- All I ask is a tall ship
and a star to sail her by.
All I ask is a tall ship
and a star to sail her by.
All I ask is a tall ship
and a star to sail her by.
Is that enough?
Can I keep this 'cause
this is written by Richard.
I can frame this.
Hello princess.
[gentle music]
- I would describe the Kray
twins or the Kray brothers.
There were three brothers
as definitely gangsters,
not particularly
brilliant criminals,
but gangsters who were able
to rule their piece of turf
in East London with fear.
- Well, the Kray
twins were a big name.
They had a name for violence
who were violent criminals.
I don't think they were
the most intelligent guys
at that game.
But they had a name, certainly,
and a lot of people
feared them actually.
- The Kray twins were
two very violent brothers
who were based in the
east end of London.
- My mom, she was a lovely
lady, really nice person.
And she was the Kray
twin's first cousin.
But we all lived
together in Valance Road
and we lived in with me
Nan on the top floor.
We had, she had the bottom
and so we was in and out.
We was in and out everywhere
because it was like
a big family thing.
Most people ran
there were our family
and people that we knew.
They were like family.
It was like a little village.
- Part, the only way
I could describe it
was like a little palace,
absolutely immaculate.
It's the only house
I'd ever been in
that had these
little lace curtains
that gathered in the
middle, tied up with a bow,
a little pink bow, and
then came out again,
probably quite popular
in the east end,
but I hadn't seen them.
- Oh, it was just for, no
one had a lot of money,
but my Nan kept everything
spotless, clean,
and we had lots of family
and lots of friends in.
So, yeah, it was good.
It was a great atmosphere.
- Well, from 15, all I wanted
to be was a hairdresser.
I loved doing hair.
I loved bleaching hair,
perming hair, cutting hair.
So I went and did a
three year apprenticeship
down in Holloway Road
at a hairdresser's.
And I absolutely loved it.
Hard work, but I loved it.
- [Interviewer] How did
you meet the Kray family?
- I met them in 1961.
I'd got married, I'd only
been married six months,
and I went to a
little afternoon club
with my husband in
City Road, Islington.
I saw this handsome man
standing in the corner.
I thought, God, he's gorgeous.
Looks like Burt Lancaster.
And I said, who's that?
He said, oh, that's
Charlie Kray.
I didn't know anything
about the Krays.
I've never heard the
name in Islington.
I married into a family
of seven brothers,
all hard nuts I can assure you.
The Flanagan family, everybody
knew them in Islington.
And they had a set of twins.
Their first born
was a set of twins,
just like the Kray twins.
And they were absolutely
identical as well.
But I'd never
heard of the Krays.
Everybody kept to
their own little patch.
And the Flanagans
were North London.
And the Krays
obviously were east.
So I got talking to Charlie Kray
and he said, I had this lovely
long blonde hair at the time.
And he said, god, you've
got gorgeous hair.
I said, I'm a hairdresser.
And he said, oh, do you
do any private work?
I thought he was gonna
ask me for a haircut.
And I said, I do,
but only on Thursday afternoons
when I'm not at the salon.
And he said, you wouldn't go
home and do my mother's hair.
And that intrigues you
'cause you think he's
a gorgeous looking man.
Looks like he's got a few quid.
Why does he get his mother
sent to a lovely salon.
I said, why doesn't your
mother go to her hairdressers?
He said, she doesn't
get any peace.
People asking her questions
and asking her
favors all the time.
Well, I didn't know, of course,
what he meant at the time.
And he said, I'll give
you the directions.
It's Bethel Green Road.
I'd never heard of Bethel
Green Road in my life.
So anyway, I mapped it
out from Hyry Corner
and I arrived at Valance
Road in August, 1961.
And the door opened.
This lovely little typical mum,
probably very much
like my own mother,
blonde, beautiful smile.
Oh, hello, you are Maureen.
You are the hairdresser
I knew you were coming.
Come in.
I said, oh, hello Mrs. Kray.
Don't call me Mrs. Kray.
Call me Violet.
And I knew from that
moment on, we'd be friends.
And we were right to
the very, very end.
- Oh, Violet was lovely.
She was like my other
Nan 'cause my Nan.
And they were sisters.
They looked alike and they
were so like each other.
They was really lovely.
She really lovely woman.
She was so, it is so sad when
she died, it broke her up
when they went away, she
was never the same again.
It just broke her.
And she had to travel
all over the country,
get an ear there, and
everywhere, wherever
the prisons was.
Sometimes she'd take me
and my brother with us
just for a bit of company
getting there and back.
But it destroyed her.
- You went along a little
hall from the front door
and straight into a kitchen.
And would you believe,
I mean, in those days,
that's where you
washed people's hair.
And I washed her hair over
the kitchen sink, no sprays.
You did it with the
saucepan, washed her hair,
put it back in a towel.
And then you started
doing the rollers up
and you took your
own hair dryer.
But there was a little upstairs,
which I didn't go to the
first time of course,
there was an upstairs
'cause I saw the stairs.
And next to the
kitchen was a little,
what I call a front
room a little parlor
again, was immaculate
with a little sofa
and two armchairs and a
cabinet and a television.
But what intrigued me
most in this kitchen
had a little fireplace
with a shelf.
And I was looking, while she
was, her hair was drying,
I was looking along
this mantelpiece.
I saw all these pictures of
boxers, these two boxers.
But you couldn't
tell them apart.
They were absolutely identical.
And when I took her
out the hair dryer,
I said, Violet, who
are these people?
Sure, they're my boys.
They're my twins.
I said, well, how'd
you tell 'em apart?
They're absolutely identical.
She said, I can tell 'em apart.
So I thought, well, that's
a mother talking, isn't it?
And she had little trophies,
what they'd won from boxing,
standing on a little
glass cabinet,
which was typical in sixties
and seventies in the corner.
And I'm looking at all these
trophies that they'd won,
especially Reggie, who was
the better box as she told me.
And then about quarter
of an hour after
I'd combed all the hair
out, used a gallon of lacer,
just sitting down,
having a cup of tea.
And I heard the door and I
heard her voice say, mum.
And she said, that's Reggie.
And I thought, wow, how
on Earth would you know,
it's just a voice saying, mom.
She said, that's Reggie.
And in came this
equally handsome guy,
but immaculately dressed again
and immediately started
with 20 questions.
I thought I was on
trial, obviously,
because I was a stranger.
I was a stranger in his
mother's house alone with her.
He hadn't sent me,
Ronnie hadn't told him.
Obviously Charlie had sent me,
but not informed those two.
And it was like,
where do you live?
Are you married?
Who you married to?
What'd you do for a living?
How old are you?
When I said I'd been
married six months,
he said I was too young.
But then he sat down,
he had a cup of tea
with the obligatory cigarette,
which they chain smoked.
The two of them.
Ronnie, slightly worse.
I thought, God, all
these questions,
but maybe in protection
of the mother.
- Oh, it's very all close-knit.
You get a few that sort of
say something about the twins.
But not many people did.
Most people sort
of got on with them
and they helped some
out quite a lot.
Like they'd give a bit of money.
People didn't have
a lot of money,
they didn't like, they
treat the kids and that,
and even this woman
that they treated once,
and she went, I'm so glad
they give me that money.
She went, 'cause I didn't
have enough in the meter,
like in your gas
or electric meter.
So they did kindness.
I think people appreciated that.
They appreciated they
could do kind things,
they probably get that from
the mother, not the father.
Reggie did say that
in one of his books.
He said, I do take some
responsibility for my mum dying
because she had a lot to do.
A woman of her age
shouldn't have been running
around doing things,
and Ronnie idolized
her, really loved her.
- [Interviewer] What was
old Charlie like, the dad?
- [Kim] A horrible man.
Horrible, nasty person.
- The grave dad.
Well, I've got to say
a miserable old git.
And anybody belonging
to the family
who's alive now will
tell you the same.
I never called him Charlie.
From the day I met him
to the day he died,
I only called him Mr. Kray.
I had no sort of conversation
or camaraderie with him.
He was miserable.
The twins certainly
didn't like him.
And later as I got to be
there a few weeks and weeks,
and he came in and
went out again.
As soon as he saw me,
he didn't like anybody
else to be there.
I got to know that he was
quite violent to his wife.
- Well, he beat my aunt Violet.
He beat her many, many
times when she was younger,
she was having a baby.
He kicked her in the stomach,
she'd lost a little girl.
