Speaker 1: To me, it was inevitable. I think what happened to
Speaker 1: people who live that type of life of violence, they
Speaker 1: die by the sword. People probably wouldn't understand. It's not
Speaker 1: like it is on TV. A body is not cleaned up.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously have they hose off the blood story,
Speaker 1: but it's still very raw.
Speaker 2: It hasn't been through the whole.
Speaker 1: Pretty things that happens at the funeral parlam. So seeing
Speaker 1: that was very confronting.
Speaker 2: I'm Andrew Rule. This is life in Crimes. Last week
Speaker 2: we heard the first part of the story of the
Speaker 2: new book Eleven Minutes by Gregory M. Carroll. Greg Carroll,
Speaker 2: If you think the surname is slightly familiar, it is.
Speaker 2: He's the younger brother of the late Ian Ravel Carroll,
Speaker 2: who was in fact one of the six Great Bookie
Speaker 2: Robbers who pulled the Great Bookie Robbery in nineteen seventy six.
Speaker 2: He also knew Vannie Mickelson, who was a very hard
Speaker 2: man to some extent the girl's right hand man on
Speaker 2: the docks, and he had met the legendary Ray Chuck
Speaker 2: Ray Chuck alias Raymond Patrick Bennett, and so he knew
Speaker 2: to some extent half the game. YEP. And that is
Speaker 2: a unique thing to bring to the table when you're
Speaker 2: writing a book that's based on the Great Bookie Robbery.
Speaker 2: And we're so pleased to have come to us. So
Speaker 2: take us to the Bookie Robbery. It happens in April
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy six. Where were you?
Speaker 1: I was working in a computer company in Queen's in the road,
Speaker 1: in Queen's Road.
Speaker 2: Oh, Queen's Road. Sorry, Queen's Road, just across the road.
Speaker 1: No, it wasn't Queen I didn't have a view. Yeah
Speaker 1: I was there.
Speaker 2: How did your first year of the robbery on the radio?
Speaker 1: But no, it was a situation which was quite strange
Speaker 1: at the time. Ian asked me out for lunch, went
Speaker 1: on the book on the day?
Speaker 2: Oh did he? Yeah? So funny because he had for
Speaker 2: lunch often.
Speaker 1: No, never first, the first time ever.
Speaker 2: Anybody is interesting later Yeah, well.
Speaker 1: So there's a few I wasn't just the only person there.
Speaker 1: There was a few other people. He knew what time
Speaker 1: of day. Yeah, well, that's debatable. I was called there,
Speaker 1: is it?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I was called to obviously give a statement.
Speaker 2: You could get confused.
Speaker 1: Yes, I thought I was confused, But so I think
Speaker 1: I said rattled.
Speaker 2: Yes, you were young.
Speaker 1: So I think I said it was there from twelve o'clock,
Speaker 1: might have been twelve thirty. But the strange thing was
Speaker 1: it was it was very very soon after the thing,
Speaker 1: so it was obviously.
Speaker 2: He might have gone straight to lunch. Yes, he might
Speaker 2: have been hungry after his morning. And there's no doubt
Speaker 2: he was in the job, no doubt he was in
Speaker 2: the building. Yeah. Yeah, you don't think he was an
Speaker 2: accessory after the fact, he was.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, Yeah, him and Ray Ray and
Speaker 1: Ray Track, which everyone causes Ray Bennett these days. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I met, I met Ray through a couple of times.
Speaker 1: By saying met, it was more I was in the
Speaker 1: room at the same time, you see, it.
Speaker 2: Was Yeah, I was that when he got shot. But
Speaker 2: a hard little man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you basically got the the feeling or the
Speaker 1: understanding that you were to make yourself scarce when when
Speaker 1: he was around.
Speaker 2: Of course, where did you have lunch?
Speaker 1: Well, in the book, I refer to it as going
Speaker 1: to the Windsor, which it wasn't the Windsor Hotel in
Speaker 1: town or the Hotel Wings, And I think it's good.
Speaker 1: It was the Windsor Pub in Paran.
Speaker 2: Okay and you're not dead. Sure what time you got
Speaker 2: there or you might have been there before he was? Yes,
Speaker 2: were you waiting for him? But you turned up held
Speaker 2: up in the traffic?
