Me and My Brothers

by Kray, Charlie

  I could hear Ronnie still creating in his cell. An officer passed by and motioned towards the first cell. ‘He’s making more fuss over your ten than his thirty,’ he said.

  Shortly afterwards the officer came back. ‘Charlie,’ he said. ‘Ian Barrie’s got twenty years. He’s in a state. I can’t pull him out of it. Can you have a word and try to calm him down?’

  I did my best. I told him I was sorry but he had to calm down. There was an appeal coming up; his sentence was bound to be reduced. I didn’t really believe it, but it was all I could think of to quieten him down. Hope was all I could offer.

  When I went back to my cell Connie was sobbing. ‘Nine years,’ he kept saying.

  Connie,’ I said as gently as I could, trying to hide my irritation, ‘Freddie and me have got ten years for doing nothing. How do you think we feel?’ I sat down on the cell bed and put my head in my hands. Reality was forcing through the numbness as the effects of the tranquillizer began to wear off and I found myself trying to get to grips with what ten years meant. I was coming up to forty-three years old. Even with full remission I was going to be more or less fifty when I came out. Fifty!

  I looked at Freddie. What had happened to bring us here? What hand of fate had decided to make us the fall guys? Why us? With the daunting prospect of spending vital middle-aged years incarcerated behind bars hitting home to me now, I was at my lowest ebb, frail and weak from nearly a year in custody, drained dry from hearing my reputation blackened in thirty-nine dizzy days of courtroom drama. And then the cell door opened and my solicitor Ralph Haeems walked in. Detectives Read and Cator were upstairs and they wanted to see me, he said.

  My heart leapt. Maybe, I thought, they were shocked at the severity of my sentence; maybe they were going to make a submission for it to be reduced. Crazy thoughts, I know, but I was so low I was ready to clutch at any straw. I looked at Ralph hopefully, but his face was grim. ‘What do they want to see me for?’

  Ralph looked down, shamefaced, embarrassed. ‘They’re going to charge you again with the murder of Frank Mitchell.’

  I froze.

  Ten years for something I hadn’t done was terrible enough. But to face a life sentence for a murder I had nothing to do with…

  The previous summer the murder charge against me had been dropped through lack of evidence without the case going to trial. But since then a law known as a Voluntary Bill of Indictment had been passed, which meant that I could be charged again. The new legislation made it possible for the prosecution to put the accused straight before a judge and jury without bothering with committal proceedings in a lower court.

  I looked at Read and Cator with contempt, but they couldn’t bring themselves to look at me. They knew full well I had had nothing to do with Mitchell’s murder. They charged me and asked if I had anything to say but I said nothing. What was there to say?

  That night in Brixton, I learned from prison staff that it was common knowledge in the nick that the police were determined to stitch me up on the Mitchell case. They had not liked the charge against me being dropped at Bow Street the previous July. I ached with despair. Was there no end to the police vendetta? Wasn’t ten years enough? Did they really want me to go away for a lifetime too?

  I was standing on a chair in the security wing looking out of a window when Tommy Cowley called up from the remand block below. ‘Charlie, I know how bad you feel. But there’s no way you can be found guilty on this Mitchell thing.’

  I grunted sarcastically. ‘You all said they wouldn’t be able to get me in the McVitie trial, but I ended up with ten years so please don’t say anything now.’

  Tommy simply repeated that I couldn’t possibly be found guilty. I thanked him for trying to make me feel better, and I hoped he was right, but I felt it was a useless, stupid thing to say. If the police wanted to get someone they had plenty of ways of doing it.

  I had learned my lesson from the Bow Street hearing and I was going into the witness box, come what may, to say my piece. I had nothing to lose. At the committal proceedings I’d listened to Vowden’s advice and it had rebounded on me: by not going into the witness box I’d left myself open to all sorts of allegations which, because of my silence, must have been believed. The most outrageous of these, which would have been funny in less dire circumstances, concerned Leslie Payne’s accountant friend, Freddie Gore, whom the twins and I had had some dealings with during the Great African Safari.