And I don't think you can ever
forgive that sort of thing.
So she put up with it.
And then when the twins
was older, he slapped
to her stomach when they was out
and her nose was bleeding.
Ronnie went in.
- She was crying.
Be he'd hit her a few times.
He didn't know because
it was in the afternoon.
The very seldom the twins
were in the afternoon.
Ronnie had come home
with one of his headaches
and gone to bed.
And he heard his mother
crying and screaming
and wallop, wallop.
And he jumped up,
ran down the stairs,
and he got his father
up by the neck.
And he'd give him such a punch.
And he said, if you
ever touch her again.
- He went, I'll k*ll you.
And he didn't, he never
laid a hand on her no more.
- And I definitely know
that he meant that.
He said, and I'm
gonna tell Reggie
exactly what you've done today.
And he will say the same.
And he never touched her again.
Never.
- He never, never laid
an hand on no more.
But he still had mental crawl.
He still like walloped
put hands on her up
and that sort of thing.
But he never hit her, never
again didn't have the chance.
They was growing up then.
And they'd just kicked the
shy out of him, to be honest.
[upbeat music]
- [Interviewer] What
was Clubland London
like in the 1960s?
- Wonderful.
Much better than, much
much better than now.
I mean, as I got to know
the Krays a little better,
the nights they took
their mother out,
which was usually a Friday.
Took her to the
Asta and the Colony.
They asked me to go with them.
I mean, it was probably
to keep the mother a bit
of company as well at the table
'cause they were always
hobnobbing around the tables.
But exciting, absolutely
fabulous clubs
like with little
gold guild chairs
and red plush seats, flock
wallpaper as you know,
everybody had, all the pubs
had it, all the clubs had it.
But we were treated like queens.
I mean, when we
left Valance Road
and the cars were outside,
at least four cars.
I walked with Mrs. Kray and I
went to get in the first car,
but no, no, no, no.
They said, you are gonna go
in the second car with Reggie.
'cause Ronnie always had to
sit in the passenger seat
of the first car.
But they never traveled in
the car together in case,
because obviously they thought
they were gonna be attacked.
And two of them never
traveled with their mother.
But the clubs were fabulous.
You were treated like
with practically a bow
on the front door.
Everybody knew them.
Everybody knew Mrs. Kray and
shook hands and showed us
to the best table.
- My Nan sugarcoated
everything with them.
You know, they ain't my
boys, they wouldn't do that.
But it's, yeah, yeah, but
we just got used to it
being around it's, well, even
when I lived at Braveway,
as we was always up
there always up there.
- [Interviewer] Tell
us about Francis Kray.
- Francis.
I met Francis probably about
the third or fourth time
I was at Mrs. Kray's house.
- Oh, Francis was
a lovely woman.
Really nice.
She was always in my
mom and Nan's house.
She used to come and sit
with us in my Nan's house
'cause it was quiet
room in Nan's.
She didn't have the traffic of
all the people that they used
to bring in that she
was a lovely girl.
She really was.
She's really, I remember
so well, so beautiful.
He thought the world of her
don't matter what she
said or done to him,
he'd forgive her everything.
- Reggie had brought her in
and sort of dumped her there
as usual and said,
I won't be long.
And it was quite late afternoon,
I'd say five maybe up was five.
And she said, you will be,
yes, I'll be coming back.
I won't be an hour.
And off they went dressed
immaculately off to some meeting
before they went to a club.
He had no intentions
of coming back.
But he'd left her
with Mrs. Kray.
And then I said,
oh, I'll sit here.
I haven't gotta go home yet.
I'll sit here for
a couple of hours.
I thought she was extremely
pretty, very well dressed,
but extremely nervous
and very vulnerable.
I tried a conversation
several times
and Violet used
to shake her head
and say, you won't get any
conversation out of her.
The only thing was
that you notice
she was nervous and she
had these little gloves on
and would wrap them around
her fingers in nerves.
And she'd keep
glancing at the clock
and saying, he is coming back.
Do you think, how
long will he be?
I said, but he's only been
gone for an hour Francis,
all she wanted was Reggie to
come back and take her home.
But I'd have to
leave at what, seven,
six or seven
o'clock and go home.
I mean, I had a
husband to go home to,
but Mrs. Kray told
me the next week,
half past 10 at the night
a knock come at the door.
And it was Albert Donahue or
Ronnie Bender, somebody else
was sent to pick her
up and take her home.
He never came back because
by that time he was in a club
with Ronnie.
And the worst thing he
could have said was,
I've gotta go home and pick
up Francis and take her home.
She was on pills.
I knew that at the time.
But just for her nerves
at the beginning,
just from the doctor
prescribed, very, very nervous.
But long before she
committed suicide,
she had tried twice before,
once her father had saved her
in the flat.
And once her brother
had saved her,
this is the handsome
brother that was equally
as good looking as her.
He saved her.
But the third time, luck ran out
and the girl was gone.
- [Interviewer] Did
the Kray's crimes
and subsequent
sentences shock you?
- Well, we didn't know about
the crimes at the time.
I didn't know that anything
about Blind Beggars
and the k*lling
of George Cornell.
I'd never been in the
Blind Beggars in my life.
I went a couple of times
to the grave Morris,
which was was one of
their meeting places,
which was just a long, near
enough to white chapel tube.
Went with them a couple of times
with Mrs. Kray for a drink.
Terrible atmosphere.
The minute that Ronnie
walked in the pub,
everything went quiet.
Everybody looked to think,
god, what mood's he in tonight
'cause you dared laugh.
Men dared laugh around
him because he'd turn,
he could turn and say,
who are you laughing at?
Are you laughing at me?
And then that'd be violence.
They never wanted
any violence in front
of their mother, of course.
So everybody behaved when
their mother wasn't there.
That was a different
can of fish.
- Nipper Reed had
spent many, many months
amassing a huge amount of
evidence against the Krays.
When eventually he
was ready to strike,
he knocked down the doors
of the Krays, their family,
their associates, and
everyone was pulled in.
It didn't take long
before some of the
associates started to talk.
[gentle music]
- No I didn't go to the trial.
My Nan and granddad did.
But no I didn't go.
I was too little
really, you wouldn't
wanna take a kid there.
- I went to the old
Bailey three times.
Once with the father and
mother and once with Mrs. Kray
and other people.
Checker Berry took us another
time, was a great friend.
Laurie O'Leary took
us another time.
But that was a terrible
thing to see those people
sitting in the dark on the day
that sticks in my mind
is when the judge said
that's where the numbers,
because there were so many
of them that they got fixated
with names and made
mistakes and names.
So they would have
to wear numbers,
and Ronnie tore it off
his neck and threw it
across the court.
And he said, we are not cattle.
We won't wear numbers.
And so everybody else
threw theirs on the floor.
And the day he went
into the witness box
was the most terrible mistake.
I wish I'd had more influence.
I wish maybe Freddie
Foreman who had influence
with him had said, don't
go into the witness spots.
Because he shouted and screamed
and really put himself down
as the villain that he was.
- They everyone was
buying all the newspapers.
And that my mom had a
book full of the cuttings,
with the cutting, which
over the years disappeared,
- While the twins were
being held for questioning,
they demanded that
some certain members
of the firm took
the flack for some
of the more serious crimes.
Well, that had the
opposite effect.
And some of those
people then were equited
for evidence against the twins,
which ultimately
caused their downfall.
And the guilty verdicts
that they both had.
- The day that they were
given their sentence.
That did shock us.
It shocked everybody.
The the 30 years
shocked everybody.
I'd just realized that
I, the Richardsons
had been sentenced
to 25 before them.
So I thought, well maybe
they'll get the same.
Or maybe a doctor
would be called
to assess Ronnie,
which should have been.
Reggie was drunk on the night
and grieving from a wife
that had just recently
committed suicide.
So that was a
mitigating circumstance
that was never, ever
brought up in court.
- It broke Violet's heart.
Really did.
We couldn't believe it
'cause we thought they've
done stuff before.
But this one, they were
never gonna come out.
And I think they know that.
Nanny and Granddad Lee went, oh,
we will never see
them boys again
'cause they was old, old people.
We'll never see 'em again.
They was gonna be inside.
- I've spoken to lawyers
and solicitors since,
and they said,
had it been today,
Ronnie Kray would've been
assessed as what he was,
a paranoid schizophrenic.
