Ronnie Biggs, 79, refused parole

RONNIE BIGGS was refused parole yesterday by Justice Secretary Jack Straw, who accused the Great Train Robber of being “wholly unrepentant” about his crimes.

Straw rejected a parole board recommendation that the 79-year-old be released, saying it was “unacceptable” that Biggs had fled prison.

Biggs would have been a free man “many years ago” if he had complied with the sentence given to him, Straw said.

The decision was attacked as “perverse” by Biggs’s legal adviser, who accused Mr Straw of “cruel and unusual punishment”.

In a statement Straw said: “Mr Biggs chose to serve only one year of a 30-year sentence before he took the personal decision to commit another offence and escape from prison, avoiding capture by travelling abroad for 35 years whilst outrageously courting the media.

“I am refusing the parole board’s recommendation for parole. Biggs chose not to obey the law and respect the punishments given to him – the legal system in this country deserves more respect than this.

“It was Mr Biggs’s own choice to offend and he now appears to want to avoid the consequences of his decision. I do not think this is acceptable.

Biggs was eligible for release tomorrow, having served 10 years of his 30-year sentence.

He cannot eat or speak, can barely walk and last weekend broke his hip when he fell out of his bed in Norwich Prison.

He is now in the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital where sources said his condition had deteriorated in the past 24 hours and he was now regarded as “poorly”.

Biggs’s parole has to be reviewed within two years.

Biggs’s legal adviser, Giovanni Di Stefano, said he was planning to launch a judicial review to try to have it overturned.

“All the other Great Train Robbers served a third of their sentences. Why should Ronnie Biggs be any different?” he said.

Harry Fletcher, assistant general secretary of Napo, the probation officers’ union said: “It is difficult to see how he poses a threat to anyone apart from politicians.”

But Keith Norman, general secretary of Aslef, the train drivers’ union, backed the decision.

“Biggs is not some cheeky chappy, romantic Robin Hood figure.

“He is a petty thief who was involved in a violent crime that left Jack Mills seriously harmed while he was going about his work.

“He was attacked with an axe handle, handcuffed to the second man, tossed into the engine compartment and never fully recovered.”