said, you're going away for 15 years. So that was it. What's came through your mind when you get the 15 stretch? Two of the causes come over and said, we thought you're going to do us a third one. When I knew you was fucked. He said, there's no way you was getting out of this, right? But two of them said, we thought you'd done us. Because that was why I hesitated. But if you want to be Jesse James or Jack Mezzarene, Jack Mareen, you have the cornings, you don't like that. If you want to be Dinninger, that's what Peter Scott used to say to me, they do you like Dinninger. He said, you'll get the Dinninger bullet. I said, yeah, but I ain't shot no one, Peter. I said, so why would he? He said, well, after what you've done, that's what my dad was worried about. He was saying, why don't you call it a day? You're in front. I start your life again. But I watched too many Jesse James films. I watched Dinninger. I watched The Great Escape. Oh, the only time I... Don't enjoy, he was... Well, Jack, John Dinninger in the USA. Yeah, I watched the following way, Johnny Depp. They do him from behind. And I've got to be honest with you, when then things used to happen, I used to feel a chill. And I watched Mezzarene in, I was in Birmingham. And he, at the end, I said, brilliant film, he's dripping in blood. And I sat there and I was a little bit phased. I remember thinking, because I haven't told you what the, yeah, sorry. I'm sitting there thinking, am I gonna end up like him? They're dripping in the blood, dead. So there was moments when I'm very, very confident, but occasionally like Dinninger film and all that, I'd think about it. They all get killed in people. And I aspire to them people, but I'm not as dangerous as them people. You can't say, there ain't no one out there who say they've been shot or whatever. You know, even the COSR, when you've got four stitches, they try to say assault. I sort of run a trial and they dropped it out because they never fucking hit him. Did you go through psychiatric reports or anything? No, nothing like that. You've got to be mad to fucking want to stay in jail. Why would you... There was nothing psychiatric about trying to get out. You've got to be mad, not so. So when you get to 15 strikes... I did have psychiatric reports for court, yeah. And the judge said, if you pursue it, if he says you're mad, I knew he said I wouldn't say it. He says, usually you're going to Broadmoor. I said he ain't gonna say I'm mad, something like that. So I did have him, but not with the prison. It was private sort of thing. So seeing you get your 15 strikes, did you have any chance to escape? Only the... Just when it started caught? Yeah, but what it was, when I got guilty, I had one more plan. When they let you off at the bottom of the hill, they're waiting for the next van. So it's the same trick with the thing. And that they walk you through and then they cuff you off and you walk through. And it takes a while before you hear any movement behind. So what I was gonna do, but he done it differently, he walked me right through to the cells. I was gonna say, I don't feel well. I was gonna, Jimmy had this trick when the police used to try and batter me. He said, I'm asthmatic. All right, so I was gonna do something like that. I will the box, sit there like that off the cuffs and just run random. And hope that as I run back to where the coaches are, the next coach is coming in, you know what I mean? It's about a one in 10 chance. So they never done it. When I got weighed off, it took me right away to the cells, which is what they should do. But they don't always do it, you see. It's the breaking of procedure where you argue to get a chance, but I never got another chance after that. But I don't finish off. I go, I go on one robbery and I shouldn't have done it. The scarce firm said we might get 300 lards or something like that. And this is after your 15th stretch? Yeah, I ain't finish it off. I've got, I didn't go back on a home visit, right? So, yeah, yeah, yeah. So you're doing your 15th stretch? I could have got the religion gone back or whatever. So, you know, I've only got like four months to do or something, right? But it's not so lack of intelligent because you're not on license. When someone like me, you're on license for, I've got a 15, you're on license for like seven years. So if you get in an argument, you're recalled back to the prison. But if you haven't finished your sentence, you're on the truck, but you can't get nicked for nothing. You can't get recalled for, you know, you just go back and finish your sentence. So it's worth it. But anyway, it went wrong on the robbery and what happened was I don't normally work with firms. I've just got smashed in the kite with a meekly, right? The kid, he didn't work out. And he missed the door. So we couldn't get to where the cash machines were. So there's a box coming out. There's probably no money in it, free ground. What should we do? So take the fucking box, right? So he goes, I run the wrong way. I forgot where the car was. I mean, I've only been out days, right? I run back to the car. The geezer's decided to be a hero. I pulled him away. He's got a trolley. I mean, I don't understand why people do it. You know, the other kid's got a meekly, but I punched him, got him on the floor, getting the car and we drive off. You can't even get the box open, the kid, I'm with. Like they've got a way of knocking it from the boot of the car and it opens. There's different ways of doing it. I don't do that. I always make him open the box. So open the box. I don't do that. That, I don't take the fucking box. None of that. It's open the box, pal. So all clarity. At the scene of the crime, I didn't know this. At the scene of the crime, there was no blood, but you would have thought there was. In the car, there was no blood, but where we left the car, there was all blood. And it was that, that done me. Yeah, me. Yeah, it done me. So I knew I was gone. So I'm thinking it's an, it's arguably an indeterminate sentence. I might get, I might get a five for that. I've got a six. I might get a five for it. And at the time, I thought you did the five for the five. When I get nicked, I think I'm looking, they give me a 16. When I got the 16, I thought I'm doing, if it had been an indeterminate, I'd have got 16 years. I thought you'd do the whole lot, but it's half. Anyway. So I go back, I'm