  The only harsh encounter I’d had with Gore had been when he walked into an office I shared with Payne in Great Portland Street and interrupted a conversation we were having. I didn’t approve of his manners, but let it pass. About ten minutes later, however, he came back and did the same thing.

  ‘Mr Gore,’ I said angrily, ‘don’t do that to me again. It’s an insult. Remember, you work here and can be sacked. If you must say something privately, do it outside.’

  After our arrests, when they were holding us on all sorts of weird and wonderful charges, Gore walked into the witness box at Bow Street and was asked by the prosecution, ‘Have you ever been threatened by anyone?’

  ‘Yes – one person.’ Gore replied.

  ‘Do you see that person anywhere in this court?’

  Gore looked at the twins and me and the others in dock and pointed. I looked around to see who he was pointing at, but Ronnie nudged me and whispered, ‘He means you.’

  Shocked, I stood up. ‘I threatened you?’ I said. ‘I’ve never threatened you in my life.’

  During the lunchtime adjournment I told Vowden about the incident in the office – the only time I’d said anything remotely harsh to Gore – and said I wanted to go into the witness box to set the record straight.

  Vowden would not hear of it. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘Wait till we get to the Old Bailey. We’ll get him there.’

  ‘But at least ask him how I was supposed to have threatened him,’ I pleaded.

  Vowden would not budge. He did not want to commit himself, he said, in case we gave something away that might be useful to the prosecution.

  I argued with him. Since there were no reporting restrictions Gore’s allegation was going to be all over the papers, with no response at all from me. To people who didn’t know me, it would look as though I was admitting the threat, and I was sure that would be bad for my case. But Vowden told me I must be guided by him in matters of law, so I swallowed it. The next day, the papers made a meal of it: GANG BOSS THREATENS WITNESS!’ screamed the headlines.

  Nice! I was choked, and I couldn’t resist asking Vowden if he’d seen the papers. ‘Unfortunately, I have,’ he replied, embarrassed.

  When I appeared at the Old Bailey on the McVitie charge Vowden was again against my going into the box, repeating that if I didn’t say anything, nothing could be used against me. My gut reaction said he was wrong, but I went along with him because he was the legal expert.

  As it was, the decision not to give evidence was disastrous for me. In his summing up, Melford Stevenson made an issue of it, saying, ‘If Charles Kray was innocent, would he not have gone into the witness box?’ He made it look as if I had made the decision not to give evidence!

  Afterwards I told Vowden I’d been made to look an idiot. He tried to console me by saying that it did not matter and that Stevenson should not have said what he did. Sadly, that didn’t do much for me.

  Barristers are very highly trained but they are not very worldly. I don’t think Vowden was ‘got at’, either at Bow Street or at the Old Bailey, but I do think he gave me bad advice (albeit in good faith) in a case that was to ruin my life. So when the Mitchell trial opened at the Old Bailey in April 1969, I made the point strongly to Vowden: I was not going to be set up twice; I was going into the box, come what may. And I did.

  I’m sure that giving evidence helped me, particularly since the judge Mr Justice Lawton was fair-minded, totally aware of what was going on and, unlike Stevenson, eager to see that justice was done. For example, when the prosecution counse
l – Kenneth Jones again – tried to belittle me over my earnings as a theatrical agent Lawton stepped in to let everyone know what was right.

  Jones, who obviously knew nothing about the theatrical agency business, implied that I was trying to cover something up concerning a bank statement, which the judge then asked to see. Within seconds he said the statement was in order and he understood it perfectly. Jones was angry at being put in his place and tried to take it out on me. He quoted five people who had given a different version of events from the one I had sworn, and said, ‘Come, come, Mr Kray. What reason do you give for their telling lies? All five of them?’

  ‘That’s quite simple,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, is it?’ Jones replied. ‘Why is that?’

  ‘Because they are sitting there and I am standing here,’ I said.

