Have you ever met a famous criminal?

[WomenHour]

I haven't just wondering how common it is

@GreenPlum

I used to work in a pub where the great train robbery was planned in the room upstairs.

obsessed with that crime, its on netflix now

Someone convicted for the Hatton Garden robbery had a kid in my kids class.

Yes, Chopper Read, Australian gang criminal. There's a movie about him.

I was at primary school with a boy who as an adult spent eight years in a maximum security prison for fraud. He later appeared on a TV show talking about how he was atoning for his sins.

He also talked about being gay, and I had to smile. As a boy he'd had girls pining for him and dreaming of marrying him. (Not me, of course; I was too smitten with Bjorn from ABBA.)

There was a lad in my form at school went on to plan, huntdown and kill someone.

Sorry -- here's a famous one.

I was in Rio in 1994, watching the sunset from the path by Copacabana beach, when I noticed someone watching me. He was in a singlet and shorts and looked familiar -- and in fact was looking at me as if he expected me to go over and say hello. But I couldn't place his face, and eventually he got on his bicycle and slowly rode away.

So, not a meeting as such, but I realised later it was the (in)famous Ronnie Biggs.

@groovergirl I also met Ronnie Biggs!! 😂😂 it was a few years before he passed away. Was an old man by then. Very friendly, still bounds of confidence even then. He loved my little dog. I have a photo of the two of them together! Xo

I am a Probation Officer and have met and interviewed hundreds of serious offenders (some "famous") over the years including contributing to parole hearings and assessments. Very rarely do they present as particularly interesting or different. Mostly they are damaged from their abusive childhoods or negative early life experiences and can't behave appropriately now or in the future. Lots of them are regretful but mostly for the impact on themselves (ie being caught).

Yes, one of the 'great train robbers '. I met Ronald 'Buster' Edwards when I he ran a fruit and veg stall, I think it was in west London, maybe Putney. I was quite young. I and saw some peaches and asked about them. Edwards made a comment 'ooh, I've got some lovely peaches' in a suggestive laddish way. Being quite young, I was taken aback and Edwards gave me a look as if to say that he knew he was out of order, because of my age. I don't think that I bought the peaches.

For some reason, I remembered him and his stall and when I read that he had a stall, it triggered an old memory. I have just looked him up and he looked just like his photo in Wikipedia, outgoing and a happy go lucky character, typical stall holder.

My mother always said that people should remember that the train driver was beaten up and was ill for many years afterwards.

Yes, Ronnie Biggs and a teen who murdered. Worked with both.

My great grandfather was very high up in the railway and was paid to spy on the great train robbers

years ago,I met a single mum with 3 kids (boy,girl and boy)
they where the most badly behaved kids I’ve ever met
mum didn’t give a fuck-just wanted the benefits and who cared what the kids did?
dad was a child abuser who went to prison-both where planning their dds sexual abuse for when she was older
their house was filthy-dog shit ground into the carpet,the kitchen sides thick with grease,no bedding on the dirty beds-the eldest had to have all his teeth out by the age of 7/8 as they where rotten-the list is as long as my arm

I remember saying to my mate ‘if nothing is done-he’s going to end up killing someone’

i lost touch,and heard that ss had pulled their fingers out and taken the kids into care (mum was wailing about lost benefits and dad was doing 7 years for abusing a 9 year old)

about ten years later my dd had gone out,and came home in a right state-she claimed a lad had walked towards her as she was about to get to the end of our street,covered in blood and laughing like a manic-he saw her and turned round and walked off
she freaked out and ran home

turned out it was their eldest child-he’d found his mum,tracked down her boyfriend and killed him
hed them left the body,walked down the street (where dd saw him) and back to a taxi rank and confessed to the staff
they rang the police,he was arrested and is now doing life-he was 19 years old

Daniel Reed-he’d didn’t deserve his start in life-and I believe if he’d been taken away much earlier he wouldn’t have done it

Not a criminal, but I did have tea with last public executioner many, many years ago.

Not me, but my mum has. As a young woman, she and a female friend used to go in a couple of bars in Huddersfield. She remembers meeting and standing next to Peter Sutcliffe 😯 obviously this was before he was caught. She does say she clearly remembers him and thinking he was very odd.

I know one of Reynhard Sinaga's victims as well so that person met him 😥

Such good performances in that! And wow!

No one famous. But did have a friend who turned out to be a paedophile.