Call to release Biggs from prison

Ronnie Biggs is serving a 30-year prison sentence

Great train robber Ronnie Biggs should be released from prison to be allowed to "die with dignity", a penal campaigner has said.

Prisons Handbook editor Mark Leech said ministers should "do the decent thing" and free the 79-year-old.

Biggs, who spent over 35 years on the run after escaping from HMP Wandsworth, is being treated in a Norfolk hospital for pneumonia after a move from prison.

Biggs's son Michael, 34, has also called for his father to be freed.

"It's about time the government released Ronnie Biggs," said Mr Leech who is himself a former offender.

"They've had their pound of flesh, they should now do the decent thing and let this elderly man die with dignity."

Why waste taxpayers' money now? My dad isn't a danger to anyone Michael Biggs

Michael Biggs has called on the Home Office to show "compassion".

"My father is a very sick man who will be 80 this year," said Mr Biggs, who lives in London.

"Why don't they just show some compassion and free him so he can be with his family.

"Why waste taxpayers' money now? My dad isn't a danger to anyone."

On Friday Biggs was moved to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital.

He is said to be in a comfortable condition and is expected to be returned to prison early next week.

Biggs, from Lambeth, London, was a member of the a 15-strong gang which attacked the Glasgow to London mail train at Ledburn in Buckinghamshire on 8 August 1963 before making off with �2.6m.

Compassionate release

He was given a 30-year sentence but escaped from Wandsworth prison, south London, in a furniture van after only 15 months inside.

He was on the run for more that 35 years, living in Spain, Australia and Brazil, before returning to the UK voluntarily in 2001.

Biggs's illness is the latest in a series of health problems. He is due to be considered for parole later this year.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: "We do not discuss the cases of individual prisoners.

"The criteria for compassionate release in medical cases are where the prisoner is suffering from a terminal illness and death is likely to occur soon or where the prisoner is bedridden or severely incapacitated."

A life expectancy of three months is considered an appropriate period and severe stroke victims are also considered, the spokesperson said.

E-mail this to a friend

Printable version