He would've been assessed and
sent straight to Broadmoor.
Reggie, as I say, is a
different can of fish.
He wasn't insane, but he
was under great stress.
And maybe that could
have been a circumstance.
- [Interviewer] Why
do you think the Krays
were given such hefty sentences?
- Oh, they just wanted
them out the way
they messed with
the establishment.
That's what we've always said.
They messed with them
people, they'll have you.
- 30 years was a
terrible sentence.
And Violet started crying.
And I said, what,
don't cry, don't cry.
She went, well, 13
years is a long time.
I said, Violet,
it's not 13 years.
She said, oh, what was it then?
I said, it's 30.
Oh.
And then she nearly collapsed.
She heard wrong.
And she thought the
judge had said 13,
which would've been marvelous,
but we had no
chance of 13 years.
- Oh, but Donahue, I
think he was the one
because he was like super
grass sort of thing.
But [indistinct] and all
that, they didn't deserve
to go to prison.
They just caught up with people
who had sort of bad
mental health problems.
Ronnie weren't thinking right,
Reggie was drinking too much
and taking speed
when Francis died
'cause he couldn't cope
with the loss of her.
- I went with Violet
several times.
I went to Durham,
traveled all up to Durham.
We got a list from their uncle.
He was in a terrible
state in Durham.
I think he'd had two
fights already Ronnie,
can you imagine a Kray
coming into a prison
and you've got the
little upstarts in there.
Everybody thought to theirself,
well, I can fight Ronnie Kray.
What name would I have
if I suddenly had a terrible
fight with Ronnie Kray
and put him into
hospital or even worse.
So he was picked on a lot and
he had those terrible fits
of depression.
No doctor was called to
him for about a couple
of months until Violet really
got onto this solicitor.
And we at last got
doctor to go in
and put him under medication
'cause he went to Durham
with no medication.
So he was in a terrible state.
But I visited him.
I visited Ronnie,
Reggie and Charlie.
And of course the
best visit was Charlie
because he'd come out
with that wonderful smile.
- Well, when we was
younger it was fine
'cause you'd run around with
the other kids in there.
It was like a big playground.
As we got older, we sort of
grew, we was teenagers then,
so we were like teenage.
So we didn't want to really
go there all the time.
We didn't young
people don't wanna sit
in a prison all the
time, so visiting people.
So we trailed off a bit.
I mean, brother fell out
with Reggie big time.
And once he'd fell out
with someone, me brother,
he won't talk to him again.
So the visit
stopped with Reggie.
But I carried on seeing
Reggie because I loved him.
He was always nice to me.
He was very understanding.
He was more like
a father figure,
he was like a father figure.
And he was always nice.
He was always pleasant,
entirely different
to what Ronnie was.
- But I had the best visits.
I know this sounds unbelievable,
but I had the best
visits at Broadmoor.
And when I say that to people,
oh, what fun we had at
Broadmoor, they say,
how can you have
fun at Broadmoor?
It's an asylum, it's
a prison hospital
for the criminally insane.
But by that time, of course,
he was lovely subdued
with medication.
He'd asked for all his suits
to be made and bought in.
We got instructions
to take silk shirts.
I took him silk ties.
He came out dressed, well,
I don't know what to say.
Dressed exactly the same
as he did on the outside,
going to a nightclub.
Absolutely immaculate
had what he wanted.
I went with a man
called Jack Lee,
who unfortunately passed
away a few years ago.
But we went every month.
And on our way through
the east end, we used
to buy smoked salmon bagels
'cause that was another
order of Ronnie,
ties, hanky, silk
underwear, silk socks,
unlike poor Reggie, of course,
who could only later on
have track suits, t-shirts
and Reebok trainers.
And they had to be Reebok.
He'd heard from the young
guys in there, obviously,
that that was the
make at the time.
So we had to get him a Reebok
track suit, Reebok t-shirt,
Reebok trainers, but could
never dress like Ronnie Kray.
And the visits in Broadmoor
was, were wonderful.
I never minded to go, although
it was another journey
right to Crowthorne.
But we never stopped laughing.
- Could be a nightmare
at the best of times.
Especially if Charlie
was with us on visits
down in Maidstone Prison.
If him and Charlie
had fallen out,
there was always an
atmosphere of him and Charlie
were speaking on good terms.
Then it was a better
visit for everybody.
So the first visits he
had an aura about him.
Very short in height, Reggie.
But when he walked through,
he knew that there was
someone of high importance
in Gangland.
- I was running a security
company at the time
when I first met the Kray twins.
And security company
was getting big.
I actually had my wife
was an identical twin.
They were rappers and
they'd done a song called,
"They Took the Rap"
and it was a set
of twins doing a song
about a set of twins.
And I was doing a little
bit of work in London
in borderline criminality.
And they had heard of me and
I'd obviously heard of them.
And they wanted to meet me
because I had a record contract
for them to sign with a swing.
So that was the initial
meeting, really.
And I went down to meet
Reggie at Mate Stone.
He could obviously see the
potential in being my friend.
I definitely got the potential
of being associated
with the Krays.
And like everyone else, I was
a very young man and in awe.
And they've done an awful,
anyone who makes their
living from selling
their criminal past
owes a lot to the Krays.
Everybody.
Yeah, everyone they
made crime palatable
to the general public.
And I feel that I was very
much a part of their legs
and arms while they was in there
in a lot of different
areas, as was other people.
And it benefited me greatly
to be associated with,
I was a Kray association.
And it benefited
them financially
and gratefully that they
were associated with me.
Yeah.
So it was a working amicable
relationship between me
and them and me and anyone else
that was working with them,
it made my army of men
out and down the country
a little bit bigger.
And it made them an
awful lot more powerful
and stronger having
me on their side
as I truly believe I had the
biggest firm around that era,
you know what I mean?
In that little space of time,
there weren't nothing
bigger or better than mine.
And I suppose falsely
it was looked upon
as I was working for them.
It wasn't really, but I
didn't mind that little mix
being mistook, you
know what I mean?
Done me favors and them favors.
So we went through our
relationship like that,
I mean, I'd done
things for them.
They've done a lot for me.
My reputation helped them
and their reputation
definitely helped me.
That propelled me
into the Dave Cook
that everyone knows
and sees today.
- I got the call from Kate Kray,
actually to tell
me Ronnie had died.
That was the first I
knew early morning.
She was in a supermarket
when it came over a radio
playing music, a news flash.
And she phoned me immediately.
And then later on
that day, I got a call
from Reggie saying, I want you
to do the seating in the church
because you know everybody,
it's no good an usher
seating people from
the funeral parlor
because the usher knew nobody.
- I got a phone call
from Reggie Kray saying,
someone's rung up
the funeral parlor,
they was gonna desecrate
the body and burn it down,
and would I sleep in
the funeral parlor.
So I've got a few
people around me
to sleep in the funeral
parlor 24 hours a day
for the two weeks
waiting for the funeral
to actually take place.
And in that time, it
then dawned on everyone
how big a funeral it was
actually going to be.
I don't think anyone at
the beginning had any,
I genuinely believe this.
I don't think anyone at all
at the beginning of
that funeral, actually
at the beginning
of that week, thought that the
funeral was gonna be so vast.
It just materialized
in front of our eyes.
As the days went past,
it was growing bigger.
They started, the cameramen
started finding their places
outside the funeral
parlor a week beforehand.
And the police was coming,
it was gonna be vast.
And that propelled me into
organizing the biggest
security job I've had,
for the most televised
world publicized job anyone
would ever have in security.
And I genuinely
believed at the time
this was gonna propel
me into the major league
financially security and
be a trampoline for me
to go into anything
else after that,
and I took on board the 150 of
what I thought were the
tastiest men I could had
in my phone book, I
had the equivalent
of Mr. Newcastle, Mr. Liverpool,
Mr. Glasgow, Mr. London,
I had the creme de la creme as
you was there yourself, sir,
all under one umbrella
of [indistinct].
I thought that was
gonna propel me
into some kind of
security stardom.
But it actually brought
me to the attention
of the general public
and of the authorities
that there was an
army, an army of,
and it was their very
first, as it was pointed out
to me in my next old
Bailey court case,
the very first public showing
of organized crime
in Great Britain
where one criminal organized
every other criminal
in Great Britain to all
be at the same place
at the same time,
all in the same g*ng
celebrating the life
of another criminal.
That was a very
frightening thing
for the authorities, although
I took it on board as well.