fucked. They stitched my thing up for me. I've got a scar there. And I live with people and all that. Good people who live up all that. I can't tell you how lovely, like. Yeah, I love this guy. So people looking after me and my mate John. I've got to say he's named John Burnie. Like, heroic, you know, family and all different people looking after me. They kick off a door there, two little kids. And I'm like six and eight at the time, like that. Like, if they observe the gaffer a week, I'm not there. But they heard I was there. They took a few liberties, shall I say. Run me out of town. Anyway, like, post does the shit. So I go to, we're now getting towards the end of the story. Thank God. So I get to Blackpool and I have a bit of work. What happens? I cut my fucking hand. I mean, I couldn't believe it. Claret, I get on a bike and I dump the bike but they find the bikes on my claret. So I'm sitting in a hotel, I've got a bottle of champagne. I'm looking at the TV all of a sudden. Russell, Russell, John McVickerson, Russell Grant. Wanted for a bit of work. Right, 25, he said for 25 for 25. I go and fucking remember. Wanted in Blackpool and I think here we go again. Right, so now I've got two bits of work. So I was thinking, it was just starting to phase the indeterminate sentence now. So all those years, I was thinking on my head, why did you not run? So now the Mezzarene films that, we're now in 2009. The Picasso Atmos is 1997, okay? So we've gone, I'll start out escaping in 86 and now it's 2009. So all the ag I've just talked, I've had and more. I mean, you couldn't get it in all the ag I've had. But the people who supported me throughout and helped me all my life, I thank God for them people because some of them didn't know me and they helped me and they risked their liberty for me and they did think something like Mary, Tricky, John, Bob, one of them, Phil and all these people and their other people. So you end up in crime with 200 of you and 200 causes now and about here. The fact that you're in national press, it doesn't mean nothing because you look at a paper just yesterday's news. So when you're wanted, there's only 4, 500 people who know about you realistically and who care and out of them, there's only 10 or 20 who really care. And at the police, they've got other things to do but the ones who are hunting you, the key eight, they're the dangerous ones. So because of the Mezzarene film and the Dininger thing, I always thought, because I'm gonna run. When they come on me next time, I'm gonna run because it handed me for years. I mean, I can remember all the other things as a kid. I'm sort of a person, if I missed a panel, I wouldn't forget but you've got to be positive. So when I see the Mezzarene film and Dininger, which come out in 2008, 2009, it was 2009, I thought, could I end up like that? So I had an eerie feeling because I'm gonna run. When they come on me this time, I'm gonna run anyway. I have a bad feeling at four o'clock in the morning on a Wednesday, I think, go. It's never happened to me before. I didn't, then I had a bad dream. I go out in the morning, I'm on my bike and I see a bird, she had a barber and it's like in the Terminator film. When the Terminator sees the thing, it goes like that sort of thing. She went, she must be trained to make sure it's you. She sort of went like that. And as I drifted that way, she drifted that way and it was a cosy there but he was beyond the thing. She was the danger, she went like that. I skip around, get off. I've got a little trick from where I am. I always have a little hat and I walk off. I get a taxi, I go around, this is the mistake, I go around, there's no police there. So I thought, are you paranoid? I wasn't certain, I was meeting someone. I said, listen to me, don't come down. I said, because it's on top here. She went, I'm already down. Anyway, I go back to the gaff, all right? If you'd have said to that fraud mob, on that fraud mob, that was the best squad that hunted me. That ex-flying squad, that ex-murder squad. In my opinion, what I learned afterwards, that was cleverer but that was unlucky. I was lucky during that period because I was just lucky but I was also very observant. Not many people would bother going in one ass and out the back. You wouldn't bother doing that for most people but I would, right? So I'm thinking, if the day ever comes, I will run. So on the day, on this night, I've bumped into Big Jim, my mate. It's just how lucky I am. I ain't seen him in 25 years. He said, fuck, he can't believe I've had two bad, wanted, 30 grand reward, he wasn't 50 or nothing but it was 30 grand on crime watch. And they put me two weeks on the spin. You'll never see that. What they knew was, on the first week, if you stay where you are, once it goes into the second week, you just go out and act normal. They put me on the second week and it did throw me. I thought, fuck me, I could have made it rick it but I never go to the same place twice. I never talk to neighbors. I go, I won't stay in the ghetto, I'm talking to neighbors because you can't read every paper, internet and all the rest of it. So they've done it twice on the spin. He wouldn't have got a lot of calls. They was trying to spook me so I moved. Anyway, months later, whatever. I'm in London and they get me. So, Jimmy's bird said to me, right, he's misses. She said, why don't you stay the night? I said, no, I'm going home, I was with someone. She was going back to the gaff. She goes back to the gaff early and I forgot my phone. I was supposed to ring them and say, is there any old building? When she got this, you knew, really got to their swagger. So now I'm going there about half hour later. So she later, I didn't have the phone. I've gone back, I thought I'm paranoid. So I go back. I thought the two people I see, maybe they was not Robbie's squad, but it was. So I go back. As I go back, the lights off and I left the light on special. I thought I see someone's head move back. All of a sudden, I'm pleased, don't move. So it's day of judgment time. Do I run? Don't I fucking run? But if you think about it for a 10 stretch, I've got to run. And he went to me. Is this something I lay down on the floor? Something, right? He said, something. I know I had me hands in my pockets. He went, take your hands out. You shouldn't have your hands in your pockets. They killed me. I mean, I had me hands. He said, take