I didn’t give him time to reply. I took the barrel out of his mouth and smashed him in the face with the butt. His lip split, but he wasn’t a dead man, and he seemed to appreciate that his life had been spared.
He spluttered his thanks: ‘OK, you’re not a gangster. You are not a gangster.’
I pushed him back into the pub, nodded to Frank and we prepared to leave. I told the barman to pour our drinks down the drain, which he did without making any comment. Frank and I breezed off into the night. Job done, and Johnny kept his huge, ignorant mouth shut.
The jealousy about the schemes in our manor didn’t stop, though. I was forever watching my back because my contacts kept warning me about other firms with ambitions.
A few weeks later I was walking through Holloway, minding my own business. I was on my way to check on my business interests, and have a drink with some of our firm. Perhaps that day I’d taken my eye off the ball; perhaps I should have been on the lookout for any trouble.
Crack! A gun fired and I felt that my leg had been set on fire. The pain was unbearable. Through the pain I could hear, ‘Bobby’s been shot! Bobby’s been shot!’
I knew it was a drive-by because, after the bullet hit, I saw a cloud of exhaust smoke and heard a motor revving. Apart from that, it was all about pain and the lads yelling out instructions about how to treat the wound. Chrissy, amazingly enough, had been out drinking with us after his partial recovery. He still walked with a limp and boasted a few scars. He wrapped his coat around my leg.
As usual, I ended up back at the Major’s pad. He poured antiseptic on the wound, and I have to say that if Kennedy’s brother had been nearby it would have been used on the Major. The pain was the worst I have ever felt in my life.
The Major knew his guns. ‘It was a .22 rifle. Look, the bullet has gone straight through your leg. But it’s only a flesh wound. A little more to the left and you would have lost your knee cap.’
‘Thanks, Major,’ was all I could manage, relieved to still be attached to my knee.
He was an expert with plastic skin, so he sprayed on the substance, which helps with the healing process. By this time my knee was twice its normal size; I gulped down the Major’s painkillers in a desperate move to feel better. They did help, and probably took about half the pain away. I paid the Major his £50 fee and ended up at the house of Chrissy’s mother. She looked after me and changed the bandages for several weeks.
Revenge. It is such a short word, but has so much meaning. The boys were determined to get full revenge on my attacker. As it happened, they didn’t wait for me to recover; they took matters into their own hands.
As I lay on the couch at Chrissy’s mum’s place with my leg in the air a few days later, I was happy to learn that my attacker would have to sleep on his belly for the foreseeable future. The guy was a minor enforcer called Joe – his job with his firm was to intimidate people who were being ripped off and make sure that they paid their fees for protection and a host of other rackets. It was a bad move to try to put me on the sidelines.
The boys had found out he was responsible, went to find him, bent him over a wall and cut his arse. He was in agony every time he went for a poo, and I took some satisfaction from that.
I had no regrets from any of my actions. Anyone who suffered at my hands from a premeditated act deserved it: the end game, for me, was always money.
The boys had found out that the .22 rifle belonged to Joe’s dad. I decided to pass the time by writing a brief note to the father:
‘I suggest that your boy sticks to darts. He wouldn’t have won a teddy at the fairground with that shooting. I know he’ll be in more pain than me at the moment.’
Well, a note came back in an envelope. The note offered an apology and the package bulged with £500. No further action needed.
I was making too many enemies. Shortly after the rifle incident, a shotgun was fired from another passing car. The pellets hit Big Eddie, who wasn’t badly hurt, but he vowed revenge on the spot. He took note of the car number, went off to have his wounds treated by the Major, and appeared at my house the next morning with a beaming grin.
‘Eh? You’ve just been peppered with pellets and you’re grinning.’
‘I’ve had a result,’ Eddie announced. ‘I’ve found out who fired the pellets, and he is definitely no friend of yours. Do you remember a bloke from the ruck, with earrings and long, greasy black hair?’
‘How could I forget? He whacked me on the back with that iron bar and I can still feel it.’
‘I’ve just been to see him. I borrowed Kennedy’s brother from Old Frank. Hope you don’t mind.’
‘No, no, that’s OK,’ I answered, growing more curious by the second. ‘What the fuck happened?’
‘Well, I …’
‘Go on,’ I ordered. ‘What the fuck did you do?’
Big Eddie produced the revolver, cradled it in his huge hands, and laid it on the dining-room table.
‘Kennedy’s brother can be well pleased with his work tonight. He was fired through the letterbox but seems to have hit a sensitive area. Your greasy friend isn’t the man he was.’
I had the last word: ‘I hope you’re not talking bollocks!’
After that, the banter turned into a nightmare because a bit of work went wrong. It went badly wrong. Someone died.
We’d heard about a large amount of wages being stored in a house – around £30,000 or £40,000. We had to tie up the people – that’s called a wrap-up – while we looked for the cash. We found a lot of it, but a gun went off accidentally.
I had tied up one of the people and one of the gags was too tight. The noise of the gun caused panic and one of the group choked on their own vomit. We had to run off because of the noise from the gun, and couldn’t check on the gags. That was a disaster for all the families involved.
