Thread: England - Train robber Biggs wins freedom

Looks like he fooled them and escaped one last time.......go biggsy

Now Biggs is well enough to go to a football match
Nigel Rosser and Felix Allen
03.11.09


Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs won his freedom after doctors said he was so ill he had only weeks to live

But today the pensioner is feeling so much better he is planning a trip to see his beloved Arsenal play in the Premier League.

He has told friends he wants to watch a live game before he dies, following a slow but steady recovery from his life-threatening bout of pneumonia and MRSA.

Biggs, who was freed from prison on compassionate grounds by Justice Secretary Jack Straw in August, has begun putting on weight and has grown noticeably stronger in recent weeks, according to friends.

Confounding medical evidence that he was “unlikely” to recover from the pneumonia he picked up in Norwich prison, the train robber is now moving better and able to travel outdoors.

At the weekend Biggs, 80, travelled the short distance from his Barnet care home to his son Michael's house to watch Arsenal play Tottenham Hotspur on television.

After the game the passionate “Gooner” declared himself fit enough to attend a live Arsenal match at the Emirates Stadium, ideally, friends said, as soon as the clash with Arsenal's arch London rivals, Roman Abramovich's Chelsea on November 29.

He told friends via his spelling board: “I haven't seen Arsenal live since the early 1960s, and think I'm strong enough to watch them one last time. I would love to see the new stadium.”

Friends believe that just simple basic NHS care has allowed him to start to recover.

One said: “He is now getting excellent care on the NHS and has responded well to it. He's still not what you'd call a well man, and he will be fed through a tube for the rest of his life.

“But he could die from any little infection he picks up at any time. Mike has to be very careful as to whom Ron meets and come into contact with. Swine Flu is obviously a major concern.

“But he can do more things than before and is more comfortable. He used to say he wanted to have a pint of bitter at a Margate pub as a free man before he died, but since he can't eat or drink anything anymore, he's changed that to wanting to watch the Gunners live before he dies. The win over Spurs certainly perked him up as would a win over Chelsea.”

Despite Biggs family's insistence that the Train Robber remains terminally ill, his improvement will anger many who believe he shouldn't have been released from prison.

Relatives of Jack Mills, the train driver who never recovered after being hit over the head during the 1963 raid, said today they were now resigned to the fact Biggs was able to enjoy his freedom.

Daughter-in-law Patricia Mills, wife of the driver's son John, 68, told the Standard: “I fully expected it, I think everybody did.

“We have been through a lot over the years and we've said all we have to say [about Biggs]. We tend now to just try to ignore it.”

Following pleas from Biggs's son Michael, 34, Mr Straw made a massive u-turn and announced that he was freeing the robber on compassionate grounds - only a month after ruling he was a wholly unrepentant' criminal who should die in jail.

At the time, Mr Straw cited medical evidence showing that his condition would not improve and it looked unlikely that Biggs would ever leave his bed at Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital.

Unable to speak or talk following a series of strokes, the former robber needs 24-hour medical care.

Biggs was a member of the gang from Lambeth, South London which robbed the Glasgow to London mail train of £2.6million in 1963.

Those that were were caught, including Biggs, were given sentences of up to 30 years. But after just 15 months in prison Biggs escaped from HMP Wandsworth and lived as a fugitive in Australia and Brazil, where Michael was born.

In 2001, after falling ill, Biggs returned to the UK voluntarily and was sent back to prison. He is now likely to be in a nursing home for the rest of his life.The cost of his 24-hour care is estimated to be at least £40,000 a year.

On top of the nursing home fees, Biggs is also expected to receive the state pension of £95.25 a week, backdated to his formal release on August 7, to cover basics. . London Evening Standard.

^ That hits home as to why I left the UK (shit hole) in the first place. It now appears that the Lockerbie bomber twat has also made a miraculous recovery also.

Different gravity entirely. Lockerbie bomber is a mass murderer, Biggs ain't.

Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs rushed to hospital with chest pains
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Last updated at 12:50 PM on 29th May 2010

Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs was today admitted to hospital after complaining of chest pain.
Biggs, 80, is expected to undergo tests at Barnet General Hospital later today, his son Michael said.
He explained: 'He had pain in his chest this morning, he's conscious but he's in a lot of pain.'
Biggs was released from prison on medical grounds last year and has been living in a care home in Barnet.
Michael Biggs, who is with his father in hospital, said: 'He was brought in to Barnet General this morning and he'll be having tests later today.
'He was complaining of pains in his chest.
'My daughter was born in the last few weeks so he's been in good spirits celebrating that.'
Biggs has been plagued with ill health in recent years.
Originally from Lambeth, south London, he was a member of a 15-strong gang which attacked the Glasgow to London mail train at Ledburn, Bucks, on August 8 1963 before making off with £2.6 million.
He was given a 30-year sentence but escaped from Wandsworth prison, south London, in a furniture van after spending 15 months in jail.
He was on the run for more than 30 years, living in Spain, Australia and Brazil, before returning to the UK voluntarily in 2001


Read more: Ronnie Biggs rushed to hospital | Mail Online

Originally Posted by crippen

Ronnie Biggs, the Great Train Robber, is to be moved to a nursing home after making a strong enough recovery to leave hospital.

Give him a few weeks and the old fucker will be playing squash with the Lockerbie Bomber.

Is he still out there living it up ??

Excellent....He put the pommy stooges in there place.....go Biggsy..

Originally Posted by billy the kid

think that was the reason why they let biggs go because they knew the lockerbie bomber was gonna get a free ticket as well . media would have had a field day if biggs was kept in and the bomber freed.

But the difference is we know Biggs did the crime. There is so many holes in the Lockerbie Bombers conviction you could drive a bus through it.

Biggs went on the run for more than 35 years in Australia and Brazil after the £2.6million Great Train Robbery in 1963, returning home in 2001 for treatment after suffering a series of strokes.

Any relation to Andrew Biggs?

March this year at the funeral of Great Train Robbery partner-in-crime Bruce Reynolds Telegraph


Great Train Robber Biggs defiant on 50th anniversary

4 Aug 2013
Half a century after Britain's infamous Great Train Robbery, the most notorious member of the gang, Ronnie Biggs, is unrepentant and says he is proud of his role in the heist.

The gang stole the equivalent of pound sterling45 million ($69 million, 52 million euros) in today's money from a mail train travelling from Glasgow to London 50 years ago on Thursday.

The crime itself was audacious enough, but it was Biggs' 36 years on the run and his high-profile new life in Brazil which propelled him to fame.

He escaped from prison in 1965 and was finally arrested and thrown back in jail in 2001 on his voluntary return to Britain.

Biggs, who will celebrate his 84th birthday on the anniversary of the robbery, was released from prison in 2009 after his lawyer claimed he was close to death following a series of strokes.

But he is still alive and although now confined to a wheelchair he showed he has lost none of his old defiance by making an obscene hand gesture to journalists at the funeral of the gang's mastermind Bruce Reynolds in March this year.

Biggs, who cannot speak and communicates through a spelling board, said ahead of the 50th anniversary: "If you want to ask me if I have any regrets about being one of the train robbers, my answer is 'no!'

"I will go further: I am proud to have been one of them. I am equally happy to be described as the 'tea-boy' or 'The Brain'.

"I was there that August night and that is what counts. I am one of the few witnesses -- living or dead -- to what was 'The Crime of the Century'."

______
Biggs, who now lives in a nursing home, has contributed to a new book about the robbery to explain first-hand the complete story of the heist.

Time for another hit record?

I do dislike the glamorisation of criminals