your hands out of your pockets. Take your hands out of your pockets. I went like that. He went, turn around and face the wall or something. And I just went, I thought, well, you've got to go for it. And I went for it. So I've rolled, I bolt. He don't shoot me. He's running after me. But what he done is training. He had to put the gun and use the taser. And I had these boots and I'd bought that week. These, like, from wherever, from down Chelsea way. I had to put these boots on. I always got trainers on. And I nearly put my trainers on that night. I fall because of the trainers. Because he said, I've got a taser on you and I can see the red light. I can't carry on running straight, but I should have done. He would have missed me. I didn't know this. So I do a left, he's going like that. And I'm thinking they'll be all running around the corner. So I never run back. I run that way. He got me by an inch there. It only just got me. So he would have missed me running, but I didn't know that. So if you've got someone running after you have a taser, just carry on running because they'll miss. So he tasers me. I screamed like when you're free and you drop your ice cream. So he's come over, it took the finger. He went, right, it took the finger. He's going through his procedure. Is he mad? I just thought, are you mad? I've got, I'm drunk, but I've got my thing. But he went, lay down on the floor and went towards him. In the depths, he says, he tried to grab his gun. I didn't, all right? I tried to hit him, but I wasn't sharp enough. I wasn't, I just wasn't sharp enough or brave enough or something. I wasn't determined enough, that's the word. It's not really, it's, it's being sharp. You know, you can't hit a sharp man. You know, I could have got him. And he, and this time he's done me again. He's done me in, right there, sent up. But this time he's bashed me. So he's got me on the floor, but I won't let him cuff me. So we're scuffling. There's no, no one coming from the flat. We're about 200 meters away. And he had to, like a static taser. He'd done me five times. Oh no, he stood up and he shot me. But he, this is why I know what I've got me. He's got me, he's aimed me from the back. He's got me there. The third one hit me there, right? I couldn't move. It freezes you, but it doesn't knock you over, right? He pulled it out and he's done me like that. He's done me another five times. And on the fifth one, I went, I can't, I said to him, I'll give in. I couldn't help it. I did about, I did five and three. I couldn't take nothing more. All right, my central nervous system is ending up. But I've been fit, I might have been able to take another two, but I wouldn't have got away. They cuffed me, they come. They stood me up. And it's like the end of the war, isn't it? And they never read me my rights. I don't even know fucking a thing. I could see him shaking up and he all stood by me. And he went silent. And I thought, you're gonna get an IPP. You're fucked here, right? And he went silent and they didn't hold me. And we just walked down very gracefully. And when I got to the van, they held me and I looked down and I see this pub. I make them ever see the street again. So I end up in court. And of course, I've got one more escape story, but I don't get away. I'm sitting with my brief, who's a man tuned in. She's been sent, they couldn't get up from London. And I see someone coming here. They let some people in. And I thought, I've got a chance of us. I just carried on talking, talking, talking. And when I knew he'd gone down to collect some people, right? I say, I'm off now. I see you there. She didn't know why I'd just cut the things there. It's the fellow went, do you want to cut the tea? He got the tea, give me the tea. As I went back to the cell, I thought, right, I've got off. I'm only guessing. I walked back, I go, right in his thing. I didn't do him in the boat race because you're right, didn't. You couldn't get life off for it. For a hot, scorched, cold and water. Very dangerous stuff in someone's boat race. So I'm pleased I didn't. And plus I didn't think he deserved it. You know, he was a little guy. You know, that was enough, but it wasn't enough because I've done him this big lump of shit here. And the guy, the screw, just about the lock here, he knows he ain't got time. He ain't just jumbling. I go to the thing, he goes to the other side and they were like this. So I'm about 14 stone fit. No, for 30 and a half I'm fit. I'm probably about 30 and a half. So I'm going, and the woman and the guy that I've done the scolding, they just took a little bit of strength from me because he wasn't big enough. This guy's like you and me, you look about 15, 16 stone, something like that. In the push thing, you should get the better of me, but he was lighter than me. So it was going like that, like that. And on the third go, I couldn't do it. The big lump come done me. I'm like that. He locked it from the other side of the screw. I'm like, I'm like that. And they went, are you going to behave yourself? So I said, well, I said, where am I going to escape? Right, he had my arm. I said, I said, see where that will carry me to the cell and he let me go. I went back to the cell and as that was my last, but it wasn't my last, it was my last attempt. It was my last attempt. So I never got another chance. So I go to, you know what I mean? I end up in, I go live before jail. I close the stories there, but it'll be on day. And I end up in a maximum security jail with Curtis Warren. So he's just arrived at the jail, right? Do you want to hear this story? It's a good story. So Ferris would tell you when you're seeing him. So you had a bad bad man. If I couldn't fire, I'd fizz it on this arm. I should call him the flying Scotsman. That's why I used to call him him, right? I didn't write to him from when those years ago, because he was a high profile guy. And I come off, I was on the ACAT, I come off after a year. I wouldn't speak to anyone who was ACAT. What was your sentence? When I got the 15, on the next one. Oh, sorry, I get the 16. So was I 16? Yeah, so I go to Liverpool before I tell you about Curtis, right? I go to Liverpool and there's a geezer comes out of the chair being, we're all dressed. And I said, you look happy, mate, right? I mean, I'm fucking gutted. He went, yeah, he said, I was expecting a seven, IPP. He said, I've got a five, judge, judge, whatever. I