Get a load of me, at the time,
villains were supposed
to be in dark alleys.
You'd collar up, no
pictures, no comment, no,
and don't drive a nice car,
you know, keep it low key.
That was what crime was supposed
to be about at the time.
And I took it beyond that
and showed off me and mine.
- I was told who was
going to carry Ronnie
and therefore I said,
well, okay, I will.
And he said, I've
spoken to Dave Courtney
and he's got 150 guards
outside on the path leading up
to the church door
and St. Matthew's Row,
which is where the church is,
and all along Bethel Green Road.
I said, well, fine, that's fine.
It'll keep people away from
maybe running at the cars.
They wanna take flowers off.
I mean, they do
these silly things
when these sort of people die.
And then he said, and I've
got 12 security guards,
six down each side
of the church.
I said, no, you're not Reg.
He said, what?
I said, no, you're not.
I don't want any security
guards in the church,
ushering people forward,
pushing people back.
I will do the lot.
He said, Flan, you
cannot handle 300 people.
I said, yes I can,
because I want one guard,
very, very efficient
and look immaculate.
The doors behind the
wooden doors are glass
so I can see who's coming
and I'm gonna tell him
to let 12 in at a time.
And I know where
my book in my hand
where Reggie wants
certain people placed.
And he said, we
will have six then.
I said, Reg, please, no,
just gimme the one guy
who you trust implicitly,
a very efficient security
guard on the door.
And no one will come
in those glass door
until I give him the nod.
And that's how it was done.
But I mean, a
difficult day for me,
because you got all of a
sudden who comes walking down
after I've seated the family.
And Reg came in
handcuffs obviously,
but who walks down the
aisle but Lenny McClain
with a friend of his,
and he's walked down
and plunked himself
in the third row.
Now what man is gonna
say to Lenny McClain,
you can't sit there, but this
is what I knew I could do.
I knew if he left it
to me, I use my brain.
I went up to Lenny
and I said, Lenny,
you can't sit there darling.
Get up.
He said, why?
I'm all right here Flan.
I went, no, we've got a
special place for you.
He went, oh, are you
expecting trouble?
See so I played to
his vanity really.
I said, maybe Lenny, I want
you in a special place.
Reggie's told me
where to put you.
And I marched him back
to the seventh row.
Him and his friends sat
down like two lambs,
of course, five minutes
later, who walks in?
Roy Shaw.
Now you can't sit Roy
Shaw on the same side
of the church or anywhere
near Lenny McClain,
but an usher or anybody else
wouldn't have
known these things.
I knew these things
I know the rivalry
and the feud they had.
So I see Roy Shaw on the
other side of the church,
couple of rows back, and
that's how I had to box clever
with certain people.
And I knew Reggie saw that.
- Different factions
of different groups
that generally didn't get on,
they were sh**ting and k*lling
each other in everyday life.
Northern, southern, Protestant,
Catholic, black, white,
Indian, Pakistani, Hells Angel,
the whole mix was
gonna be there.
But they was all
there and they all
drew a truce because they
was honoring the monarch
of the British underworld.
Yeah, Ronnie Kray had died.
- Oh, mega.
I mean the one with
Violet, Violet's funeral
that was really loads of
people hanging about outside
of flats just wanting
to pay their respects.
And then when the
twins with the funeral,
we went to all of them.
We had the one of
Charlie, we had Ronnie
and Charlie and Reggie.
So we'd been to all of them
and they're always packed.
The more funerals you went to,
the more more packed out it was.
I mean, you had to fight your
way through to the undertakers
to get like to get sort of
say what thing he
was in, you know?
But it's, no, it was amazing.
It was, I mean, people just
showed out their support
to him, everything.
But I suppose that didn't
do much good doing that.
- I did actually have a
conversation with the chief
of police when I was doing
my little c*ck attitude.
And he said, and we
was talking about
who's gonna do what
with the security.
And he said, and I was doing
what I'm not gonna put bibs on,
they're gonna know who
my men are and blah blah.
And if you don't know who
should be in the church
and who shouldn't, church
only holds 200 people,
you're gonna be turning away
people that should be in there
and who's gonna stand around
the hole at the funeral,
who's gonna stand
outside the cemetery,
who's gonna come in the
church, who's allowed
in the funeral
parlor, he's running.
He bury him.
And when Reggie gets
out the funeral parlor
and goes to the actual
funeral to see run him rest,
I'm gonna be looking after him.
And if you're looking
after a president
walking from the curb to
there, if someone jumps out
with a firearm, what
are you supposed to do?
Just go like that in
front of him or whatever.
You have to have a firearm
to defend the president
so stupidly, which I
could cut my tongue out,
I'd try to explain that
to the chief of police
where he is going you and
your little band of men,
I know you're gonna
do the best you can,
but one thing we've got that
you haven't got is firearms.
And not a fool.
Not a fool.
I actually, my artist
that was, well, no,
the one thing you've
got, we haven't got
is firearm certificates.
All got a g*n.
If we're looking
after our monarch,
we've gotta defend
him in the way.
So saying that to
the chief of police
actually ended the whole
of Dave Courtney's career.
- The little old ladies that
came to the three funerals.
The funny thing, I, they
stand at the railings outside
and they wave to me
and I go in the church
and I get 'em three
funeral cards,
just the three ladies from
the block of flats round
in Valance Road that knew them.
And I take them out to them
and they say, oh, thank you.
And I did it to Ronnie,
Charlie, Reggie,
and also Gary Kray,
Charlie Kray's son.
So, I did the seating
for the four Krays
and everything went
smooth the whole way
to Chingford Cemetery.
When we got to Walthamstow,
we passed the Walthamstow dog
track and we are in the car.
I'm in the third
car with the family,
with Rita and Kim Pete.
And I looked up
and there were builders
sitting on the roof
of Walham sewer dog
track, obviously workers.
They took their
helmets off and cheered
and sat there till the
whole funeral went past.
I thought, these are builders,
probably never seen
a Kray in their life,
but obviously heard about them.
And that's how the myth goes on.
- The association to the Krays
then became the biggest bird.
I didn't know that at the time,
but within that same week,
they went to every door
where I had a doorman and went,
you won't have a
license for television
if you still employ
Dave Courtney.
They went to the magazines
that was writing for
and said, sack him
as a journalist.
Went to every film director
that would put me in the film
and said, you don't want
to have him in the film
because criminally orientated
film ain't going get on.
They banned my film
from ever coming out.
You know, it affected
my life greatly,
but I didn't realize
it at the time.
The very next day, I'm now
propelled in the stardom
as heir to the throne,
celebrity gangster,
what is that word?
What does that mean?
Celebrity gangster,
heir to the throne.
- [Interviewer] Charlie
Kray wrote a book
about doing business
with the mafia.
Do do you believe the Krays
had an involvement with
the American mafia?
- Yes, definitely.
And it's been
documented in films.
It's bumped up a little
bit what happened.
But they did come over here
and they did meet
in a city hotel.
I can't specifically say
it was the Tower Hotel,
it may not have been,
but it was a city hotel.
And both twins went.
But just previous
to this, remember
that they'd bought
George Raft over,
which was George Raft the
film star played gangsters
and dressed immaculate.
He was known at the time as
the smartest man in Hollywood.
And Ronnie Kray loved that
and I think copied
a few of the cravats
and a few of the
silk handkerchiefs.
That's why he was
always buying them
and ordering them just stopped
by not wearing the
spats on the shoes
that George Raft wore.
They brought George Raft
over to the Colony Club,
and that was the
intro into hoping
that the mafia could bring
organized crime to London.
That's what Ronnie told me.
That's what Reggie told me.
And that's what Charlie told me.
- You're asking me whether
I genuinely believed
that the Kray twins
had mafia connections.
I genuinely believed that
members of the mafia did come
to this country and they
were entertained by the mafia
in the Kray twins' nightclub.
And they was looked after and
wined and dined with ladies
and drink and whatever they had.
As I have been, as I
have been in America
with the Gambinos, I've
had them at my house,
I've been over to America.
I've wined and dined them,
but I'm not actually confessing
that I could call upon them
as one of my arms and legs
to do anything for me.
I've associated
with and met them
and the Kray twins
are exactly the same.
They met them, I don't
believe for one minute
that the actual mafia
looked upon them
or wanted to actually join
up with them two brothers
that just run that little
bit of the east end.
