Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs has died.

[Guest Andy]

I don't think you know much about the case or the man.

The judgmental holier than thou attitude of some people on here makes me nauseous!:arghh:

 

Come on simmo, you put a thread on here knowing full well it would be argued. He was a low life crook so why should people not be judgmental, after all that is surly what you must have expected when you started the thread?

[mr luvpants]

Biggs didn't "batter" anyone. He was a small player that made a mistake and paid dearly, he was sentenced to 30 years!! he served 9 years and lost his liberty , he wasn't exceptionally intelligent and was led on by the media who created the myth. It seems that many where sucked in by it all.

 

I did not say he did but he was involved with a gang and one of the gang members bashed Jack Mills so therefore Biggs was party to the offence.

[simmo]

Come on simmo, you put a thread on here knowing full well it would be argued. He was a low life crook so why should people not be judgmental, after all that is surly what you must have expected when you started the thread?

I didn't start the thread:dull:

[simmo]

I did not say he did but he was involved with a gang and one of the gang members bashed Jack Mills so therefore Biggs was party to the offence.

 

yes and he served 9 years and the media made a lot of money by making him out to be a hero.

[Guest Andy]

I didn't start the thread:dull:

 

ooooops, many apologies simmo. I take back what i said :embarrassed:

[mr luvpants]

yes and he served 9 years and the media made a lot of money by making him out to be a hero.

 

 

He still had 21 years to serve to pay his debt. The man was a low life and so were the other robbers. Anything but a hero.

[simmo]

He still had 21 years to serve to pay his debt. The man was a low life and so were the other robbers. Anything but a hero.

I keep hearing this "he isn't a hero" stuff but am having difficulty finding anyone actually referring to him as one. So you think 30 years for his part in the robbery was fair?

[mr luvpants]

It does not matter what I think. He was tried by jury at the time and that was the sentence that was handed down. End of.

[mr luvpants]

I keep hearing this "he isn't a hero" stuff but am having difficulty finding anyone actually referring to him as one. So you think 30 years for his part in the robbery was fair?

 

You have a short memory! You wrote " the media made a lot of money by making him out to be a hero". I replied that he was a not a hero.

[simmo]

It does not matter what I think. He was tried by jury at the time and that was the sentence that was handed down. End of.

No it doesn't matter what either of us think but that doesn't mean we can't debate it.

The jury only decide guilty or not guilty, not the sentence.

 

I wonder what the point of debating with anyone that ends their posts with "End of" is but whatever...

[simmo]

You have a short memory! You wrote " the media made a lot of money by making him out to be a hero". I replied that he was a not a hero.

My point is that very few people in the "real" world see him as a hero.

[mr luvpants]

I wonder what the point of debating with anyone that ends their posts with "End of" is but whatever...

 

You are not reading my posts in context. I wrote "He was tried by jury at the time and that was the sentence that was handed down. End of." "End of" meaning that his sentence was handed down by a judge appointed by the government to hand down sentences and the matter was finalised. What you or I think is irrelevant.

TBH I am not going to waste my time here debating something that happened 30 odd years ago. Ronnie Biggs is dead. He was involved in a crime that resulted in a man eventually losing his life and he did not serve his time in jail as sentenced by a court of law. I personally will not be losing any sleep over it.

[flag of convenience]

I have far more concern for the life of the train driver who had the quality of his life shattered and died early.

 

I have absolutely no interest in this man's death, minor or major player. He led a life of deceit, and was arrogant and boastful when he lived in South America.

The ailing old man then returns home to sympathy and understanding.

 

Biggs was a gutless coward.

 

He had a colourful life but come on gutless coward? He returned home to prison. He lived on his wits. British tourists and others sought court with him.

An Anti Hero to be sure. Apparently a dying breed.

[flag of convenience]

My point is that very few people in the "real" world see him as a hero.

 

He wasn't a hero. He was an Anti Hero though.

[Toolbox]

He only went back to the UK for free NHS care because he was skint, god knows how much he cost the tax payer in the 12 years he was back.......Jack straw should have said no thanks stay where you are.

[flag of convenience]

It does not matter what I think. He was tried by jury at the time and that was the sentence that was handed down. End of.

 

Hardly end of. On appeal he would have likely got out doing not much more than he eventually did anyway.

[flag of convenience]

He only went back to the UK for free NHS care because he was skint, god knows how much he cost the tax payer in the 12 years he was back.......Jack straw should have said no thanks stay where you are.

 

Hardly suggests a life of comfort in Rio then. I'd suggest he paid his debt to society.

[Toolbox]

Hardly suggests a life of comfort in Rio then. I'd suggest he paid his debt to society.