said, what are you? He said, Robber. I said, I'm a Robber. He said, you should be all right. I told him, no, you're not gonna be all right, mate. Right, he couldn't believe it. He went, no, you're not gonna be all right. I only told him back to Robbers, but I think he knew who I was. And he went, no, you're in trouble. He said, I'm gonna tell you three judges to avoid. One was Swift, one was the Ed Gees that they was all terrified of. One was someone else. So when I went through the proceedings, you go up every month. The first one, I said, no, no, no, Swift dropped him out. The second one was the next one who gives an indeterminate. The third one is the next one. So I had not known and gone guilty. I would have got probably six years to do, but if you look back on all my prison, I don't work in workshops, I won't do this. I don't behave myself enough to get out on a sentence like that. They would hold on to me for about eight years. So when I go, do go up. Judge Matt, Judge James, he said, I don't give indeterminate sentences. So I went guilty. Anyway, I'm now at Maximum Security. Curtis Warren arrives and he's supposed to be the best tennis player in the system. So someone's a little kid, Shaddy, not a little kid. He's a gang member from Manchester. He says, you can play a thing. Russell said, yeah, he's a mad gambler. Shaddy, right? So I am as well. We both gamble and everything on football and other things. He said, well, he thinks he's the best. I said, well, it's me or Keith Stewart are the best. Fat Northern who I never beat from Manchester. I love dealing, right? But I said, I'll have half-hands in it. So by the time we get back, there's probably hundreds of pounds of burn and more going on this thing. So I'm going to the gym the day before we're having the big match, me and Curtis. He says, you want a game, lad? I said, I'm going for a run. He said, what difference? I said, he said, we're going to play tomorrow. Why don't we just, it was a mistake on you. It was a mistake for him, right? We're going to play. It was the biggest mistake you ever made in his tennis career. We go down the gym, six, two to win. He's got the best forehand, he's left handed, and he's got the best forehand I've ever played against. But his backhand is not better than mine. His backhand. So he kills me. So I come back to the wing. I said, right, I'll settle after my debt. I said, I've got no chance for this guy. He said, he's mustered. I said, Curtis, well done, mate, right? He said, sorry, dad. I said, no, you're a different class. Fair play to us. I sat there that night. No one wanted to give mercy. Looking for a bit of mercy. No mercy at all, right? So all of a sudden, no one would. I said, I'm up for nothing. I said, well, what can I do that's different? I'll just put everything on his backhand. So we go in, there's Bronson. A geese are called a friend of Curtis's who's called Magoo. And another geese are refereeing it, right? Big Stan. Great boxer in the day from Gaston, I think, right? He would have beat me at tennis if it was the same, mate, he's a great tennis player. But he's a bit older than that, right? So they're refereeing it. Me and him, right? This proper fucking needle. I'm four-nil up, right? Every single shot, I'm not trying to win the shot over there. I'm putting it to his backhand. He's struggling a bit. And then I'll smash it over there. I'm four-nil up, I'm thinking I'm done. You know, the legend sort of thing, right? But it's a bit of a banter because I'm not as fit as him. So I play for time. I go like that and I kick the ball away as I go. Geese are fucking old, they're fucking all that bollocks. You know what I mean, right? I'm playing for time. I said, well, you can't be superman with a Liverpool like you. You're super fit. You can do rowing in under about 17 and a half minutes and he's not tall, right? You know, I can do a 20, but you know, I'm not practicing it. I can do a 20 without practicing, right? So I'll probably get down to 19, but I'll get that. It does circuits, press up some fucking mad things, right? So he's super fit, but he's struggling all of a sudden. He's four-one, then it's four-two, then it's four-three. It's four-four, right? I thought, fuck it, you know, this geese are right. And he's looking at me, right? We're changing every two games, right? I'm looking at the three, right? There's loads of people bet against him, not because they think I win, but because they want to take him on. They'd have to crack with him, you know what I mean? The bank don't know that, right? So it's the two-way splits, like about a grand either way. It's all different people. It's a massive thing in the jail. Everyone's fucking sort of, you know, bet on it. It went, I went five-four, I was always one in front. And all of a sudden I thought, no, I've got him here. I've done him, right? I've done him. And then they called time. In the next set it was two-all, but whoever's winning, there's one. And he went, he says, you know, fair play to your lad. You tricky cock me or something like that, right? And from that, we become very good friends. But I was always taken on with badminton, and badminton is a different kind of fish. I mean, I played tennis here, so I was 10. So did he, Curtis. But badminton, no. I always tried, and I got to draw every once. And had he gone a little while, 10 minutes later, he'd have won, but he always said, no, you've got to draw. So when we used to walk back, it's a quarter of a mile walk. So when we come back from badminton, right, he would always give me the jabber. He thought he'd come down here, lad, gonna do this, gonna do that. And it was funny with the banter. So we had years of banter between us. Then he gets swagged, then he comes back. My eight years is up, and this is the last story. I used to play a guy called Colin Joyce, very good chess player. Beat him once, the 10th. He's the Goofs Gang alleged leader, right? And I knew Cabo used to play football with his co-team. So I had like a little fucking doc there, right? I've only got eight months left. I had a doc there, I thought, I wouldn't like it if, you know, it's a little bit, I was a bit vain about it. I thought, you know, if he's like a girlfriend or something, it was horrible. It was like a thing, it was a thing. I didn't think nothing of it. So I got wax in my ear. So I go down to the thing. I said, I've been