  He did not have an answer to that. I sensed the judge nodding in agreement. He seemed to be aware of who was telling the truth – unlike Stevenson whose preoccupation, it seemed, was to find people guilty. Lawton appreciated very early in the trial that the case against me was extremely slim. One particular piece of evidence, concerning where I had been on two days in December 1966, was vital, and thankfully I was able to prove that I was not where the police said I was because I was at home in bed with quinsy. Fortunately, a Dr Morris, a child psychiatrist with a practice in Wimpole Street, came to my home to visit my son Gary, who he was treating for suspected rheumatic fever, and he wrote to the court confirming I had been in bed. Lawton told the jury that a letter from such a professional gentleman should be accepted, and from then on I was home and dry.

  It was the judge who actually led the prosecution into dropping its case against me. After hearing all the evidence he ordered the jury to leave the court while he had a discussion with Kenneth Jones.

  ‘Regarding Mr Charles Kray,’ said the judge. ‘Four people have testified that he was at a meeting to kill Frank Mitchell. A lot of things have been said at this trial, but let us say they were right: he was there and they all discussed it. He could have said, ‘No, thank you, I want nothing to do with it.’ Because we don’t hear very much about Charles Kray afterwards, do we? Whatever they say, it is not very safe at all, is it?’

  Mr Jones agreed it wasn’t.

  ‘Do you want to carry on with the case against him?’ asked the judge.

  ‘No, m’lud.’

  ‘Then I am stopping the case against Mr Kray,’ said the judge.

  And in the dock I found myself weeping with relief. I was too caught up in the emotion of the moment to be embarrassed or ashamed of my tears. Anyone who has been in a major court, fighting to prove their innocence will appreciate my feelings. The relief was indescribable, and at last I felt that the nightmare of the Axeman was over.

  I was wrong.

  The police, not satisfied with my ten-year sentence in the McVitie case; had another card up their sleeves: if I didn’t actually help to murder poor Frank Mitchell, they argued, then I had helped plot his escape from Dartmoor and had harboured him in London. More rubbish, of course. But more agony, too. I was beginning to feel that their persecution was endless.

  Thankfully, this case was eventually thrown out too, but not before I’d been reduced to tears again in the witness box.

  Fuelled by more and more lies from Albert Donaghue, Billy Exley and Harry Hopwood, the persistent prosecutor hammered away at me, insisting that I must have known about the arrangements for springing Mitchell. I took it for what seemed an age, and then the terrible injustice of having to defend myself against lying idiots finally got to me, overwhelming me, and I cracked. Trembling with emotion, I said: ‘I didn’t have anything to do with it. They did. You have to remember, my name is Kray and if anyone makes a statement and puts the name Kray on it, they are believed by the police.’ I gripped the frame of the witness box tightly as I felt my voice going. I fought in vain to control it. ‘I’m doing ten years for nothing because of all these lies,’ I choked.

  And as I wept again with the frustration and injustice of it all, Mr Justice Lawton adjourned the court.

  The high tension of the Old Bailey saps one’s energy; adrenalin starts to flow as soon as the building comes into sight. I had had more than 300 tortuous hours which had done my brain in, leaving me mentally drained and ragged, my nerves in tatters.

  When they finally took me back to Brixton and opened my cell, I walked in with my shoulders hunched in dejection, what little pride I’d clung to in court all gone. I fell on the bed and curled myself into a tight ball, enjoying the silence and the solitude.

  I think then I knew how a fox feels when he finally shakes off the hounds.