Speaker 1: Yeah, as you were.
Speaker 2: What do you say?
Speaker 1: Nothing? It was a no reference to anything during the
Speaker 1: whole lunch.
Speaker 2: And I thought he's with him any mates? Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 2: Vinnie Vinnie was with him. Bennie Micholson. Yeah, one of
Speaker 2: a very big family.
Speaker 1: Oh, I think yeah, I think meant Vinnie a lot.
Speaker 2: He survived. I think yes, he did a long time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, Vinnie Vinniel was quite close to you.
Speaker 2: Were you in touch at all when he was over in.
Speaker 1: The west, So it was he quietly.
Speaker 2: Circulated back here. Yeah? And what was he like, Minnie Micholson?
Speaker 2: Now we're talking here, so our listeners not about a
Speaker 2: fellow that was one of a big family of very
Speaker 2: hard cases, knock about people, and were been long time
Speaker 2: associates of and of of course Bennard or Chuck raychack a. Yeah,
Speaker 2: the the old time crooks always got him Raychack. It
Speaker 2: was his birthday from Chiltern originally, and and probably Cox,
Speaker 2: I imagine he knew.
Speaker 1: I don't really know where the Cox initial thing came in. Obviously,
Speaker 1: he was in a long bay at the time of
Speaker 1: the bookie robbery, and it was it seemed very coincidental
Speaker 1: that he attempted an escape. What was it, I think
Speaker 1: about August or September seventy five.
Speaker 2: See, so in the book, might have might have wanted
Speaker 2: to be.
Speaker 1: Yes, I think he might and in the book I
Speaker 1: actually again the book is a novel, so it's fictitious.
Speaker 2: But with many real names and places.
Speaker 1: Yes, And I just thought it was very coincidental that
Speaker 1: because he would have been the type of person that
Speaker 1: probably would have been very interested.
Speaker 2: In the size and the sort of buck that might
Speaker 2: have well had inside him and and would be trusted
Speaker 2: to get it to himself. Yeah. So anyway, sorry, it's
Speaker 2: all interesting. So there you are, you're at lunch, not dead.
Speaker 2: Short time you got there before your brother. Your brother
Speaker 2: turns up. He's got Vinnie Mickelson with him. It was
Speaker 2: Vinnie one of the six, or it was any outside
Speaker 2: the six, because there's always that little bit of slight
Speaker 2: sort of different, you know, somebody says this is the sixth,
Speaker 2: and somebody's got five of them. But this bloke was out.
Speaker 2: This one drove the Van and this, you know, all
Speaker 2: this stuff.
Speaker 1: I guess I've got to go back one step first
Speaker 1: with all this, I just said it's a fictional story,
Speaker 1: the novel it is.
Speaker 2: But we're talking about the difference between the fictions.
Speaker 1: And the perceiver and what happened that Ian never sat
Speaker 1: down and Vinnie I knew Vinnie after he and died
Speaker 1: as well. Neither of ever sat down and said this
Speaker 1: is what happened. But over time you build up a
Speaker 1: picture from little comments made or smirks, or when a
Speaker 1: name is mentioned, you know they have the lookdown or
Speaker 1: look up or whatever, and you build up this feeling.
Speaker 1: And over the years I developed what I considered to
Speaker 1: be the story.
Speaker 2: You were receptive to the intuitive.
Speaker 1: Yes, side of it, and that's really what the book is.
Speaker 1: The book is my I would say, it's I say,
Speaker 1: it's an emotional truth. It's what I honestly feel happened.
Speaker 1: But there is no proof, so I know from a
Speaker 1: factual side, I probably you probably know more than I did,
Speaker 1: to be honest.
Speaker 2: But alleged fact you know, this is the problem. We
Speaker 2: learned things and yes, and parent them off, and you
Speaker 2: know some of them are right and some aren't.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so I put together in my head without
Speaker 1: every thinking. So the book was just a result of
Speaker 1: the last couple of years. But you know, the story
Speaker 1: was in my head for a long time, a long
Speaker 1: long time before that.
Speaker 2: How did you find Vinnie? What was he like?
Speaker 1: I really liked Vinnie. He's was one of those tough guys.