putting olive oil in it. Could you do the ear, please? Suzie, I don't know, she said, I'm not supposed to do it. I said, well, I said, like, yeah, come out straight away. Come out straight away, but she caught the nerve. Anyway, next day, I'm playing chess, and it's starting to swell up. And John and Natty was my pal, and he smashed the whole fucking winger. And then only went on for him for 100, 100 men went on for him, right? It's on the news and all this at the time. He was there. I said, John, you play him. He's my pal, John. So I was, do I see? Kurt is not there now, he's somewhere else. There's other people in the jail, you know. My wing has been in a lot of trouble. Hostage takings with screws and all that, right? It's a mad gaff. I'm the only person, Bcat, that kept it for eight years. No one had done eight years. The most of Bcat had been there for four years. So they dig me out because of the McVicar son and the escapes. But when I go there, I won't go down the workshop. So we're back to the dust. I took six nickings. I get a week's block. I get lose TV, canteen, all that. And in the end, they say, go education. So they swallowed. I was the only person and one other who followed the dust thing. So I was the only person who down the workshop wouldn't go because I don't care about a block. Don't bother me. So I had the first year there, or six months, I had a lot of trouble, right? And the people I have it with are high profile in the jail. So they don't like that either. You can't win with them. But they left me alone, but they left me there for eight fucking years, these people. So I should have got about a 13 totality of sentence. And it was a Giza called Kwami. He said to me, how long should you, well, I'll get to that in a minute. What happens is I go down to the doctors and I'd had a trapped nerve and it took about a year for it to go. And I lost all small muscles in my knee and I've got a knee injury. All had my ability to run. I can't run without my knee because of trapped nerve. They wouldn't do it at the MRI scan. So I'd murder with this doctor. So when I go down the healthcare, I've got billions of it. It rings up straight away. It says, hospital appointment. I said, but you don't give hospital appointments like that. You don't fucking thing. I said, he went, no. He said, I said, why? He said, could be cancer. So I go down the thing, they do a test. He said, if it's something wrong, we'll let you know, I didn't hear nothing. Then I had to go down to his eve. They did something else, a proper scan. Then I go into January. So I've got cancer. I never told no one, like in the prison I told. And I told my mate John and he told people in Liverpool which I didn't really want to do, but he did. But I never told anyone. None of my mates know. Why? Because I ain't really a sort of Giza. I mean, I just don't, Why are you saying prefer? No, what I thought was, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna live, I'm gonna live. I didn't, what I'm trying to say, when I got out, you know, I didn't tell anyone, I didn't have told anyone. And my mum, I didn't worry my mum. I just don't, I'm funny in certain things. I just couldn't be bothered going into it all. Anyway, I've got it. And on about the third visit to the hospital, they got me cuffed, but when you go in there to scan, you're on your own. You, there's no, you screws have to stand out because it's radioactive. So I said, we're going in there in a minute, take the thing off, he went, no. I said, can you use the toilet please? So I come out, single cuff, long cuff. He said, he said, I said, no, you're not putting me on the cuffs. So they jumped me, right? Not only did they jump me, right? Put me in the floor and all that, right? I'm not gonna fight, cause I'm going home. I said, you fuck my slags all of a sudden. They said, you're gonna miss your things today. You're, you're, you're, it's on my tongue somewhere, right at the base of the tongue on my neck somewhere, I don't know. He said, you're gonna miss your cancer treatment. And this was true, but this would be a mistake on my part. You shouldn't take these people on. As Frankie Fraser and Gentry said, always be polite to them, don't. It's Fraser, don't give, he sort of said, don't give these people a chance, Russell, ever. Fraser started off with 10, done 20. Rorschaw said to me, he was on a, he visited him at some Mickey Mouse fucking jail. And they went Fraser, they just, you would think you'd be a cake, would all be frightened of them, they weren't. He ended up on hunger strike. And Rorschaw said, take them, take them to eat. And Frankie Fraser went, no, I'm not eating, I'm on fucking hunger strike. I'll die before I fucking think. But they nearly killed him anyway. So they bust me up and they're not gonna give me my treatment. So when I go the next day, they say you can have the two treatments. So that was reasonable. But what happened was it fucked my throat up. I couldn't eat. This is the thing. So they put a tube in there and the feed, I was allergic to. So over the six weeks of treatment, that's the chemo once a week. But the other thing there, it was really robust, they said. I had a seven in 10 chance of living three out of 10 dying. I couldn't eat. I was allergic to the feed. I went from 14 stone, fit. It's a 10. So when people see me, sometimes in the morning, during the state of shot, because they might not have seen me for a while. I could see people's boat. And the woman come and they said, you've got a fight, I said, I'm fighting. I said, I'm gonna fucking energy, Susie. I said, I haven't got any energy. I said, but I know it'll contain me energy. I'm not losing energy. I'm all right. It can't be all right anyway. Around about June, I've got two months left to go. I'm now 12 stone. People come down to visit me, Terry Smith. Dave Armani, done 45 years. 