  Chapter Twelve

  The full weight of what had happened hit me when I walked into the security wing at Brixton that evening. I went into the room with four cells, and the Governor, assistant governor and chief prison officer were standing there, solemn-faced, like a bizarre welcoming committee. They were not sure what to say, but they knew enough about convicted men not to be flippant or sarcastic. On a table in front of them were cardboard boxes for our clothes. For eight months on remand and for more than a month of the trial we had worn our own clothes, but now we had to exchange them for prison issue. We put our clothes in the boxes and knew it would be a long time before we saw them again. They took away the boxes and banged us up. I wanted darkness to cover me, so that I could be alone with my thoughts, but we were all A-Category – maximum security – men and a red light was left on all the time. I didn’t feel suicidal. But I was depressed. The prison clothes felt awful, the atmosphere in the cell was terrible, and all the time that red light was on and the prison officers looked through the flap in the cell door, invading my thoughts. I thought again of Mum and the old man and the rest of our family and wondered how they were taking the sentences. I sat there, my eyes closed to that insensitive red light, trying to work out how it had all happened. Ten years! It sounded like a lifetime. And for what? Just for keeping my mouth shut. I fell asleep through sheer exhaustion. I felt as if I’d been digging a road all day.

  That first terrible night as a convicted criminal was worse than anything I’d experienced in my life.

  In the morning the red light had gone out and the wing was bright with March sunshine. Ronnie came out of his cell and clapped his hands. He looked at the prison officers. ‘Good morning, gentlemen. What a lovely morning.’

  The officers looked at him strangely.

  “There’s no point being downhearted,’ Ronnie said. ‘We’ve got to carry on.’

  One officer turned to me and said, ‘He’s something else.’ I said he’d always been like that and would never change.

  The cheerful banter continued while we had our breakfast and then it was time for exercise. As we were on our way out Ronnie was laughing with one of the officers, a tall, heavily built bloke in his early forties.

  ‘What I’m going to do today,’ Ronnie said, ‘is write off for a world cruise because that’s one thing I want to do when I get out.’

  The officer was half-laughing with Ronnie and before he knew what he was saying the words had slipped out. ‘Oh, well,’ he said. ‘You’ve got thirty years to save up for it.’

  He knew he had said the wrong thing. But it was too late. Ronnie went white and moved forward threateningly.

  ‘Ronnie,’ said the officer quickly. ‘I’m so sorry. I apologize. You were larking about and I forgot and said it without thinking.’

  I believed him. So did Ronnie. He calmed down immediately and told the officer to forget it. But, he said, it wasn’t a nice thing to say. After exercise, the officer came to my cell and asked if Ronnie was still upset. The incident was still playing on his mind, he said, and it was such a stupid thing to say. I said Ronnie had forgotten it, but I don’t think the officer believed me, because he went up to Ronnie at lunchtime and apologized yet again.

  Later that day Ronnie sent off for some brochures.

  That officer’s slip of the tongue was sparked off
by the tension that surrounded the twins. And that tension was not helped by some idiots in a cell about fifty feet away on the opposite side of the square; a section full of drunks doing a month, or creeps finishing six months or whatever for petty crimes.

  One day, as we were exercising in the square, two chaps – young by the sound of their voices – called down mockingly, ‘I’ve got another ten days to do – and you’ve got thirty years. How do you feel about that?’ Then they laughed.

  The taunts went on and on for a couple of days. Finally Ronnie could stand it no longer; the tormentors were probably cowards who would have topped themselves if they had been given thirty years and he wanted them silenced. He asked the security wing’s chief prison officer to tell whoever was responsible to shut up.

  The Prison Officer was delighted to step in. He thought it was unfair when Ronnie and Reggie were taking their punishment so well; also, he would have to deal with the problem if Ronnie lost his rag. Later that day, he told them, ‘By the way, I found out who it was. I don’t think you’ll be hearing any more from them.’

  While we had all been in the square on exercise the officer had stood in a cell, waiting and watching. When the two idiots stood up and started their cowardly shouting, he noted their cell and went round. ‘Hello, you brave little pair,’ he said. ‘Those blokes down there are doing thirty years, but I’ll tell you something – at least they’re men. You snivelling idiots are causing us problems by upsetting them, so I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. If I hear one more peep out of you I’ll bring Ronnie and Reggie through here on our way somewhere and leave them with you for five minutes. I’m warning you – one more peep.’

  The two guys, in their mid-twenties, were the type who would mug old ladies, or pick on victims who couldn’t fight back, the type who tease animals through bars, the type with no bottle. Not surprisingly, we didn’t hear another word from them.