Speaker 1: He was a tough guy, honestly, probably the hardest guy
Speaker 1: I've ever known. Also, the him was a lot smarter
Speaker 1: than a lot of people gave him credit for, even
Speaker 1: though being a boxer and that.
Speaker 2: Well he was a union secretary. It was like, I mean,
Speaker 2: I know that was a criminal organization, but you had
Speaker 2: to be come again in the secretary by being stupid.
Speaker 1: No exactly. So you know, you had to know people
Speaker 1: and you know, to do stuff, do stuff. So Vinny
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have put into the same category category is in.
Speaker 1: But from a tough, tough guy, you know, if you
Speaker 1: wanted someone on your side.
Speaker 2: He was.
Speaker 1: He was the man.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, just to bring our listeners up to date,
Speaker 2: the robbery happened in nineteen seventy six. In nineteen eighty three,
Speaker 2: January the third, Yes, it's pretty well the anniversary this
Speaker 2: January somewhat forty two years or whatever. It might pay
Speaker 2: forty three years or something, since your brother Ian was
Speaker 2: shot dead in what looks sort of like a gunfight
Speaker 2: more or less at Mount Martha. I remember working at
Speaker 2: police rounds at the time. This was a story that
Speaker 2: you know, I others wrote on the day that that
Speaker 2: looked as if had burned Russell Cox. Oh, it was
Speaker 2: although that I think that bit was known on the day,
Speaker 2: but I know it soon came out. He had a
Speaker 2: confrontation with Cox, with fellow crooked Russell Cox, and guns
Speaker 2: were fired and both were wounded. But your brother died, yes,
Speaker 2: and Russell Cox was spirited away with his ever loving
Speaker 2: partner Helen Dean. Yep. Which was quite a story of itself. Yes,
Speaker 2: it is quite a story. Yeah, tell them listens. What
Speaker 2: that story of your version of that story about Ian's death? Yeah,
Speaker 2: and Zeth and Cox's escape.
Speaker 1: Well, it was Ian's house, yeah, and Cox was on
Speaker 1: the run and Cox escaped. I've got the dates now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he escaped from Long Bay or from Tingle.
Speaker 2: I think I think seventy eight for eleven years.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think so. He was on the run at
Speaker 1: the time, and through back stories they knew each other.
Speaker 1: So when he turned up in Melbourne, he wanted somewhere
Speaker 1: to lay lower, and and supplied him the holiday house
Speaker 1: and holiday house. That's another thing too. It was class
Speaker 1: as a holiday house, but it really was in the workhouse.
Speaker 1: That's where that's where things were done. So although the
Speaker 1: cops would go and rousted criminals houses, criminals never kept
Speaker 1: anything in their house because they mean, apart from me,
Speaker 1: they knew.
Speaker 2: The cops goods wouldn't. Yeah, that's too smart.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So this was where off site, off site stuff,
Speaker 1: so ens home wherever it was, was always clean. And
Speaker 1: after they after he was shot, they discovered huge caches
Speaker 1: and guns and everything else in the.
Speaker 2: In the sort of robbery kits. Yeah yeah, yeah, just
Speaker 2: for them for our listeners, things like not only guns,
Speaker 2: but all sorts of good stuff like first aid kids,
Speaker 2: so if you've got hurt and I think temporary signage
Speaker 2: to put on the side of a car saying.
Speaker 1: Career or whatever, and radio frequencies of police radio frequency
Speaker 1: stuff and they were.
Speaker 2: Really quite sophisticated it was, and disguises how you fare
Speaker 2: well or whatever.
Speaker 1: And yeah, well Cox was renowned as a I mean
Speaker 1: I probably met Cox half a dozen times over the years,
Speaker 1: and I don't think twice he ever looked the same.
Speaker 1: So beard, no beard, short hair, long hair, the glasses,
Speaker 1: you name it was. He's always different. But he was
Speaker 1: on the run, you remember that.
Speaker 2: So you met him, You met him in those intervening
Speaker 2: years before the before the gunfight. Oh yeah, you met
Speaker 2: him in that time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And in fact, I had dinner with Ian and Cox
Speaker 1: New Z on the eight two, so four days, three
Speaker 1: days before them before he was killed.
