The Great Bank Robber Freed At Last

PR Log (Press Release) – Aug 13, 2009 – Thirty years to the day after a famous heist, the well known Great Train robber, Ronnie Biggs has finally been released from detention.

In the early 1960’s the name Ronnie Biggs was on everybody’s lips. Biggs has spent most of his life on the run from justice. He was behind the largest robbery by value in Britain’s history, until the record was broken in 1971, when the Baker Street robbery took place.

Biggs returned to England in 2001, by his own choice, fully aware that he would be arrested and jailed. He longed to walk into a British pub and order a pint of bitter. However, Biggs was detained immediately and never made it to the pub.

The 80 year old Biggs is bedridden, unable to feed himself, walk or talk, weakened by strokes and pneumonia. Biggs can only communicate by pointing to letters on a board.
Yet another application for Bigg’s release was rejected on July 2 2009 by Jack Straw the Secretary of British Justice. He said Biggs remained wholly unrepentant of the crime.

British officials however, finally agreed to withdraw the guards from Bigg’s hospital bed, allowing him freedom on ‘compassionate grounds,’ as he is no longer believed to be a danger to society.

Biggs was just 34 years old, when the legendary robbery took place on August 8th 1963. The Royal Mail train was seized by the gang of thieves. The train driver was beaten by the robbers with an iron bar, although no guns were used. The gang got away with 2.6 million pounds, (around $65 million at today’s rate). The train driver never fully recovered from his injuries and the bulk of the stolen money was never recovered.

Sentenced to 30 years imprisonment, Biggs escaped after only 15 months, with three other prisoners. He climbed a wall that enclosed the prisoner’s exercise yard and escaped in a furniture van. It’s estimated Biggs still had of a large amount of the stolen money.

In 1970 He shifted to Australia and lived a quite normal life as a builder. Biggs had undergone an identity change and plastic surgery in Paris. Biggs then fled to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, when the Australian police were tipped off to his whereabouts.

Biggs lived the life-style of a playboy, as he spent many years walking the sunny beaches of Rio de Janeiro. He recorded ‘No One Is Innocent’ with the Sex Pistols and made an advert for hair replacement. He was frequently photographed with tourists.

Biggs lived openly mocking English law, as Brazil refused to extradite him. When he fathered a Brazilian son he claimed even more immunity. Biggs was kidnapped by British ex-soldiers in 1981 and taken to Barbados. The Barbados police rescued Biggs from a yacht and sent him back to Brazil.

Within hours of the announcement of the release of ailing Biggs, the BBC was flooded with emails from critics of the move.

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