Yeah, because just across the
water, there's Freddy Foreman
who run that little bit with
the Richardsons just over there
who run that little bit.
And there was the
Nashs in North London
who run that little bit.
And there was the Kray twins
who run that little bit.
You know, they would, I
don't think for a second
that the mafia actually
seriously thought
of anything joining up business
wise with the Kray twins.
- They wanted to use the
Krays to come over to England
and start a gambling
business over here.
But from my opinion,
it's my opinion,
the Krays were the wrong
people to approach.
- They, on the other hand,
might have actually
propelled their visit
and hopefully gained a lot of
respect from everyone else,
letting everyone else think
that they was gonna do
business with the mafia.
- They were violent criminals,
and I think there was
plenty of people in London,
if they had have
approached those people,
I think the mafia could have
had an inroad in England.
Yeah, sure.
- So I can't speak about
the other families in London
or in the UK but
if it's our circle,
then the names which come up
are of course Freddy Foreman
with the Philadelphia mob when
he was out there on his toes
during the late
seventies and eighties.
He had a good
relationship with them.
They highly respect
them even to this day.
So did the New York families,
Joe Powell, Sr.
It goes back many years.
They still speak highly of
Joe, the elders in New York
who I've had lunch with,
and Will Pine, of course,
the twins, Reggie and Ronnie,
they are spoken highly
off ones who knew Ronnie
or who met Ronnie when
he was over there,
but above the twins,
it's mainly Freddie
Foreman, Joe Powell Sr.
And Will Pine.
And I'm course, I'm sure
that other families.
- As I did by being
connected to the Kray twins.
Yeah.
And on the same thing as that,
I used the Kray
twins to promote me.
And they used that visit from
the mafia to promote them.
But whether it was a serious
meeting of, shall we pair up
and do any business together,
I very, very, very
much doubt it.
- And I said, oh, I've got to
see him, I've got to see him.
Is he exactly like
he's in films?
And he said, well
come out Friday
because we are bringing
our mother down there
to meet George Raft.
Oh, I thought, god, we
dressed up Mrs. Kray and I,
we both had first dolls
on and our hair piled up
and we really looked good
and off we went to
the Colony Club.
And that's where
I met George Raft.
And he was exactly
how he is in films.
Not a tall man, quite a
small man, but so elegant.
Oh my god, really, really.
And still had the spats on his
shoes, which I commented on.
I said, that's what
you wear in films.
And he said, I do
and I love them.
And I said to Ronnie, Ronnie,
you'll be wearing those.
He said, no I won't.
And that's it.
I like my shoes as they are.
No, I won't be wearing those.
So that's how I met George Raft.
But they bought, Judy Garland
was singing at the Palladium
at the time and she
was absolutely bankrupt
and they'd given her a six
weeks time at the Palladium.
And the twins went, they were
introduced to her backstage
and Ronnie said, you know
that song that you sing?
And she said, well, it must be
"Somewhere Over the Rainbow".
He said, when you get
changed, when you finish here,
we are gonna take you
out to a couple of clubs.
She thought, well, all right.
She was with her husband,
they got her in the car
and he said, Valance Road.
And they took her
to Valance Road
and she thought, she must have
thought, god, what's this?
He said, no, no, no, we're
only gonna be here 10 minutes.
This is my mother's house.
They took her in and
he said to Violet
'cause she told me,
she said, look mom,
we bought you your favorite
singer, Judy Garland.
And she said, that's
not Judy Garland.
She said, she's too tiny
'cause by this time,
it was nearing the
end of her life.
She was an alcoholic,
she was drug addicted
and as I say, bankrupt.
And Ronnie said, oh, she'll
prove it by singing the song.
And she sat there with Mrs. Kray
and held her hand and sang
"Somewhere Over the Rainbow".
Can you imagine the most
famous singer in the world,
possibly alongside Frank
Sinatra at the time,
is sitting in a little
house in Valance Road
singing "Somewhere
Over the Rainbow".
The next night she was
singing to thousands
of people at the
London Palladium.
But that's the sort of
person he was Ronnie,
he wanted everything.
And up until a certain point
he could have everything.
- Yeah. I've never
heard any mafia man say
that they was gonna be doing
business with the Kray twins.
I've never heard no Americans
run round and say that.
Not really.
Not anyone of any stature.
So, I'm on my thoughts on that.
Oh, it's not true.
- [Interviewer] Do you
believe that the twins
had dealings with the mafia?
- Well, I think early on,
I think they did early on,
because one of them
come over to Violet
and I think Ronnie got
him a dog or something.
God knows why buying him a dog.
But he had a dog, those bull
terriers, he give him that.
And I dunno what
happened to the dog,
but I think he left
it, he left it.
He probably didn't want a
dog to take it back there
with him, but, so he kept
it, Ronnie, he kept it,
he was like used to feed
it and this and that
and he really loved it.
And he used to say,
because they're not
very attractive dogs.
And he used to say,
I feel sorry for him.
And he went, yeah, he
ain't nothing to look at.
He said, but it's
a nice little dog.
[upbeat music]
- I think the Krays definitely
had a link to the mafia,
but that link wasn't
quite how some people
would lead you to believe.
[gentle music]
- [Interviewee]
Well, before I start,
I just wanna make it clear
that you're not
gonna show my face
because a lot of
what I know is still,
I'm still on what you
guys would call the firm.
- Okay, yeah, yeah.
Where it all begins is in
1960 when a new betting
and gaming act is passed,
which came into force in 1961.
Before that, the only
place that you could bet
was on a race course.
- [Interviewee] I spent a lot
of time in London in the 1960s
with my father.
Of course there was gaming
in London before we arrived,
but we knew how
to do it properly.
We had a long history of it
in The Bahamas, Vegas, Cuba,
and then London fell.
- You couldn't, there
were no betting shops,
there were no casinos,
there was nothing.
At the point that the
act came into force,
it opened the whole of
the gambling industry up
and allowed pretty much
anybody to open a casino,
a betting shop.
The act itself was
quite poorly worded.
And there were casinos
opening at a rate
of something like 100
a week at one point.
But because it was poorly worded
and because it's
largely a cash business,
it attracted a lot
of undesirables
and organized crime
soon kind of began
to get a foothold
in the industry.
- [Interviewee] Things
worked well in Cuba
for many years, but not anymore.
And my father moved
to London in 1963
where he set up a school.
My father would only
work with the best.
And he brought the Kray
brothers across from,
to run the school.
Bobby and Freddy were from the
same neighbor as my father.
They were really respected.
He knew for a gambling
club to be successful,
the clientele had to trust
that the games were strained.
That they may have been some
very serious people involved,
but the games were always there.
- 1963 is the first time the
Krays actually meet the mafia.
When Angelo Bruno,
who was the boss
of the Philadelphia crime
family, made a trip to London
to really see
whether it was true
what he was being
told about gaming
and the potential
for his organization
to have a cut of it.
Angelo Bruno went
back to America
and very quickly dispatched
a man called Dino Cellini
who was May Lansky's
kind of right hand man.
- [Interviewee] Meyer
and my father were close.
It wouldn't be unusual to see
him two or three times a week.
- He took up residence at
the Hilton in Park Lane
and went on to open
a Croupier school.
Dino Cellini never described
himself as a mafia man.
He wasn't a made man.
He hadn't gone
through all of that.
He was a mathematician.
He was a specialist in gaming
and he'd worked for
the mafia in Vegas.
He'd worked for them in Cuba
and he had made them an
incredible amount of money.
When Dino opened
the Croupier school,
he did it smack bang in
the middle of the west end
in Hanover Square.
- [Interviewee] He knew what
made a successful casino
and he understood the
odds of the mechanics
and the math better
than anyone I knew.
- By now, the invasion, if
you want to call it that,
of the mafia into
London was beginning.
They already had a hand in
several casinos in the West End.
And Kirs in Mayfair was one,
Hilton in Park Lane another,
there were another four or five
that they had interests in.
The crowning jewel
in this master plan
that was being
devised by May Lansky
and Dino Cellini was
the Dorchester Hotel.
They felt that that
was the top hotel
in London at that time.
And to have a gaming
floor in that hotel
would make it their
flagship operation.
So the approach to
Maxwell Joseph, the owner
and negotiations went well.
He agreed maybe as you would,
and it looked all dead set as
if they were gonna have gaming
at the Dorchester Hotel.