 

 

 

Think your probably right and I do believe 30 years was a very over the top sentence.....still would have left him in Rio though, if it had been up to me.

[Parley]

A life in Rio sounds pretty good to me.

Knocking up a local girl so ha can stay in the country.

 

Happy Days.

[Peccavi]

I'd say he had backbone. He reinvented himself in Brazil which can't have been easy. He didn't personally hurt anyone from my recollection of events that I have read. He was a bit of an Anti Hero. A term sadly found in use today.

 

Backbone is facing bullets and bombs-when you have to be there, rather than want to be. Backbone is any amount of good people who do difficult jobs under extreme circumstances. Such people are to be found the world over.

 

They still had to work in OZ. He as a carpenter and she in a biscuit factory. Hardly rich on criminal proceedings. Tabloid press of course will pay for a story. Perhaps they were criminal paying out the money.

Still when you witness what the chinless wonders in the corporate world get away with in recent times, practically bringing a entire national economy down the old crooks don't sound too bad.

 

I have no interest in any press tabloid or otherwise. It seems that there never was a time when facts were reported rather than opinions. (This has typed itself into the next quote? I'm not starting the process again). Today that is an art form. I am (dammit! WHY is text playing up?).....I am quite capable of making the distinction. So? my opinion is that Biggs was a spineless coward.

 

....."greedy bankers" and "chinless wonders in the corporate world". Such a tedious and frankly ludicrous argument. What crimes exactly you think corporate bods have committed? And was it all of them? Perhaps you could lodge a police report if you believe a crime has been committed.

 

I do not think it tedious at all. The culture of greed is rooted in the finance industry. It has caused innumerable problems; destroyed lives-and led to suicide in some cases. Occupy Wall street is still going, but our global 'free' press do not report it. Rather than contempt for their cause I admire them. 'Lodge a Police report'? You of course jest. What these creatures are doing is legal. That makes it OK doesn't it?

 

Petty suggests a rather lot. The status was put on him by others not himself who made do the best he could.

 

It does indeed doesn't it? It is useful tool for minimising culpability and responsibility.

 

He did serve a fair stretch in prison. On his return he was sent back inside for about 8 years and then released on compassionate grounds due to his ill health.

 

It could be validly argued that the sentencing was manifestly excessive (crimes that offend system are always thus judged. Crimes that offend society incur far lesser sentencing-if at all).

 

Biggs' time in prison was negligible, and those last years were not spent breaking bricks.

 

Compassionate grounds? Compassion is so selective isn't it?

[Peccavi]

Well Biggs-at least you generated interesting debate!

 

 

 

Actually a few are behind bars in USA. All too few sadly. Are you serious what crimes have been committed? While you find blame on the bankers tedious and stick up for them, I equally find the excessive commentary on Biggsy quite frankly just as ludicrous. I'd say he paid many times over for the crime committed.

 

Two wrongs make a right? I agree about the excessive commentary thing though. A death notice would have sufficed. He did not of course pay 'many times over' for the crime committed. He went to great lengths to ensure that.

 

He lived in hard times for a considerable period in Brazil and served time in UK prison as a sick and rather broken man. He paid more than enough for past misdeeds. I do find the vengeance of the whip him to an inch of his life brigade on here rather distasteful.

 

It's gut wrenching isn't it? As is the need to defend aberrant behaviour of one individual/group dependent on political philosophy.

 

Well, in the case of JP Morgan: Bank Secrecy Act violations; money laundering for drug cartels; violations of sanction orders against Cuba, Iran, Sudan, and former Liberian strongman Charles Taylor; executing fictitious trades where the customer ... was on both sides of the deal; misrepresentations of CDOs and mortgage-backed securities; violations of the Service members Civil Relief Act; fraudulent sale of unregistered securities; auto-finance deceptions; violations of state and federal ERISA laws; filing of unverified affidavits for credit card debt collections; "artificial market making" at Japanese affiliates; shifting trading losses on a currency trade to a customer account; fraudulent sales of derivatives to the city of Milan, Italy; and obstruction of justice (including refusing the release of documents in the Bernie Madoff case). All fully documented. The authorities just prefer to levy billions in fines, for some reason.

An outside observer might be forgiven for thinking the company isn't so much a bank as a criminal enterprise with a bank attached to it...

 

Nicely put!

 

I don't think you know much about the case or the man.

The judgmental holier than thou attitude of some people on here makes me nauseous!:arghh:

 

I hope you get well soon.

 

Was it Jack Mills ?

 

And it wasn't Ronnie who bashed him.

 

Then that's OK then...

 

Biggs didn't "batter" anyone. He was a small player that made a mistake and paid dearly, he was sentenced to 30 years!! he served 9 years and lost his liberty , he wasn't exceptionally intelligent and was led on by the media who created the myth. It seems that many where sucked in by it all.

