Ronnie Biggs Released

[Si Hunt]

Ronnie Biggs, the Great Train Robber, was "released" from prison today. It makes very little difference, as he's hospital bound and Doctors don't expect him to recover. He has, despite not being able to speak, still managed to convey he is "over the moon" at being free.

It's hard to feel anger towards someone who is so ill they can't talk or move. Yet for me there is the nagging feeling that this man, whose family were until today still berating the authorities for the "injustice" of his continued imprisonment, has made fools out of everyone.

He commited a crime, stole the equivilent of £38m in a brutal robbery (the Train driver was bashed with a metal bar and suffered ill-health for the rest of his life... a life that ended long after Biggs was still enjoying his freedom) and then escaped prison to live the majority of his life in luxury in South America. He then, oh yes, came back to good old Britain to die, so we could have the pleasure of paying for his healthcare.

All this is not good. And yet it's too late now - he has, literally, gotton away with it.

So do you feel sorry for this old man? Do you agree with his release and the cancellation of his prison term? Do you think he's a "gentlemanly villain"? Or do you think punishment for a serious crime, especially one which someone has successfully eluded justice for, should still be dealt out, even when you are ill?

Si.

[Alex]

Well I wouldn't say he's gotten completely away with it, he did serve nine years in total - and he had nothing to do with the act of physical violence. I imagine if something similar happened today, someone might get a long sentence, but then they'd be released half way through...

That all said, he did make a career (if actually quite poorly paid) out of rubbing it in to people's faces that he'd escaped from the justice system. And he was undoubtedly not someone who improved the world in any way.

Hmm. It's a difficult one. But I can't say I bear him any ill will, as after the strokes his quality of life is awful now, on top of being so unwell.

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Hmmm - something which was commented on when he returned was that he was required to fill out the remainder of his sentence ... despite the fact that a comparable criminal today wouldn't be sentanced to anything like that. In fact the modern murdered would get less of a conviction.

Makes you wonder huh!

[Andrew Curnow]

I don't know enough about the Great Train Robbery to really comment, but it does somehow leave a bit of a nasty taste in the mouth - letting somebody out of prison because they've become old & ill is a bit of a dodgy policy IMHO. What if he was a convicted Nazi war criminal, would they have let him out? A serial killer? At what point do we say, "Oh go on then, it wasn't that bad a crime, let him out" and when do we say "Oh no, that was too naughty, die in prison".

[Rob McCow]

Is the NHS really footing the bill for his healthcare?

[Si Hunt]

Yes.

I think what annoys me is that the implication in all of this seems to be that he's been served a wrong. Statements like:

Biggs's son Michael said his father was sick and frail and freedom would make little "practical" difference.

But he said it would make a big "spiritual" difference to the family.

It's got the vibe of him being a wronged man, or them as a family being wronged. When in fact, this man has commited a crime, then lived a wealthy life most of us could never dream of. It's almost like they resent the fact he had to serve the time for the crime he commited.

Hmmm - something which was commented on when he returned was that he was required to fill out the remainder of his sentence ... despite the fact that a comparable criminal today wouldn't be sentanced to anything like that. In fact the modern murdered would get less of a conviction.

I can't really see what's unfair about that. If he hadn't escaped, he would have had to serve that term. The law changes, it's at best cheeky, at worse a bloody nerve to expect your sentence to be "downgraded" in line with current policy because you have evaded serving it for 30 years!

Well I wouldn't say he's gotten completely away with it, he did serve nine years in total

Well that's a bit of a deceptive statement - he served 18 months at the time, before he escaped. Presumably the other seven and a half years you're referring to are the last seven and a half, since he gave himself up? I'm sure most criminals would love to be able to "defer" some or all of their sentence until a time of their life when they are too ill to be able to move from a bed anyway! Virtually all the time he has served has been, of his own choosing, when he couldn't do much with it anyway. So it doesn't really count, does it?

Si.

[Captain Tancredi]

Well, I'd say there's a difference between serving ten or even twenty years in middle age when you can still expect to have some sort of life to look forward to afterwards, and serving it in your seventies when there's every chance you're going to die behind bars. He's in no condition to harm anyone now and it's presumably just an exercise in ensuring that he doesn't have any reference to prison on his death certificate. As Alex says, the amount of time he's served in the end is probably not all that far off what a modern criminal would get for the same offence today.

There's another aspect which crops up in the news every so often, which is that the prison service is having to deal with an increasingly large number of prisoners of retirement age- particularly lifers who were put away in their thirties and forties, but also the first generation of murderers convicted after the death penalty was abolished- and it just isn't set up to provide that kind of care.

[Larry]

I have to say that having read a similar thread over on Galifrey Base I am amazed at the utter lack of compasion being shown on there to a dying man. I am not condoning what Biggs did or his attitude to the legal system and his avoiding justice for so long if he was still in reasonable health he should of completed his term but the attitude on hear you would think he was a child murderer or pedeophile.

[Jamie McCrimmon]

I too have a total lack of compassion, and I worry that this will set a precedent for letting other criminals out of jail on the grounds of ill health. Bigg's status as some sort of folk hero has always been distasteful, too.

[Paul Monk]

Bigg's status as some sort of folk hero has always been distasteful, too.