But Sir Maxwell had
a condition he wanted
to see the operation
working first.
He didn't want to
be the guinea pig.
He wanted to know that if
he introduced the gaming,
that it was slick and it worked
and it wasn't gonna
backfire on him.
So he spoke to the
representatives from the mafia
and said, look, I'm all for
it, but show me it works first.
And that's what
the mafia then did.
Using the Victoria Sporting
Club in Edgeware Road.
The mafia then started to
put their plan into action.
The idea was not just to cater
for London's wealthy society.
- [Interviewee] Oh, the
jackets, yeah, yeah.
We'd run those in
Vegas other places.
And London was no different
groups of high rollers
who would spend big, I mean,
we'd fly them in from the US
and they played
exclusively at our club
before we could fly back again.
Those were serious players
with serious money.
And by now we have interests
in a few clubs in the West End.
- In the September of 1965,
the mob finally get their
hands on the Colony Club,
which I guess is probably the
most famous mafia linked club
in London.
Through a a series of deals
they acquired the club
and began transforming it.
They knew they
wanted a front man,
but they weren't sure who,
so initially they sat
down with Billy Hill,
who was formally the g*ng
boss of London, really,
and still held a lot of sway.
And so they sat him down
and asked his advice,
and he said, look, you
need an Englishman.
You need an Englishman
to do the hosting.
But the mafia thought
they knew better.
And so they called on
their friend George Raft,
who was the famous
Hollywood actor,
famous for playing gangsters,
but also famous for mixing with
them and working with them.
And he'd done various
jobs with them,
fronting casino operations
in other parts of the world.
So he, to them, was
the ideal candidate.
And almost overnight,
when he was installed
at the Colony Club,
it was an overnight success.
People flocked there because
George Raft was there.
So it was a calculated
risk by the mafia.
But at this point, it did work.
- By the time they
opened the Colony Club,
my father had a suite at the
Dorchester where we lived,
and I was working with him too.
It was a great time to
be a young man in London.
And once George arrived,
the Colony really shook off
the famous photo of
him outside the club
in front of the Rolls
Royce was taken by father.
All the stars loved the Colony,
especially as George was there.
It was a big bang g*n
when they were filming
the "Dirty Johnson" in London.
The cast were there every night.
And I remember Charles
Bronson and Kelly Al
is especially telling my
father became great friends.
- At around this time a summit
was called in Central London.
And it really read
like a who's who
of the criminal underworld.
People who were attending
were people like Angelo Bruno,
again, Dino Cellini, May
Lansky himself flew in
as well as other
representatives from countries
like Germany,
Yugoslavia, Holland,
who were part of
that mafia family.
And it was to decide
how everything was
gonna be distributed
and how the roots were gonna
work for the money to go back
and all of the finer detail.
But the problem was the
Met Police found out
about this meeting,
and so it got moved
to a private house
in South London.
It was Wimbledon, I believe.
And at that meeting were
also some English criminals,
some English people
who could help.
Not the Krays though.
- [Interviewee] I knew that
in the early days in London,
some of our people met with some
of the local guys
on the streets.
I wasn't present, but I
was told the Kray brothers
were involved in a breach.
It was good business.
And everyone got on and
there was an understanding
that there had to be no
trouble in our establishment.
I know one evening when our
understanding didn't quite
work out though, I think it
was Ronnie who was arguing
with the man at the table
close to the entrance
and one of our
guys had to go over
and call the situation.
We didn't need the attention.
And they, yeah, they didn't
come in much after that.
- Angelo Bruno felt initially
when he first met them,
that they would be
crucial to his plan,
try and get the local
hoodlums on side.
But the mafia were
realizing that the Krays
were really th*gs.
They were good th*gs
but bad criminals.
They were shining
an unwelcome light
on the mafia's
operations at the Colony
and so they came
to an agreement.
Angelo Bruno offered them
1,700 pounds every single week
to stay away from
the Colony Club.
Towards the end of 1966,
the government got wind
of what was going on.
There were discussions held
between the Prime Minister
and his security advisors
about the invasion
were the words that we
used of undesirables
into London, and the concerns
about what would happen
if they continued to
spread their operations
throughout the country.
[gentle music]
In the January of 1967, at
the other end of the country,
a man called Angus Sibert
was found dead in the back
of his car in a
small mining town.
Angus was a cash collector
for a gaming company.
The company dealt in pinball
machines, juke boxes,
one arm bandits and
Angus had been m*rder*d.
The police quite
quickly arrested
and subsequently
convicted two men,
and those men worked
in the same company
that Angus worked for.
So this m*rder was linked
to the gaming community.
I don't think it's
any coincidence that
within three weeks
of that m*rder happening,
the government expelled
five mafia figures from the UK
and said, we don't
want you here.
You are undesirable.
Go away.
One of those was Dino Cellini.
- [Interviewee] Oh, the
end of things of London
began when they
refused to let George
back into the
country in early '67.
Then my father and a number
of the associates were asked
to leave Oregon deport.
- George Raft he was
on a holiday at the
time, at his home,
was told, we're not gonna
let you back into the UK
if you try and fly in.
So he was blocked too.
This made life really,
really difficult
and totally scuppered
the plans that May Lansky
and Dino Cellini
had been working on.
- [Interviewee] But let
me make one thing clear.
No one could have ordered
my father on a plane
if he didn't want go,
but he knew it was over
and it was time to move on.
- The government started to
work on another gaming bill,
but one that would be
stricter, one that would mean
that people who
operated a casino
had to have certain credentials.
It made it very, very difficult
for anybody within
organized crime to operate.
The deal with the Dorchester
kind of limped on for a bit,
but as people started to learn
about the changes in the law
and with Dino not
being in the UK
and May Lansky not
being able to fly in
it just died to death,
it never happened.
But that's not quite
the end of the story.
The Krays have one more
meeting with the mafia.
In 1968, not long before the
twins were arrested for m*rder,
Ronnie Kray flies with
a companion to New York
to meet Angelo Bruno.
But unbeknown to Ronnie,
he's trailed the entire time
by the FBI, who knows every
movement and log it in a report.
When Ron came back,
he was full of stories
of how the mafia
had looked after him
and the respect
that he'd commanded.
And, but the reality of it
really was that Angelo Bruno
had palmed him off on some
of his minions, really
to look after him.
Whether any meaningful
business was conducted
during this visit,
no one really knows
because within only a few
weeks of him coming back
to the UK, everything
went up for the Krays.
- I'm sure that there was
a few Americans that did
come over here and say,
oh, I've actually met
and spoke to the
Gambinos myself.
I wouldn't actually
dare actually go,
I'm associated with,
and I've got mafia connections,
and I could call upon them to
actually k*ll someone for me.
Or they wanted to ask to run
Margaret South London as well.
Yeah, no, no
disrespect whatsoever.
I hold them highly and
greatly in what they did
with what they had and for
where they was at that time.
You cannot compare it beyond
words to compare to now,
but at the time, they was
running their little bit
and running it quite well.
You know, I mean,
my hat off to him,
but whether you are
actually asking,
if you are asking me
whether I genuinely believe
that they had a mafia connection
where the mafia was
looking at them as equals
to ask what help or what
they could do together.
I can't prove one
way or the other,
but I very, very much
doubt it knowing the mafia
and knowing the Krays as
personally as well as I do.
Because on the other side
of one river, the Thames,
there was Freddy Fullman,
so it was a completely
different outfit.
They should have asked him.
That was more than
likely to have happened.
But because they
had the nightclub
and they was going
get a load of me,
they did have the mafia
there to entertain them.
And I'm sure the mafia
came for the entertainment,
the free birds, the free booze,
everyone running around
looking after 'em.
I'd do it, I'd do it.
I've been out to America.
I have been entertained
by the Gambinos.
They've took me, I wouldn't
dare say I'm connected.
- Yeah, a few years ago, I had
to go over at the neighbors
with Italian friends of
mine, and I met a couple
of families over there
who were proper guys.
They were made people, you know,
I socialized with 'em
on a couple of nights
and I met the family,
very family orientated.
These guys didn't portray
themselves as being gangsters.
They were very quiet,
very sociable people.
And that's the difference
with people like that
and the Kray twins, the Kray
twins were unapproachable.
These people were approachable.
You could sit down, you
could speak to them,
and that's the difference,
all the difference in
the world actually.
