'Mad' Frankie Fraser
He and his much younger girlfriend are playing at the Andrew's Lane Theatre, in Dublin. She sings husky cabaret songs ("As time goes by", etc) in a slinky dress, while a guy tinkles away on the piano. She looks over at him as she sings and he smiles gives her a thumbs sign and you can see that they are in love.
He talks of growing up near the docks in London, in the 20s and 30s. Times were hard. People robbed to survive, as simple as that.
His parents were totally honest, not into crime at all. His mother was Irish, from Cork. His father was Canadian and his mother was a Red Indian. Only he and one sister got into crime, their other brother and two sisters didn't.
He recalls how they'd make money by stealing tared blocks of wood from building sites and sell it for firewood. "Everybody had fires in them days, and it burnt really well." But they told their mother that they found the two pounds (a lot of money in those days) on the ground.
"And she was so naive that she actually believed us. But not so naive to tell my father about the money, because he would have marched right down to the police station with it, not knowing that as soon as he was gone, they would share it out amongst themselves." He grew more confident and started robbing shops. He was caught at the age of 16 and from then began a continuous spell of prison, followed by a brief spell of freedom, before being recaptured often in the most ludicrous way. Frankie was born on Friday 13th, and often had strokes of very bad luck on these days. He is the first to admit that he was stupid: "I must be, or I wouldn't have spent all that time in prison."
A friend suggested they rob a jeweller's shop on Bond Street. They did it in broad daylight and smashed the window, grabbed a few trays of stuff. Frankie got back into the car and his partner says: "The car won't start." At first Frankie thought he was joking. But he wasn't. A crowd had formed around the car. "They were encouraged to have a go in them days." To cap it off, there happened to be a detective near by on his lunch break.
Another time, they had made the robbery and were fleeing police pursuit by car. They went down the Dartford Tunnel under the Thames. Then the car ran out of petrol, leaving them pretty much nowhere to go.
He was very violent, and killed several people. Informers mostly. He says that they knew the rules: Informing meant death, and that they were willing participants in the robberies. He says that he would never kill anyone who was not involved.
He had crazy feuds with the prison officers. He got himself declared insane three times, to get easier treatment in the mental hospitals. He attacked prison officers when he thought they were abusing their authority, like hassling him at his rare meetings with visitors.
"In me own way I was a very well behaved prisoner: I kept myself clean and tidy and looked after my self. If the prison officers left me alone, I left them alone. But that was not to be."
He also figured that there were two types of prison governors: Ones that would prefer to get punched in the face, leaving a black eye they could boast about, rather than have a humiliating bunch of shit poured over them.
"Then there was the other type of prison governor, that would prefer the bucket of shit and piss, kinda kinky like. So I'd try to give each of them to opposite to what they'd prefer."
And he did, making them legends in their own prison service with names like "Pisspot". Once a prison officer even approached Frankie, saying that he had a fetish of having piss poured over him. The prison officer said that he was having an argument with his wife, who normally poured piss over him. She was refusing to do it while the argument was running. So he was appealing to Frankie, as somebody he could trust.
What a strange world we live in.
Frankie also spoke of the time in 1991 he was shot in the head at point blank range by undercover cops as he left a nightclub at four in the morning. He and his girlfriend had been checking out a rave, she was introducing him to the new dance scene. He had been in the club for eight hours, drinking, and he was tipsy. "A baby could have done it," he says.
As they went to get into the taxi, the cop came up quickly from behind and fired one shot at point blank range to Frankie's skull. Frankie lunged towards the source of the flash and noise, and his girl and him managed to upset the gunman enough to send his next two shots wide. Then the gunman ran off, but not before Frankie recognised him as, an undercover cop.
Although shot in the head, Frankie was standing and concious. He gives the gunman credit:
"This particular bullet: very clever bullet. It hasn't got the power to exit your body, so it travels round inside looking for an exit. It often gets into the heart and kills you." The bullet travelled from under his left ear, behind his nose and was stopped from entering his brain by the top of cheekbone, where he has a scar.
In hospital, Frankie was surrounded by armed police officers. He said "What? You already shot me once, you gonna shoot me again?" The officers left pretty quickly after that, and no investigation was ever made. This is bizarre: every hospital admission that looks violent has to be accounted for. Yet this one wasn't. The police have deliberately tried to pass it off as a gangland feud. But while this account appears in his million selling book, there has not even been a hint of a libel action from the police.
Why did the police want to kill him?
"I've been a notorious criminal for many years, or reputed to be a notorious criminal, put it that way. It got out that I was writing a book.It was general knowledge. The police in Britain, at this present moment and in 1991, their image has gone right lower and lower, with the Birmingham Six, Tottenham Three, Guildford Four, all famous cases, and many more. And they knew that there was a possibility in my book that I would be detailing police corruption, where they've got other innocent men convicted, or whatever.
"So they're thinking, 'O, gotta get rid of him.' And it's be put down to a gangland killing. And that's really why they done it. Their image is at the lowest level. It's their own fault, if they had done their job properly and not convicted innocent men, it wouldn't have happened.
"Actually my book in police terms, is tame. It's just saying what everybody knows, where they've got this innocent man or that behind bars. They might have thought it could have been really damaging."
"The top surgeon in Britain, a neurologist, had to inspect me about a week after. He said:"Who done it?" I told him undercover cops, just like I told you. And he said:"Do you know what Frank - I've never trusted the bastards." Frank strongly supports the legalisation of Cannabis: "I've never had a smoke of anything, so it doesn't interest me on a personal level. When I was in prison, obviously cannabis would be smuggled in sometimes, and prisoners would beg of me - have a smoke Frank, it'll do you good, it'll calm you down, because I got into so much trouble."
"Sixty years ago, 30 years ago in Britain there were no betting shops. And various reformists, prominent people, were saying: Have betting shops like they have in Southern Ireland, it's harmless. And all the judges and police and politicians said: No, we'll become a nation of gamblers. It'll only cause trouble. And people went on as much about betting shops then as they do about cannabis now. And they've had betting shops now for over thirty years in Britain. Completely harmless, no trouble of any kind. And that's the comparison with betting shops and cannabis."
"In fact cannabis is more harmless. I've never seen it do anyone any harm. When I was in prison, them lads who did smoke it, it kept them out of trouble. They were happy, they laid back, they were calm."
"Look: Marlboro Lights and vodka. They are drugs too. Cigarettes are harmful. They must be, otherwise they wouldn't put on the botton of every pack: "This could damage your health."
Frank has co-written a book about his experiences: it's called "Mad Frank" and it's available in all good bookshops.