I was staying at my parents’ house when the murder squad arrived. I was having a cup of tea with Mum and Dad when there was a knock at the door.
A couple of coppers came in and my mum asked, ‘What’s going on? Who do you want?’
‘We’ve come for Robert,’ one of them answered, as my mum started to cry.
‘What do you want him for?’ my dad asked, hoping that one of my insurance rackets had been rumbled.
‘We’re going to charge him with murder.’
The room fell silent. Mum looked at me and just sobbed and sobbed. Dad stared at me and shook his head. I had failed them both. And I was still just nineteen years old.
I stood trial for murder and was found not guilty. I was found guilty of manslaughter because the jury could see that it was an accident.
While I have no remorse for anything I’ve done in my life, over the years that unnecessary death has haunted me.
I was sentenced to seven and a half years, which was fair enough under the circumstances. I served five years, firstly at Aylesbury Young Offenders Institution and then, when I was twenty-one, they moved me to Maidstone.
Aylesbury was a violent place where prisoners were treated like dogs, and I couldn’t wait to get away from there. I was singled out as the most violent person in Aylesbury and they gave me some unbelievable treatment.
One time I was called down to the medical room. I assumed it was for a check-up or something like that.
‘We want you to take these,’ a doctor said, holding out some pills. ‘Don’t worry, they won’t harm you.’
Well, I didn’t have much choice and so I swallowed this cocktail of drugs, wondering what was coming next.
After I’d taken the drugs I was whisked off to another prison – not sure where – in a dazed state.
When I arrived there, a screw said: ‘Don’t take the cuffs off. This one is really violent.’
They took me to a room where everything was white – it looked like something from a private hospital. I was given another load of tablets; I believe now that they didn’t know that I’d had the previous lot. The double dose meant that I was absolutely stoned ou
t of my nut.
They sat me on a chair, took my shirt off, and left me with just my trousers on. Next, a guy – who looked like a doctor – produced a set of electrodes with suckers on the end. They attached them to my head and body and injected the suckers with some sort of jelly.
The next thing I knew, a strobe light was flashing in my face. Bang! Bang! Bang! The light flashed, flashed and flashed.
Then someone said, ‘OK.’
They switched some sort of current on and I felt it pulse through my body. My muscles tensed up. The current seemed to go off and on, jolting me five or six times. The room was going round and round and I was sweating like a pig. I could see rivers of sweat pouring down my body.
Through the haze I could see blurred figures monitoring me. A long list of thoughts flooded my head: ‘What sort of experiment is this? Why are they doing it? This has to be illegal! Who’s keeping records? Am I at the hands of the Gestapo? What drugs have they given me? Am I going to die?’
I must have passed out, because the next thing I knew I was back in my original prison cell at Aylesbury. It was night time and a prison officer, Mr Ward, was sitting next to my bed.
‘What the fuck happened?’ I asked, still more than a bit woozy.
‘You’ll be all right, son,’ he said, looking concerned.
Mr Ward was a decent man, and I could tell he was unhappy at my treatment. He was upset and his face said it all. He wouldn’t go into any details and walked off.
I had a thumping headache. I know people have migraines, but this was a migraine on a massive scale. My head ached and ached for a couple of weeks.
My sister Pauline came to see me and demanded to know why I had peculiar red marks on my head. No one would tell her. It was all hushed up. I was sent off to other prisons, my wounds healed, and I am still brimming with anger to this day.
All those clandestine activities were hushed up. Nothing was logged; any relevant paperwork disappeared. Prisoners who had the treatment were ghosted off to other prisons, making it difficult for relatives to trace them. By the time visits were arranged the bruises – caused by those little copper suckers on the prisoner’s head – had vanished.
There was no national outcry. Stories abounded about these barbaric treatments, but what could be proved?
The ‘liquid cosh’ method of strong tranquillisers took over: fit men were taken away, only to return as zombies. They even used the stuff on Reggie Kray. Soon, he was so used to those drugs that he drank them by the cupful.
When they moved me to Maidstone, I saw that many prisoners were on LSD, but I still encountered some clever criminals. I couldn’t wait to get out and continue my career in the armed robbery business.
But how long would I last before being nicked for good?
CHAPTER SIX
GANGSTERS, BUSINESSMEN AND POLITICIANS
I ALWAYS HATED being referred to as a gangster. I never wanted to be a gangster nor saw myself as one – as you saw with the story about Johnny the big mouth. I was a businessman, involved in the business of crime.
In my day there were three types of criminal, jostling for position. As well as the universally hated gangsters, and business people like me, you had the opportunist.
In the modern age, things are much the same. The opportunists get involved out of necessity. They may be on low incomes or have to support a drug habit. They have no other means of earning money, like a steady job. They usually have poor education and problems in their background. They are also victims of crime themselves and get caught in a vicious circle. When I hear politicians talking about taking away their benefits, I think this is insanity. Without benefits, these people will be driven into the hands of drug dealers and organised criminals. They will be even more desperate to get money to support themselves and their families, and so fuel the crime industry.