Speaker 2: Okay, now, Greg Carrol, your brother Ian and mad Dog
Speaker 2: Cox said he's Russell Cox, who was dubbed made dog
Speaker 2: by an unscrupulous journalist. As we've often pointed out, it
Speaker 2: was very unfair, unfair to dogs. Probably They had dinner
Speaker 2: on New Year's Eve, just days before the fatal gunfight
Speaker 2: that ended in your brother's death and in Cox and
Speaker 2: his partner, his lover Helen Dean, escaping into the wild
Speaker 2: blue yonder, which is a story in itself. As far
Speaker 2: as you know, I think you've told us this. They
Speaker 2: were quite friendly at that dinner.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, you would have thought they were best mates.
Speaker 1: So when I thought they were best mates, put it
Speaker 1: that way, where was that? I think it was in Ringwood.
Speaker 1: It was I don't remember the actual place. I remember
Speaker 1: that it was a vegetarian restaurant because Cox was a
Speaker 1: vegetarian and Dean. So what was she like, Helen Dean?
Speaker 1: She was very quiet, very quiet. And again, if you
Speaker 1: can imagine being at a table with Cox and Ian,
Speaker 1: they dominated did conversation and everything. Yeah, Cox was a talker.
Speaker 1: Oh it wasn't a talker either, but when they talked that,
Speaker 1: everyone else shut up. So and if they wanted to
Speaker 1: change the conversation, they would. So you'd be halfway through
Speaker 1: his sentence and let's start talking about something else, and
Speaker 1: you knew, okay, they're bored with that.
Speaker 2: Okay, nature of the beasts. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so Helen, I'd have to ask my wife, really
Speaker 1: is she talked a lot more to Helen than oh
Speaker 1: did she?
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 1: So yeah, it was the three couples. So it was
Speaker 1: Ian and Ray. That's Ray Lean, not Ray Benner. Cox
Speaker 1: and Helen and my wife and I at the dinner
Speaker 1: and vegetarian restaurant yet right, which in those days was weird.
Speaker 2: And but you said, no problem. Well, yeah you want vegetarian,
Speaker 2: you got it. Yeah, So what did you have? I
Speaker 2: don't remember something with rice. Yeah, probably it would have
Speaker 2: been probably a vegetarian carrier. I guess I would have
Speaker 2: gone for I don't remember. Now a very fit fellow,
Speaker 2: wasn't he Cox? Oh? Yes, he still kept it up. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: had the discipline, yep, he just had the discipline in
Speaker 2: the wrong areas.
Speaker 1: What well, I guess he had to stay match for
Speaker 1: match fit exactly.
Speaker 2: And your understanding, and this makes absolute seense. He is
Speaker 2: there's been a confrontation over money, money, because it usually
Speaker 2: is if money at sex.
Speaker 1: Now, I do believe again it's as I mentioned before,
Speaker 1: a lot of this is just what I feel in supposition.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Believe in kept his spare cash, which obviously had a
Speaker 1: lot of down in Mantmartha and I either read or
Speaker 1: heard somewhere Cox actually stated that he returned after the
Speaker 1: shooting several weeks later and.
Speaker 2: Got the money out of the ground.
Speaker 1: There was a backshd and it had a false floor
Speaker 1: on it. Underneath that was buried a beer barrel, beer
Speaker 1: barrel thing, and the money was shrink wrapped in that.
Speaker 1: And he returned and he said he left with one
Speaker 1: point two mil.
Speaker 2: Yeah, which is a hell of a lot of money there. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Now I can remember our listeners will be bored with this,
Speaker 2: but I can remember buying a house in the early
Speaker 2: eighties for twenty eight thousand dollars which puts into perspective
Speaker 2: point two minimiz and even and having a big house
Speaker 2: at Wonga Park and all that it might have been
Speaker 2: worth one hundred and fifty thousand. Yeah, maybe something like that.
Speaker 1: When well, I stayed in at the back of the
Speaker 1: book that I've got a factual. So the book itself
Speaker 1: is a story, but at the end of it, I've
Speaker 1: got a whole section on the actual facts that I
Speaker 1: know that Approveablen all that stuff. And talking about the money.
