Biggs wakes up behind bars after 35 years on the run

Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs was waking up behind bars today for the first time in 35 years.

His 6,000-mile journey from his Brazilian hideaway ended with the clang of gates at Belmarsh prison in south east London last night.

The ailing crook flew into Britain yesterday morning in an executive jet chartered by The Sun newspaper, and was immediately arrested.

After a brief appearance at West London Magistrates Court the 71-year-old was whisked off to jail, 35 years after breaking out of Wandsworth Prison where he had served only 15 months of a 30-year sentence for his part in the 1963 heist.

Outside court, his solicitor announced he would be asking the Court of Appeal to review the outstanding years of his sentence.

Biggs surrendered himself to Scotland Yard detectives at RAF Northolt in north west London.

He has been rendered virtually speechless by a series of strokes and answered questions in court with a barely audible grunt.

Biggs had contacted Scotland Yard by e-mail from Rio de Janeiro, his home for most of his time on the run, to say he wanted a passport and offered to give himself up.

Foreign Secretary Robin Cook intervened to ensure there would be no delays in issuing the emergency passport, which allowed Biggs to travel under his own name.

Biggs, who long ago spent his £147,000 share (worth about £1.6m in today’s money) of the 1963 mail train robbery haul, hopes to receive vital medical treatment, which he could not afford in Brazil.

He has 28 years of a 30-year prison sentence still to serve for his role in the robbery of the Glasgow-to-London mail train, which yielded £2.6m, but will not face further charges.

Biggs is hoping, because of his health, that he will be put in a jail hospital while the authorities decide what to do with him.

There have been suggestions he had run out of money and wanted to return home to benefit from free medical treatment on the NHS.

Meanwhile the Press Complaints Commission said it was to conduct an investigation into the Biggs affair.

In a statement, the PCC said: ‘‘The issues relating to payments by a national newspaper to Ronnie Biggs and his associates raise a number of issues under the newspaper code of practice.

‘‘The code makes clear that payments to convicted criminals are only permissible where there is a public interest and the material could only be obtained by means of such payment.’’

A spokesman for The Sun said: ‘‘The requirements of the PCC code relating to payments to convicted criminals were fully taken into account before we took the decision to fly Ronnie Biggs home.

‘‘We are, as always, happy to co-operate with the PCC and will be making clear to them the massive public interest in returning a convicted criminal home to face British justice and at no cost to the British taxpayer.’’