I blame Phil Collins!

[Si Hunt]

It has to be said that while Biggs is suspiciously hardly featured in "Buster", the film as a whole does portray the whole exercise as akin to a cheeky chappie apple scrumping spree.

I am not condoning what Biggs did or his attitude to the legal system and his avoiding justice for so long if he was still in reasonable health he should of completed his term but the attitude on hear you would think he was a child murderer or pedeophile.

So Larry, are you saying that the compassion should be down to his ailing health (i.e criminals should be shown more leniancy/aquitted when they are dying or terminally ill) or, as suggested by the last part of the above, because his crime wasn't that severe? It WAS the biggest Robbery in history, a violent one at that, and worthy of a 30 year prison sentence.

I really don't know. I find myself asking why one should find oneself feeling compassion for someone, just because they have reached the end of their life? It does, as they say, come to us all. Should all prisoners be freed when it looks like they might die in a few months/years time? But there's an issue here in that quite often people given months to live can actually have years left in them.

Si.

[Si Hunt]

Despite apparently not being able to "walk or talk", Biggs is pictured grinning like a loon and posing next to a Birthday balloon on the front of today's tabloids, a far cry from the previously released picture in which he looked in a vegetative state (asleep?).

The phrase "having the last laugh" for some reason sprung to mind.



Si.

[Andrew Curnow]

And presumably, to add insult to insult to injury, I guess he's getting paid handsomely for it! It'd be nice to think there was some kind of clause in his premature release which would allow the Home Office to say, "Oi, clearly you've OK, back in you go mate!" but I doubt it.

I still can't fathom why he was released - without wishing to sound cynical, the government doesn't usually do this sort of thing unless there's 'brownie points' to be had with public opinion, but as far as I can see there was nobody campaigning for his release apart from this family.

[Si Hunt]

Didn't the Sun pay for him to come back to Britain? I remember something about that.

It just strikes me as a little convenient that this photo was the only one we saw before his release:



Which suggests he's like that all the time - barely concious, the drooling tongue making him look virtually braindead. And now we see him looking basically like one of those ancient yet uncannily sprightly old men that run the London Marathan each year.

It feels bad to pick on an old man (although it's only because he's so old and in need of help that he's come home! Cheers!) but it does suddenly seem like we've all been conned a bit! As Andrew says, is it too late to send him back?

I wonder if he'll now make a "bit of a recovery" and be well enough to be treated at home? Perhaps?

Si.

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Well at least he's done some time for his crime, unlike the UK's handling of General Pinochet.

[Andrew Curnow]

That's probably very true, but I don't think we should use that as a defence for letting Biggs out!!

[Jamie McCrimmon]

I hope Peter Sutcliffe doesn't start to feel unwell. Ever.

And whatever state Biggs may be in, he came out of the whole thing better off than Jack Mills.

[Larry]

So Larry, are you saying that the compassion should be down to his ailing health (i.e criminals should be shown more leniancy/aquitted when they are dying or terminally ill) or, as suggested by the last part of the above, because his crime wasn't that severe? It WAS the biggest Robbery in history, a violent one at that, and worthy of a 30 year prison sentence.

I really don't know. I find myself asking why one should find oneself feeling compassion for someone, just because they have reached the end of their life? It does, as they say, come to us all. Should all prisoners be freed when it looks like they might die in a few months/years time? But there's an issue here in that quite often people given months to live can actually have years left in them.

Si.

not at all I'm mearly basing my opinion on the crime he commited I've seen documentories on the Train Robbery and even the senior police officers involved in the case said they were shocked at the level and severity of the prison sentences handed out to all those who took part in the robbery the truth is the establishment of the time wanted to make an example of those men and that is why life sentences were handed out.

[Pip Madeley]

I blame Phil Collins!

[WhiteCrowNZ]

To put it in perspective though ...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/8198603.stm

[Larry]

To put it in perspective though ...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/8198603.stm

well in a case like this I certainly don't think he should be released you commit an act of terroisim like he did and the life sentence he got should mean exactly that and he only gets released when they carry him out in a wooden box.

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Absolutely. In perspective, he got a sentance of 27 years, which is comparable to what Ronnie Biggs got himself. But he had the common sense to commit his crime 20 years later, making their crimes of comparable punishment ...

[Rob McCow]

Why should they release any of them? If you're bed-ridden and terminal, why does it make any difference whether the room you spend your life in has bars on the windows or not? Presumably there are prison hospitals where these people are treated.

My experience of visiting care homes for the very ill is that they have some slight similarities to prisons. The residents / inmates don't know the combination to get out and are accompanied at all times if they leave the premises.

If either of these people show signs of recovery, then will they be whisked back into jail? If Ronnie Biggs woke up in a few weeks time and said 'I'm feeling well chipper today' would the Police haul him in?

[Alex]

I have to say that I've revised my opinion a little since first posting, mainly because I didn't realise that Biggs' condition had been exaggerated. I'd read on the BBC website that: "(Biggs) was unable to walk, read, write or speak and could not eat or drink." But now it seems that wasn't true.

Basically I feel that unless you've literally weeks to go (and being in hospital would allow close family to be around you) then someone shouldn't be let out of prison. And even then, I'd only apply that to those who have committed non-violent crimes.