- Yeah what they've
done to Charlie Kray
was a very public, a very public
it should all, it's ill*gal
almost what they've done,
how they baited him, how
they played with him,
I mean, and it was just
to really make sure
that no Kray ever ended up
living happily ever after.
And it's only a myth that he
was living happily ever after.
The man died with
holes in his shoes,
one suit in his work
and a Casio watch,
but if you believe the papers,
which is what they've got,
the control of the media,
they can, and people are sheep.
They will make you believe
anything they want to tell you.
And unless you've had
it done about you,
you would never understand
what that's like.
Unless it's been on the news
about something about
you that ain't right.
You would never, and
people are believing it.
You would not understand
the power of the media.
You would not understand it.
And he's last name Kray got
him two tenure sentences,
and the last one he got,
I was actually a witness,
a character witness
in Ronnie Kray, sorry,
Charlie Kray's life sentence.
I was his next door neighbor
for a year in a special
unit at Bell Marsh.
And Charlie Kray would,
was an old man that had no
financial resources whatsoever
that would go out of anyone
that bought him a drink
and be, and say and do what
anything you wanted him to be.
- I did meet Charlie a
couple of times at events.
I'd as a youngster I'd
watched the Krays film
with the Kemp Brothers, and it
was totally sucked in by it.
And I loved the
glamour and the suits
and the respect they commanded.
And it was a great film.
And so I'd written
to Reg in prison
and I had had a
letter back from Reg,
and that initially really
began my proper interest
in the Krays.
And as part of that, I
attended some of the events,
some of the parties in
London that they used to hold
as fundraisers, charity,
things to highlight the fact
that they'd been in
prison for 30 years
and perhaps they ought to
get a chance at parole.
And that's where I met Charlie.
He was there, all of them
representing the twins.
My impression of him,
I certainly didn't
find him dangerous.
I found he was quite an
old man by that point.
He was friendly.
He was smiling, he was happy
he was a pleasure to
be in his company,
but I wasn't scared of
being in his company.
He was just a gentle
old man by then.
Maybe 30 years before then
it would've been
a different story.
But I just get the
impression that it is Charlie
that perhaps was
the hardest done by
in the whole story, really.
He ended up having to clear
up after his brothers.
And he really had
no major involvement
in the big crimes,
in the murders.
Yet he ended up serving
a huge sentence for them.
And having that name, that meant
that he could never
progress in life
when he'd served his sentence.
- Unfortunately for Charlie,
he had a thing that if you said
there's a birthday party
for a kid next week,
I want 12 crack clowns.
He said, I'll give you a number.
I can do it.
If you said you wanted to
sing some pub Saturday night,
he could do it, right.
If you wanted something
out of Harrods,
he could get discount.
He always said yes to everything
and put people together,
but he was no villain, that
was left to his brothers.
- And all anyone wanted
to do with Charlie Kray
was talk about the
Krays were a crime.
And if you went to him,
could you this Charlie,
he go, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'll have a brandy,
I'll have a brandy.
Or could you get a
pink combine harvester?
He go, I'll have a
chat with the boys,
I'll have a chat with the boys.
Can you get me a g*n course?
Will, could you get
so and so shot course
will get me a brandy.
Can you get me a kid
Charlie, Charlie?
He go, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And then that's it.
That really is it.
He would've said
yes to anything.
Can you find a
goldfish, Charlie,
you gotta have a
chat with the boys.
Get me a brandy.
He'd go out and that's his
and some buckeye
policeman saw that
and just used on it,
that jumped on it
befriended him,
done him the thing.
And in the end they're going,
get me, just get me that.
Get me this, get me that.
And he couldn't do it.
And it wasn't his cup of tea.
He's no cocaine
criminal mastermind.
He's got as much chance
of that as I have
of growing a ponytail.
That's really not real.
It's a myth.
I feel sorry for the man.
He's a normal 14-year-old kid
with a normal everyday life.
And his mum gave birth to Ronnie
and Reggie Kray, f*ck man.
I mean, he's been
paying for that dearly.
And when it came to him going,
will you get me that thing?
Will you get me that thing?
When they're handing him
and buying his friendship
with presents and all that
real, how would you call it?
Entrapment.
Entrapment.
Yeah.
They're doing that
for him, to him,
I mean, in such a blatant
way, in such a blatant way
to a little old man that they,
once they've checked up on
and the arrested them and looked
for his financial resources
or what he owns or what he
don't own, he didn't own a car
or nothing, nothing.
They still went and just
played on the Kray twin thing
and got away with it.
- No, he was never like that.
He was always one that
got pulled in with
him sort of thing.
I think he'd have rather
been a businessman
own a club or something like
that and get on with it.
But they wouldn't, it sort,
they dragged him
back all the time,
even when they was inside do
this, if he got outta prison,
they wanted him to
do stuff for him.
He went like, I haven't
even draw breath yet.
But no, definitely
wasn't feeling Charlie.
He was a nice person.
He had his mother's personality,
not the fathers at all.
- I never saw any, I
never saw Charlie Kray
break the law once.
Never saw him activity wise,
doing anything criminal.
I only saw him as a gentleman
and as a businessman.
It's sad that he
passed away in prison.
- I only, I saw him in Durham
when he first got sentenced
to the 12 years.
He asked me would I come up.
There was a couple of
things he wanted me to do.
And I was driven
up there by a guy
that was really campaigning
for his innocence
and to get him another
trial called Les Martin.
And he drove me all
the way to Durham,
or I was really so upset.
Gone was the lovely
handsome Charlie Kray's
got this dreadful, this
thing that you wear
when you are a category A,
it was like a sort of a
bib, a horrible orange.
And I thought, I've
gotta make sort of,
I've gotta make
him laugh somehow.
And I said, what's
that you've got on?
He said, oh, they're
treating me like a baby.
Look Flan, I've got a bib on.
And I cuddled him and
he bust out crying.
I mean, the only other
time I see Charlie Kray cry
was when he buried his mother.
He was very close to his mother,
but unfortunately
she favored the twins
and more so Ronnie, he was
always left a little bit
in the background with
them, with his mother.
Not that she didn't love him,
but she focused on the twins.
- [Interviewee] How did
you and the family feel
when Charlie was arrested
in these later years?
- Oh, it was terrible.
It was a fit up job.
Fit up job.
He had no connections to
anything like that at all.
He was on his uppers.
He didn't have loads
of money coming in.
And it's just, I don't
believe it at all.
I don't, everyone
you talk about,
they go, they stitched him up.
They just did.
They wanted to get rid
of the other Krays.
So they banged
him out in prison.
- As I say, always immaculate.
But this day in Durham,
he was in a terrible,
terrible state.
I think a lot of it was shock.
Shock over the 12 years.
And he told me he thought
he'd get six years
because he told me swore
on his mother's life,
he wasn't involved.
We know that it was
entrapment up north,
a birthday party
people gave for him.
They gave him a gold lighter.
They bought him champagne.
I mean, why would
they do this thing
if they weren't
undercover police?
And that's how it happens.
- I think he was a
villain in the old sense
of the word villain, but
I don't think he was party
or in any agreement
of the violence
and the murders and all
of that that happened.
That just didn't
seem to be Charlie.
Charlie was always
broke in his old age.
He never had a
great deal of money
because he couldn't
earn a great deal
of money because of the name.
- And at the age he was,
and as Ill as he was,
their choice of sell was on
the fourth f*cking floor.
Steven, if you've
never been to prison,
you've gotta understand
here that walk up and down
for breakfast and that walk
up and down for dinner,
that walk up and down for
tea, even if you are not ill
at 70 odd years old,
that's a f*cking job.
That's a task.
So they chose where to put him
and they put him four
floors up that k*lled him.
And made sure that the
last Kray died in prison.
So they won.
- That 12 year sentence
was just, was disgraceful
because we all knew
for Charlie Kray
to be told, and the
newspaper to print,
he'd been involved with millions
of pounds on a drug deal.
He's never seen a million pound.
He was always broke.
- I wasn't surprised
at his sentence at all,
because he was a Kray.
And by that point
they were notorious.
Reg had a lot of press recently.
Ronnie's funeral had
been a massive spectacle.
They just wanted him away
and out of the limelight.
And I think it was purely
because of his surname
that he got such
a huge sentence.
- And he, once, I
think one of the things
that sticks in my mind, he
said, meet me in Stringfellows
on Friday night Flan.
It was my own place to go
on Friday night anyway.
And he was coming down and he
came down with Bruce Reynolds.