45 years, killed someone in jail. He was going home on about 50 years, right? He used to bring me down for joy, so he'd do in a 42 stretch. But supposedly, he'd ganged down with Kimmings and all that. So anyway, all these people coming down, Joyce himself was gonna die. He said, they said nine people have been in that cell and they've all died. They called it the death cell. I said, why don't you have a fucking bet? He said, the screws said he was gonna die. He said, no, you, Ross, you fucking died on purpose. So it cost me a grand, right? So he was great stuff. He was a really good friend. And I got out of jail on about 12 stone. And Rachel, who was one of the screws that jumped me, right, she come down and carried the stuff. She didn't say, sorry for what happened. I was pleased she did. I've known her eight years, right? But the other two geysers, anyway, carried my stuff. I was very weak. And as I walked out the gate, it was a security screw. He didn't say good luck or anything. Come, you know what I mean? You've done late threats. They didn't say good luck, right? But I didn't even look at him. It opened the door. And as I walked out, there's a woman screw coming down. Who knew me, she knew I was going home. But I didn't say nothing to her because I'd never spoke to him in my life. You know what I mean? I know one screw there, Mr. Binning's leg, right? Doc's screw. There were screws there that awaited me and they would come down while I was in the hospital. So you're right, right? They showed a bit of sympathy, some of them. And when I get released, there's this dog's screw. When I come on the wing, he said, if you don't go down to the workshop, I'm taking you in arms. I said, take it. Do what you want. He said, because we're not having you laid down the law here. I said, okay, do what you want, right? And he got moved wings. So another screw, when I lost me in arms, they don't screw you back to me, the head thing because I was prepared to go to education. So this dog's screw, it was a right dog. When I had the cancer, he would come down once every two weeks. So I hope you do well. So it was a cunt, but when I was dying, I'll give him a mysterious thing. So as I go out, he discharges me. You know what I mean? And if it had been another screw, I might have fucking shook my butt. I couldn't shake his hand, you know what I mean? Because he was just a cunt. Yeah, he's a cunt. But he'd come down. Others come down, four or five, and all my mates every day, right? So anyway, I was shattered. It was really difficult. So now I'm walking out the gate, right? So this is the last bit. See, 30 screws coming. I didn't recognize one screw. All of a sudden, there was one there I knew six years earlier. And I went to him, wait, governor. He's not expecting, it's a maximum security prison. You're not expecting anyone to come out. I'll never forget. He went, he couldn't believe it. He went, I said, I'm going home. And I did. Thank you for having me on the show. How's life been since you've been out? It's all right. And I'm not as fit as I was. And I'm not as sharp and, you know, a bit bored. But I don't do anything, you know. I don't have it with criminals. Long you've been out now, Russell. Five strips in a couple of months time. What about the relationship with your dad and that? When you came out? He died, what happened was? Yeah, I'm sorry to hear that. Yeah, what it was, but the last letter I wrote to him, I said to him, listen, I wish you well. We were not me again. He had words, I had words. And I bumped into Lori Professor Taylor, who helped him in prison. And he said, I said, just tell him, I've gone straight. I mean, I didn't have a job or nothing. I ain't got a job now. But I said, I've gone straight. I don't do anything. Just letting him know that. He said, I tell him to get in touch with her. I said, no. We had our chance all through my life to get on. But all through my life, Lori, we, in my 20s, I got on like a house on fire. But it would always say, like, you just fucking, you don't know when to stop. You just fucking want to take everything on you. You're going to slaughter your mom. She can not be out of code with this. This is before the robberies. I said to him, I can't live my life through my mom with you dad. I said, you're like a dumb enough, you know me. I said, you know, who are you to tell me I should learn through you? That was the problem. And once I said, I won't speak to him again. I didn't. He died skin in a fucking caravan. And had I known that, I thought he was doing well. I would have gone and seen him. That's different because he was struggling. And he's my dad. And I love him. I would have gone and seen him. But I thought he had, you know, chunk of time this out. Now I'm not one in people if we fall out. That's kind of it, you know? And we, I said, we've had 25 years to Lori. So we've had 25 years to beat pals. And we ain't. So I'm not going to start being his pal now. Now, you know, I'm an old bastard and he's double-edged. But I said, I'm always seeing will. How hard does that look? So when you see somebody involved in the life of crying robberies on the run, making films, very high profile, famous and then seeing them by a loan. Like, does that worry you that that could be you? No, no, that doesn't bother me because I believe in heaven. I believe in an afterlife. So it doesn't bother me death. I've never been frightened of death. Why do you think that is? Because when I was six, I thought there was an afterlife. That's the bottom nine. I remember thinking there's a god and there's an afterlife. So I don't care about death. I don't care about death. That doesn't mean you say you can't frighten me. You couldn't fright me with death. So I was disappointed when I never run the first time. It done me because I thought you must have bottled it. But it wasn't. It's a two-essential nervous system. You've got to keep that sharp by keeping balance early nights. When I was on the run for the Picasso, I was a machine, no girlfriend. No contact with anyone. But I altered it the last year. When I come back, I altered it for the last year and it made a difference. But two years away, it never come close to me apart from when I made the mistaken leads. What I've noticed through your story as well with the escapes and prisons, there's always, when this came on top, you've always been drunk. Exactly right. I haven't got alcohol problems this life. You're bearing the rule over the place. You're not as sharp as you should be, especially on the throw-up. Put this way, you wouldn't do a, you wouldn't, this is what I say if you're on the run. You wouldn't do a marathon or go on a boxing ring drunk. So if you're on the run, don't get drunk even one night because that night is when the place might arrive. Yeah, the couples only need to get lucky once. Like you say, hella, you've been lucky a few times. I've been lucky many times. As soon as they're lucky, you're