The Ronnie Biggs I knew in Rio

The truth is very few people actually know Ronnie Biggs.

Hardly anyone in Britain has ever met him, and even fewer have had a meaningful conversation with him since he came back to Britain in 2001, after 13,068 days on the run, as he had been robbed of his voice by a series of debilitating strokes.

Ron, although his brain is as sharp as ever, has been a prisoner in his own body for more than a decade, a far greater price to pay than the time he has spent behind prison walls.

I have been a close friend of Ron's - and the ghost writer of his autobiography - for 30 years, and it has been interesting to read people, including Justice Secretary, Jack Straw, pontificating in recent weeks about him.

I first met Ron in Rio de Janeiro where we both lived. He had sneaked into town in 1970 and was tracked down by Jack Slipper of the Flying Squad in 1974.

It was over one of our regular boozy lunches that we decided that I would help him write his autobiography. Little did I know that in writing Odd Man Out and a subsequent novel with Ron, Keep On Running, I would find myself in his house on a daily basis over a four-year period. For me Ron has always been a kind, gentle and generous man. Too generous at times, as when he did have more money than he needed he would often give, or dare I say squander it, on people less well off than him.

He was essentially a family man with an extraordinary bond with his son, Michael, his first wife Charmian, his companion Ulla and the man who got him involved in the Great Train Robbery, Bruce Reynolds.

The Ron I knew in Rio was a man of tremendous humour. Stars of screen, stage, music and sport would end up on his doorstep, but so would young fugitives on the run from parole in Britain. Normally he would give the fugitives a beer, tell them a few stories, and then suggest they go back to Britain and sort out their situation.

There was a feeling that Ron was putting two fingers up at the British Establishment, but he put two fingers up at life in general. You have to remember that he was living in a city where a monkey was once voted into office. Rio suited Ron, and Ron suited Rio.

Whenever the Great Train Robbery is raised, so is the coshing of the driver Jack Mills. Mr Mills did not die at the time but of lymphatic leukaemia in 1970. Is Ron sorry about what happened to Mills? Of course he is, but he is not going to cry crocodile tears, because he did not know the man and was not involved in the incident.

The man who did cosh Mills was one of three gang members at the track never to be caught. I was once asked by a paper to take an offer of $1 million to Ron to name the three men. Ron flatly refused, as he and the other gang members had done at their trial. There was and still is honour among thieves.

I miss my lunches with Ron. I will miss him even more when he decides the time has come to stop running. So keep on running Ron, and never look back.