We encountered gangsters in the pubs and night clubs, dressing loudly, talking even louder and using violence to show they were tough. They were loud, abrasive and generally a pain in the arse. These people were known to us all as the one-man crowd. They became more of a liability in the crime business than an asset, because they brought criminal activities to the attention of the public, police and media. That was a nightmare for the real movers and shakers within the business, who were motivated purely by money and had no intention of carrying out violence just for the sake of it.
The gangsters wanted everyone to know that they operated outside the law to glamorise their own existence. It was as if the gangster had a badge stamped on his forehead saying, ‘Please nick me so that I can prove I am a gangster.’ The police were always happy to oblige.
The reason I didn’t like being around thugs and gangsters was because they were unpredictable, and prone to outbreaks of senseless violence at the drop of a hat. Those around them could never feel safe, could never relax or enjoy an evening out.
Because of my previous lifestyle and built-in animal instincts of survival, even to this day I can walk into a pub, club or any place, and pick out the guy carrying a weapon. I can detect tension in the air and I have a good idea if things are going to kick off. That is why I try to avoid those types of places. Booze and gangsters are a recipe for total disaster. Those thugs should stick to bitter lemon.
I remember one evening when I was out with some of the boys for a quiet meeting. It was with an Irish guy called Pat, who’d invited us over to his manor for a drink and to discuss a bit of work. He was a friend of Tony the Greek and worked in a warehouse. The owner of the warehouse was going bankrupt and wanted to sell off the majority of his stock before the official receivers came in to impound it.
We arrived in the pub in north-west London. It was a big Victorian building with tired décor inside. It was an Irish place, where a band played jigs and the local community jumped around to the traditional music. The band was the real deal, but I reckoned Pat should have chosen a better venue – there was something off about the place.
The air was full of smoke, the smell of stale beer and cheap perfume, aftershave and all that. I didn’t feel at home. We stood out like sore thumbs in our three-piece suits. The sight of me, standing there all suited and booted and drinking bitter lemon, must have seemed strange to the locals, but, as ever, I was determined to keep a clear head at all times.
Pat was a really nice, run-of-the mill guy and I was very impressed with his cheerful attitude and good manners. Good manners have always been a big winner for me; I hate bad-mannered people.
Tony the Greek got the drinks in as usual, and Pat explained the deal to us. He showed me the list of stock they wanted to unload and the price list it sold for, plus the price they wanted from us. After a bit of haggling on the price, we agreed to meet up with him to discuss payment terms, delivery and all that.
Once that was done we shook hands and then talked in general about other stuff Pat was involved in. Although he was an ordinary bloke, Pat was a bit of a ducker and diver like Tony the Greek and always had things to sell. I liked him and respected him. I felt that we could do a lot of business in the future. Tony had already assured me of Pat’s reliability and that he was a ‘closed-mouth guy’. I felt safe doing business with him.
As I bought our second round of drinks I noticed that there were two blokes and a woman involved in an argument. All had had too much to drink and their voices became louder and more aggressive. It was none of our business, so we carried on with our chat and let them get on with it.
Then, suddenly, all hell broke loose. Two blokes threw right-handers at each other, bottles and glasses started flying and others started joining in. It really kicked off. A bottle just missed the head of my brother, Frankie, and Tony copped a punch in the side of the head. I chinned the guy who did that and more fists flew.
I felt a punch in the stomach and carried on throwing right-handers at those near us. We heard the sound of police cars arriving, which meant it was time for us to leave. As we stumbled out of the pub and headed for our car, I felt a burning s
ensation in my gut. I felt a wet patch and assumed it was from the contents of the glasses flying around. As we drove along I had a closer look. There was blood everywhere; it was my fucking blood. One of those bastards in the pub had stabbed me, and it was quite a cut.
I grabbed Tony’s scarf and held it against the wound to stem the flow. It was a nasty wound and I knew we were looking at a hospital job, but I knew they would tell the police about a knife wound, so I had to get my story straight.
The bogus tale went along the lines that I had been boning a piece of meat for a party, but the knife had slipped and I’d accidentally stabbed myself. The doctor in the A&E raised an eyebrow at that explanation and pointed out that it was a nasty wound, very near to a main artery. He said I could easily have bled to death.
The law came and I stuck to my story, so they pissed off. They were probably pleased that I had been stabbed and they had no work to do with their investigations. I received twenty-six stitches for my night out, and a ruined suit. I should have headed off to another pub when I felt the tension in the first place. I still have the scar today, as a brutal reminder of how mindless violence can affect people for the rest of their lives.
Still, we completed the deal with Pat and he was full of apologies, although it wasn’t his fault. It wasn’t our fault, either. It was a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. When two gangsters start a brawl over an old pub trollop, it’s time to make yourself scarce.
The incident made me even more aware how you can be an innocent bystander and still end up as a victim of violent crime. It can happen to anyone. The worst thing was that, because we were out on a social bit of business, none of us had been tooled up. That reminded me of the old rule: better to be caught with a tool when you don’t need it, than be caught without one when you do need it.
On the other hand, if you do violence to others, you can’t complain when it happens to you. What goes around comes around.
But there is another twist to this story because, weeks after I had the stitches taken out, I was having lunch with the guys in our favourite Greek restaurant.
I Am Not A Gangster Page 8