Speaker 1: There was a case where Ray Bennett's mother was just
Speaker 1: before she died, she had a heart attack at her
Speaker 1: solicitors and when the paramedics came, they had her clothes
Speaker 1: off to get to her and cash came out and
Speaker 1: they found that she had ninety grand in Cash's with
Speaker 1: a lot of money house in Nicers And that's what
Speaker 1: it was. It was money, cause it was money for
Speaker 1: her to buy a house. So Ray had given her, supposedly,
Speaker 1: I should say, allegedly given her the money to buy
Speaker 1: a house.
Speaker 2: He's not going to cause you I know that.
Speaker 1: But and yeah, in the facts at the back of
Speaker 1: the book, I say that basically at the same time,
Speaker 1: I bought a house in Brighton Beach for seventy nine
Speaker 1: thousand in Melbourne.
Speaker 2: In Melbourne, yeah, okay, so that was a gives you
Speaker 2: a commadi.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so for ninety thousand you would have got a large.
Speaker 2: Good place out in the burbs yep, yep. So if
Speaker 2: you went further you get a farm lut like yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: if you went to Barrick because somewhere you were yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: That that puts it in context. So one point two
Speaker 2: minute if a tender thing like right, And it also
Speaker 2: stands up and this is a constant point of contention
Speaker 2: with some people, the amount that they got from the book. Robbery. Now,
Speaker 2: I know a guy that was in the robbery. He
Speaker 2: was on the floor and he's spoken to us about
Speaker 2: this different times, and he was a bookie's clerk and
Speaker 2: pretty wise man, successful man later on. But he's certainly
Speaker 2: not a fool and he says, Look, it was never
Speaker 2: as big a robbery as the media and others have
Speaker 2: said it was. It might have been double the official
Speaker 2: figure of one point three, but it wasn't lots and
Speaker 2: lots more. However, other people have said to me, look,
Speaker 2: I'm a bookmaker. We lost thirty five grand in the robbery.
Speaker 2: We were only insured for ten, so that was three
Speaker 2: and a half time. They lost three and a half
Speaker 2: times what they were insured for, which gives you a
Speaker 2: bit of an idea about what might have really happened. Well,
Speaker 2: it could have. The talk always is that there were
Speaker 2: six of them when they got about a million each. Yes,
Speaker 2: which Telly is with what i've put in what you've said.
Speaker 1: No, yeah, there was a lot of no offense with
Speaker 1: a lot of press put the figures up at two fifteen.
Speaker 1: But if you actually work out the weight of that money, yeah,
Speaker 1: too much. Six men couldn't carry it, even though they
Speaker 1: were warfies and they were strong guys. It would have
Speaker 1: been a struggle. So yeah, that figure is out the door.
Speaker 1: The other thing too, listeners might not aware, but back
Speaker 1: in those days, bookies paid tax on turnover, not on
Speaker 1: profits people do these days, So it didn't matter whether
Speaker 1: they won or lost. How much money they actually held
Speaker 1: on a race was taxed, and so that's why they lied.
Speaker 2: Of course, sorry Allegedly like it's fine, you can say
Speaker 2: that about okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So you know, it was a big thing that
Speaker 1: they just didn't want to pay, especially I guess if
Speaker 1: you think about it, if you're losing money and then
Speaker 1: they have to pay taxes on your losses, it would
Speaker 1: have been hard for them.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, but they didn't on tax book. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But because of that, they used to do things like
Speaker 1: they'd run two bags. Yeah, they got two lots of books,
Speaker 1: two lots of tickets, ticketing, So they did a lot
Speaker 1: of stuff that you.
Speaker 2: Know, the good they're good clients. They bet on the
Speaker 2: nod and it was all settled up at the Victoria,
Speaker 2: at the Victoria Club.
Speaker 1: So that that's what.