done. You're doing a 15 stretch or a 16 stretch. What about your mum, Russell? My mum, she worried over the COVID and all that. So I see my mum, you know, quite a lot. She started leaving real? Yeah, she's very fit. My mum, her dad lived to 100, her grandmother, lived to 99 and I knew the grandmother as a little boy. So my grandma, my nan, big woman, she lived to 30. My dad's nan lived to about 80. So I'm bigger. I thought my dad might live to late 80s. He was still running, shadowboxing, living in a caravan. If I'd known he was skinned and on his own and cold, I would have gone and seen him. Has there ever been temptation that you've been out walking past a bank or seeing something you think, mm. I'll tell you what it is, right? I, you know you can go and get one score, but that's what got me in trouble for the second time. Is it like an addiction? No, it's not an addiction, but you know it's easy. So anyone who does anything, shoplifting or anything, but I got in trouble because I give it one more go and I lost blood, lost a big scar there, right? And had I, when I didn't get, I could have got the IPP. If I don't bump into the geezer, the gas geezer, and he tells me about the three judges, I'm probably just finishing off now. I wouldn't have been out in the last five years because they would have said, you've got to do seven. But because I won't go to workshops, because I argued in my case and I've smashed screws and all that. Apart from that one screw kicked, I've hit a screw. Well, who's the maddest bastard you've been in prison with? It'd be, well, the three people are right sure because he said to me, the nurses come from the Mount Nurse. He said, right, he was in Broadmoor. Please, you turn it into night and we're going to kill you. Or they're going to kill you. He said, I knew that was it. You reach your limit with Fin Bronson, never reached the limit. I've heard him from the block. He could say it's him, but John Inazzi, who I supply chess with, it was on that program about a full saturn. He's my pal. And I always knew, he's probably the most, everyone was very careful of this guy. He's 20 stone, he's a boxer, but he's handy in all sorts of ways. And they beat me 17, 16 in a game of chess over years. He, when I'm in the hospital, two days before I go home, screws come and he said, John's gone into one. I see a screw out the window. I thought, what's he doing? That's not a place they stand, but the whole prison had been cordoned off. John smashed, cut the screws, battered them, three screws, burnt the kitchen down, smashed other things up, and they waited until there was a hundred men. That's what a consulman, that's what I see on TV. They waited to a hundred men. And when he come on, he lost his training shirt, put it back on, got one punching on the shield, and they'd done it, and they would have more, just killed him. But that's only one incident. So maybe Roshaw, maybe Bronson, I never met Bronson, I heard him shouting. John Inazzi's very brave and billy gentry. And you don't know nothing about billy gentry, right? But billy gentry had done 18 out of 18, and they'd done the first finger pop self-wrap, and Fraser, they're the ones that I've met, and I am. My dad had a rule, but he wouldn't go to them limits. He wouldn't go to those excesses. These people have to shit up, take beatings. You want to be a prison tough guy, you've got to be able to take a strip cell, block for years, and a beating. Those five people can take it, and I admire them people. I was always stopped before that point. You don't want to go down that road. They can kill you, or fuck your mind up. But block, I know swear, you put me in a block for two years, I laugh at you, don't get me. I don't care about any, I don't need nothing. I don't need a PlayStation. When I was away, when it was slot buckets and all that, nothing, now you've got TV. Toilet stations, shower. And a phone. So, there's nothing to really create about for me, but someone like poor Charlie, it's all the profession of violence. If you're a robber, you understand how to rob. Maybe some of the guards I've done, they would have beat me in a fight. I don't know, but they didn't fucking know how to stop me in a certain situation. I can't explain it, you know when to answer, whatever. A screw knows his job, a dormant knows his job, an ambulance people know their job. It's all, you know, they sometimes have problems with people. So it's all different types of case fighting, knows his job, a boxer knows his job, a knife man, a gunman, they all got different, they all wired a different way. I'm wired to escape and rob. That's it, that's what I know. And from a kid and gamble, I don't gamble now, but I gambling in my spirit. And I know how to take a chance and a risk. And my only advice to people, if you're young and don't take, don't let it escalate. When my dad started off with an eight, it was a no one. When he went 23, he would come 26. And if you can get a broad, get a broad, but it's very difficult. But the end line for a wanted man, just as James, it's a bullet in the head or a bullet in the back. It's all these people, if you push the limits, if Bronson had been a robber, Bronson gets ironed out. But he's not a robber. He's a man of violence in prison. He understands to an extreme. So he's probably the bravest man in that sense. He's an astonishing man and they'll kill him. What do you think Russell will look back in your life? I know someone from the Andrews. She's a really good friend of mine. She says, I'll probably tell her about his program one night. But she says to me, if you go back 20 years, what would you do? I'll say, I'll do it all again. I'll do it all again. Because the people I met, I can't tell you like the people I met. Oh, this is the other thing. So call me, says to me, had you got the 13 or had you got out a year earlier, would you have gone straight to the hospital without it? I said, no. It was only because I got the bit of wax from being in the cell and it was a fruit. If I get a year less, I'll probably die three, two years later. Do you see what I'm saying? Because I wouldn't have gone to the hospital. I wouldn't have trapped the nerve. So, but getting back to your question, as I say to someone, no, I wouldn't change it because I met people like he's called Rob Riley, he was my friend from Doncaster, Bambi, Hamster, people who was funny, Richard Delaney, people