 

Ach the pooer wee bubby. No suggestion was made that Biggs battered anyone btw...

 

Come on simmo, you put a thread on here knowing full well it would be argued. He was a low life crook so why should people not be judgmental, after all that is surly what you must have expected when you started the thread?

 

Oopsie,

 

I did not say he did but he was involved with a gang and one of the gang members bashed Jack Mills so therefore Biggs was party to the offence.

 

We do not agree on other matters. On this?- absolutely.

 

yes and he served 9 years and the media made a lot of money by making him out to be a hero.

 

Not just the media. I hope to get well soon also, because the need to defend this man nauseates me.

 

He still had 21 years to serve to pay his debt. The man was a low life and so were the other robbers. Anything but a hero.

 

Concur.

 

No it doesn't matter what either of us think but that doesn't mean we can't debate it.

The jury only decide guilty or not guilty, not the sentence.

 

I wonder what the point of debating with anyone that ends their posts with "End of" is but whatever...

 

It's horrendous isn't it? The 'end of' thing I mean? At least it frees you up from responding to one poster, and we can concentrate on poor Mr Biggs.

[Peccavi]

My point is that very few people in the "real" world see him as a hero.

 

I can only hope so. I had started to wonder..

 

He had a colourful life but come on gutless coward? He returned home to prison. He lived on his wits. British tourists and others sought court with him.

An Anti Hero to be sure. Apparently a dying breed.

 

He was indeed a gutless coward. I see no reason to change that. I care little whether 'British tourists and others sought court with him',-what empty lives they must lead. Nothing ameliorates what an arrogant smarm this man was.

 

Do I think the sentence was excessive though? Yes.

 

He wasn't a hero. He was an Anti Hero though.

 

Jargon and the need to categorise (for all of us) is so handy! Anything that involves the word 'hero' (anti of otherwise)-and 'Biggs' in the same sentence is personally unpalatable.

 

He only went back to the UK for free NHS care because he was skint, god knows how much he cost the tax payer in the 12 years he was back.......Jack straw should have said no thanks stay where you are.

 

I think this is partly true. However, I think this man simply wanted to die at home. Whilst I do not want him to 'rot in hell' or some such, I'm glad that he finally obliged.

Is/was he the worst of criminals? Well of course not! But look at the debate this pathetic man has caused.

Any possible respect should go to Charmaine (sp?) and what she subsequently achieved.

 

Hardly end of. On appeal he would have likely got out doing not much more than he eventually did anyway.

 

No. The worst crime of all is to offend The System. It would have been highly unlikely sentence would be reduced on Appeal........on return to the country after running away.

 

Hardly suggests a life of comfort in Rio then. I'd suggest he paid his debt to society.

 

Actually, whilst he wasn't rich, he did lead a life of comfort in Rio thanks to the generosity of friends. It isn't such a handy place to be when age and ill health kick in. Biggs was nothing if not resourceful.

He did not pay his debt to society.

 

Mr Mills has my respect. I don't know what happens in the afterlife, but I hope he has a talk with this cardboard cutout of a man.

 

Great posts all!

[Slean Wolfhead]

Further, I think it is a bit of an insult to the working classes to assume that there is this hero worship of thieves and other criminals. My background is working class, my father a manual worker and he had some troubled times in the early 80's, but never did he resort to crime and he taught his children right from wrong.

 

Johnny Rotten was asked once about the Sex Pistols split up and why he refused to go to Brazil for the Ronnie Biggs publicity stunt in 1977.

He said "I wanted to prove that not all working class people are brainless idiots with no morals, because that sort of cheesiness seems to resonate with the poor and has ridiculously become something to be proud of. The driver they beat around the head with a cosh died later, badly brain-damaged and unable to work. That might have been my dad."

[flag of convenience]

Johnny Rotten was asked once about the Sex Pistols split up and why he refused to go to Brazil for the Ronnie Biggs publicity stunt in 1977.

He said "I wanted to prove that not all working class people are brainless idiots with no morals, because that sort of cheesiness seems to resonate with the poor and has ridiculously become something to be proud of. The driver they beat around the head with a cosh died later, badly brain-damaged and unable to work. That might have been my dad."

 

While liking the Sex Pistols, I never liked the cheap publicity stunt and full respect to Rotten for not being part of it.

[Peccavi]

While liking the Sex Pistols, I never liked the cheap publicity stunt and full respect to Rotten for not being part of it.

 

Off topic perhaps, but I once saw a highlighted 'Judge Judy' clip. The defendant was Johnny Rotten. The bloke was sensible and logical in his defence, and the Judge appeared to like and respect him.

 

Establishment and anti establishment had a rapport!