Notorious Great Train Robber, Ronnie Biggs, has announced that he is to return the proceeds gained from the 1963 multi-million pound train heist in an attempt to restore public confidence in the once honourable criminal classes. Biggs, currently serving a sentence in Norwich prison after returning to the UK in 2001, has described the manner by which he came into the money as ‘an honest mistake’, and has called for a change in the rules which are making morally-upright criminals look like money-grabbing cheats.
‘I didn’t realise I was doing anything wrong,’ said the ailing 79-year-old today in a prepared statement. ‘The train stopped and everyone just jumped on the wagon, so I assumed it was totally on the level. But I tell you, as soon as I checked the law some 36 years later and found that I may have been in the wrong, I couldn’t have been more embarrassed. I turned myself in straight away. I just hope that by giving the money back now it’s not too late to change the public’s opinion

A man of principle to the end. Most seem to want to be remembered as better than we were. And then they live only in a book for a century or two at the most.