There's two, two people
to come to Stringfellows
and Peter Satin at his table.
And we were talking and
talking and he said, Flan,
make me right here.
I'm just telling
Peter Stringfellow,
we could have had anything.
We had the clubs,
the snooker halls,
we had everything going.
We were earning money.
And what happened,
my brother wanted
to start murdering people.
And he looked at
that moment in time,
that was the story of
Charlie Kray's life
all in one sentence.
He had everything.
He was charming.
He was the best front that
you could have put in the door
of any club that anybody had.
If you'd have been
standing at the door
of Stringfellows people
would've flocked there
just to see him.
He was wonderful company.
But that's what he said.
My brothers threw that all away.
My brother wanted
to m*rder people.
And that summed up Charlie Kray,
I always felt very,
very sorry for him.
- Younger people were coming,
you don't realize
they're gonna know.
But then they look at the
films, they read the books.
So they sort of understand
it, really, you know?
I mean, they are hero worships.
Even now, you'd think
after all those years
they'd sort go down a bit,
but you'd still get it now.
I mean, I get people online,
I try to keep me eye on it
'cause I get a nutter on there.
I'm your cousin, this,
that, and I go, here we go,
another loony.
So we just, I just, but yeah,
there is a lot of people
like 'em, they're popular,
but then there's people
that don't like them.
It's just the way it is.
You can't like everyone.
- [Interviewee] Final
question, Maureen.
Are you surprised
that the Kray's name
lives on to this year?
- No, I'm not.
And I think it'll live on long
after us people here are gone
and on and on and on, because
I've got five granddaughters
and they all know the Kray name.
So this myth will not end.
The story will go
on and on and on.
They fascinate people.
I think it stems
from being twins
and being quite fascinating
and intriguing and terrorizing.
But people like violence,
people like to go to the cinema
or watch violence
on their television.
We all know this,
but maybe some young
people look at this
and think, what a waste of 30
years when they had it all.
- Yeah, I think they've
been turned into a myth.
I didn't know them
about in their heyday,
so I can't speak about them
in their sixties or fifties
or their early prison years.
Only from 95 onto after
Charlie died in April, 2000,
and Reggie died October, 2000.
So it was only those years
that I knew them well,
but I mean, yeah's like
Jack the Ripper, isn't it?
He's still spoken about,
even though he is a,
but the twins, yeah, it's
strangely weird, isn't it?
That it's just that the,
some people idolize them,
but really who you
idolize two gentlemen
who end up spending more
time in prison than they did
as free men with freedom.
So that's a sadness.
But Reggie would speak about
that in Maidstone prison.
- Would you rather
be loved or feared?
And with regards to the
Krays they were feared,
but I don't think
they were loved.
I think there was probably
one person in the world
that loved them, that
was Violet, their mother,
which is a sad thing.
But the guys who were
nicked with 'em in 1968,
they should have never
been doing any burden.
It was because of that stupidity
that that had happened.
You know, my opinion, of course.
- No one on nothing
is as big as a myth.
Not the Krays, not Al
Capone, not Dave Courtney.
No one on nothing
is as big as a myth.
The Kray twins were two
very naughty little boys
in that road in Bethel Green.
Yeah.
When everyone in
Bethel Green understood
and spoke English,
- I'm not really surprised
that the myth lives on,
about the Krays.
I think my own experience
as a kid watching the films
and the glamour, and
you get sucked into it.
I can see how people are,
but I think as you get
older and you learn more,
and I think as more
things have come out about
what they were up to, I
think then you look at it
in a more human way.
And it does surprise me
sometimes that there are people
out there who have the
Krays could do no wrong,
but they did.
They hurt and k*lled and maimed
and they did a lot of damage
to a lot of people and families.
The argument of they
never hurt their own
is a myth in itself.
So it does now we know so
much more about the Krays
and their activities.
It does surprise me sometimes
that there are people out
there who will defend them
and hold them up as heroes.
And the film's legend, Tom
Hardy played a brilliant role
and it was a great film and
it was a good looking film.
And so you can see people
are sucked in all over again.
But I think the story of
the Krays is a sad one
because all three of
them died in prison.
All three of them
died not free men.
And that's the moral
of the story, isn't it?
I mean, crime doesn't pay.
- [Interviewee] Will we ever
see [indistinct chatter].
- I think the culture
of criminology
is completely different today.
It's drug orientated.
The people of my age, gangsters,
there were different guys
all together, really.
And there's too many firms,
too many European firms
in London now.
So I don't think you'll
ever see the likes
of the Krays again.
- Now it was a different
sort of thing than now.
I mean, you've seen
the locks on my door,
and I, when you go,
I'll lock them again
because you never know.
You never know what's gonna
be like Randy, you know,
but it's, no,
that's right really.
- I think it was
a moment in time.
It would just come
out of the w*r.
People were poor.
The world was a completely
different place.
They were in the right
place at the right time,
at the right age to
capitalize on an opportunity
that they saw.
I don't think that
opportunity's there now.
And I don't think, I mean,
Bethel Green certainly
is a very different
place now to what it was.
The whole of the
East End is so now,
no, I don't think so at all.
- Who knows?
I mean, I say oh
how to 'em, oh, how
to the whole reputation growing.
It ain't doing no harm.
It is myth only for us
people that know my age
or the older one, it's a myth.
But so is King Arthur
that's still going.
- We've got CCTV, we've
got mobile phones,
we've got all sorts of other
technological inventions
that mean that being a
criminal, like the Krays
is just impossible.
So if that's the way of life
and the respect
you want to command
and the glamour that you want
in your life, then be prepared
to do some tough
long jail sentences.
Because the Krays spent
decades in prison.
- You can't beat a good story.
There's always gonna be
room for a romantic baddie
in the world and as each
generation have grown up
that are pirates, cowboys,
knight in shining armor,
gangsters, James
Cagney's, Robin hoods,
they're all romantic, bad,
naughty boy figures of the past.
And the Kray twins
are rightfully so
got their little bit in it.
Yeah, they've got their
little wedge in there,
so all hell to 'em.
Yeah, hopefully when I die I'll
have a little wedge myself.
- I don't think they
should have been released.
No, not now.
Not now.
I know what I know at the time,
I did campaign for
Reggie's release,
Ron was clearly poorly
and not fit for release
and didn't really
want to be released.
He was happy where he was.
But equally now we know a
lot more about mental illness
and it's not as
much of a stigma.
I think he was in the
right place for him.
He definitely was much
better there than he was
in conventional prison.
And Reg, I mean, there
are a lot of things
that the prison service
got wrong with Reg Kray.
You know, he died a horrible
death that wasn't picked up.
The cancer wasn't
picked up early enough.
He complained for many,
many months of discomfort.
And he didn't get the
doctor's appointments
he should have had,
if he'd have come out
and been a free man
and a healthy free man.
I don't think he would've posed
a threat to society in terms
of whether he would've
offended again
because he would've
been in his sixties.
And I don't think
that would've been
an option for him.
However, he would've toured
all of the chat shows.
He'd have been on the front
page of every newspaper.
And I think the authorities
didn't want that.
And so for that reason,
they would've kept him in.
[gentle music]
- I've bleeded on a little bit
of on how much they hurt me,
But I've had a very good
life and I cannot moan
at what they've stopped me
doing by being connected to 'em
because I've had an
awful lot happen to me
because I was connected to
them in the first place.
And it would be
wrong for me to say
I wouldn't do the
Kray twin funeral
because half of my life
is damned because of it.
I've had some bad bits happen.
But in reality, if I had to
say no, I wouldn't change that.
I've had some wrong decisions
where females are concerned.
I've made some wrong
decisions where that,
which I think every
man with a c*ck has.
Yeah.
In reality, no one
wants to be at the top
of that gangster tree
'cause you don't run off
into the sunset and live
happily there ever after.
You stay at the top there until
someone puts an hole in you
or you get 30 years
wrapped around you.
And the association of being one
of the Kray twin's henchmen
don't help you in court.
And I suppose my association
with the Kray twins long term,
it's hurting me now, but
at the time, at the prime
of my life, it enhanced my life.
And I had a very, very
good enviable life.
[gentle music]
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Did you know that you can remove censorship board-wide, use our advanced search functions, be notified when new content is posted, join our memberships, set episodes to show in any order you want & more if you are logged into your account?
Register or sign in here: ucp.php?mode=register