who were funny, Leggy Parnell, he used to do rescue, choke me to death. These people, they're your family because you're living with them every day. That's what prison's about. It's the wing you're on. And I was blessed by being with people who were funny and can roar and will stand up to the screws. And I was around people like that. And if I'm rich, it's the people I met in jail and the people on the truck who helped me. And then people, obviously my mum has gone through, hell for me, but what I'm trying to say, you know your family. My people I met in jail and on the run, I give them 10 out of 10. I'm blessed to have met them people and I thank God for that. I really do. And I say that humbly. It was a great honor to meet them people. So I'm not gonna put them back at the clock and say, don't do that. Do it all again. But I wouldn't want to see someone else do it all. Because I could have got killed. Where do you go forward for the future? What's your plans? I know. I really got a plan. Just take it day by day, try and stay out of prison. I say the probation. I said, well, I ain't robbed no where ever. You know, don't get tempted by anything. She ain't stupid. She says, if you're gonna do something, you're gonna do it. Like, she sometimes says to this, she says, oh no, no. If he's gonna do something, we ain't gonna stop him. We ain't gonna stop me. But what a liby it would be if I went back on the pavement. Because one, they'd life me off. And two, it'd have to be, I think they'd check me as a ring film, I said, out of dead. What I'm gonna do, go get a life 10. Don't let me out on 10. I'll do a 20. I'm late 50s now. I'm an old codger. But I'm still a bit lively. But I can't run on my legs. I'm not as lively as I was. And my trick was being able to get away quick. And if it went wrong, run. You know, I've had chases. I don't get nowhere near me. Because I have a route and I'm gone. And it was, you know, I don't lose motorbikes on that game. I don't work with ferns, but I did on that one occasion. And unlucky for me. So to go again would be not right. And it would be. So I say, though. Well, you may not get caught. Ha ha ha ha ha! It's like the marble. It's like the marble. You might not, but once I'm trying. I might not get caught. So, but what I'm trying to say is, if I did, it would be like, I've had my last chance. You know, along the way, maybe I could have got killed. But that was professional. They never killed me. But that was the way they would. I'd buy the way the flying squad weren't allowed. When I got down in Southampton, they never had guns. Because, because of that, I said, no, you people are dangerous. It's just something like your reputation procedure. You're not having guns here. And they've done it themselves in Southampton. If it had been the flying squad, I don't think they'd have shot me, but if I did the wrong move, they would have done. Because you get one chance with them. If you go through your gun, when it's on you, they shoot you. And I can tell you stories, like terrible stories about people who have been shot dead. So I know these stories. Gary Wilson was nicknamed, he's a come out. He went like that. They shot him dead. So Easterbrook, he's arguably very brave. He come out as a 56 year old man with his gun and shot him. And he said, they bottled it. The bullets were missing, but they shot his finger off. So would I go to them levels? You can't say you would. Because most people, when they get surrounded, they go like that. But Dillinger wouldn't. Mezzarene wouldn't. Jesse James wouldn't. Not that he got done that way, got done in the back. All them people, but they all end up getting caught. And some of them get killed, but that's the history of crime in the world. You don't really win in the end, I don't think. Not robbers. They're too, they're wild robbers. They've got something wild in them. They're different drug dealers. They've got a different mind. I like robbers. They're my favorites. I love the stories about Jesse James. Mezzarene, Dillinger, but the killers, you know. If it comes on, they're killed, but at least they'll never shoot out with armed police. For anybody watching, I thought it was maybe wanting to get involved in a leaf of cream. I'd maybe want to start robbing. What advice would you have for them? If you get caught once, don't go again. I wouldn't say, I'm not wanting people with sister people, don't do so. I'm not into that reform thing. If it's in your spirit, to rob or shoplift, burgle, fight, whatever it is, but if you're on the run, you cannot think of family. You have to think of yourself. You don't go jail and say, I've got to be good for my family. You should be good for yourself. You get at one life, make the most of it. And I've met people in jail, the people I respect, they turn their life around. But on a free stretch, it's hard. You go in, you come out. You go in, you come out. On a 15, I would say, if you get a 15 or a 10, you've got, if you're away for five or six years, you can turn your life around. You can learn things. But I've learned quite a lot. I've got a degree, can't get a job with it. But what I'm saying is, you get a chance to turn your life around on a long stretch, but don't go again. You don't do what I've done is what I would say. If you want to go, good luck to you, wish you well. But don't go the second time because you could, gentry done three big arm robbery things. He done an 18, a 10 and a six all behind the door. I would be another one of him if I went again. So I can't go again because I've been given a chance. So I won't rob ever again. That's it, finished. Nice to meet you. Also listening for coming on a date, it's been an absolute mad story. It's a rollercoaster, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I genuinely wish you all the best for the future. And over in talks, we find things in the pipeline in the future. So hopefully we can get things sorted for you. We'll not touch on them now, but listen, that's just your life of fucking prisons. No doubt there's so much more that information you can give. You've got twice as a lot, but drive your mad. Don't want to bore you to death. I'm sorry, it took up so much of your time. Listen, man, I've enjoyed it. I know the listeners will love this. So listen, thanks for coming on a date and telling your story. I wish you all the best and take care, brother. Thank you very much.