Speaker 2: It's interesting, isn't it? Even a little details, there's dispute
Speaker 2: about little things and disparities, which is interesting because it
Speaker 2: plays out all through these stories. In the coverage of
Speaker 2: the robbery, it's referred to in the same papers on
Speaker 2: the same day as the Victoria Club, Victoria and the
Speaker 2: Victorian Club, which doesn't matter at all. However, there is
Speaker 2: a photograph taken on the day or that week of
Speaker 2: the entrance of the Victorian Club, and it's got in
Speaker 2: the fanlight above the door Victorian with a man. Really, yeah,
Speaker 2: I've said, and I thought, well, there you go. I've
Speaker 2: always referred to as Victoria. Yeah, but a lot of
Speaker 2: people and I've often thought, well, Victoria is a correct one,
Speaker 2: but you know, lazy people at it an end. But
Speaker 2: the actual sign, right had anan on it, on the
Speaker 2: big fan light over the door, in footie letters or
Speaker 2: large letters, even those things. Both statements are correct, Neither
Speaker 2: is wrong. It was referred to it two different ways,
Speaker 2: sometimes on letterhead Victoria, but on its own entrance Victorian,
Speaker 2: and so many other things about it can also have
Speaker 2: differing interpretations and a different set of facts, like you know,
Speaker 2: Donald Trump, different different facts. So what you've gleaned over
Speaker 2: the journey, some of it from was from the players,
Speaker 2: from your brother and from Cox, Vinnie, Me and Vinnie
Speaker 2: and Vinnie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so they're the three that I would say I knew. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I met Bennett, as I mentioned, yeah, Chuck. But other
Speaker 1: than saying hello, I don't think we have actually any
Speaker 1: had any conversation, and the dynamic in a room would change. Again,
Speaker 1: people probably wouldn't understand this from the master criminal type
Speaker 1: point of view, but Ian was charming, he was fun,
Speaker 1: He was a really nice guy. And I know you're
Speaker 1: not allowed to say that, but he was. But when, but
Speaker 1: when he and Chuck got together, the dynamic changed.
Speaker 2: More ominous.
Speaker 1: Yeah, more ominous. That's probably the better word to use.
Speaker 2: Yes, somebody said to me once one a person who
Speaker 2: didn't like Chuck because her husband was murdered by him. Okay,
Speaker 2: this is Judy Kane, wife of Les, a very interesting
Speaker 2: and intelligent woman and very articulate. And she said, oh, Chuck,
Speaker 2: he was deep and dark, deep and dark. You know,
Speaker 2: she's sort of this And it was just a throwaway line.
Speaker 2: Nothing that tells you something about him. You said, he
Speaker 2: was always sort of plotting something, you know, yeah, something.
Speaker 1: Well maybe I mean yeah, well again, the Canes another thing.
Speaker 2: Bad boys. Did you meet them? No? No, Greg, you
Speaker 2: lived around the corner from your big brother Ian and
Speaker 2: to something. Because of the gap between you a good
Speaker 2: eight years difference, you actually formed a strong bond with him.
Speaker 2: He sort of regarded you as the little brother or that,
Speaker 2: and you got quite close obviously. When Ian was killed
Speaker 2: in January, that fatal day, big shock to the family.
Speaker 2: Can you recall that day and how you got the
Speaker 2: news and how to unspoiled.
Speaker 1: I remember bits and pieces of it all. I was
Speaker 1: actually the one who either elected to or was asked to,
Speaker 1: probably asked to, I guess, to go identify in his body.
Speaker 2: So you did.
Speaker 1: I had to go to the Morgan do that, which
Speaker 1: was confront.
Speaker 2: Twenty four years old, I think roughly, yeah, something like
Speaker 2: something like that, relatively young. You weren't seen many bodies.
Speaker 1: No, probably the first, and people probably wouldn't understand. It's
Speaker 1: not like it is on TV. A body is not
Speaker 1: cleaned up. I mean, obviously they hose off the blood
Speaker 1: and stuff, but it's still very raw.
Speaker 2: Hasn't been through the whole pretty things that happens at
Speaker 2: the funeral parliament, So seeing that was pretty confronting.
Speaker 1: I don't remember how I ended up being the one,
Speaker 1: but obviously I probably just offered to his wife, who
Speaker 1: I didn't want to have to go through that to
Speaker 1: do the identification. The funeral, which was well publicized with
Speaker 1: his cars and well known in biking circles as well.
Speaker 1: The funeral possession was about a mile long out the
Speaker 1: spring Bell and outside the funeral cars there was a
Speaker 1: procession of other classic cars and hot rods, of hyper
Speaker 1: rods and all that type of stuff. So there was
Speaker 1: a large, large group of people.
Speaker 2: How did your parents go with that?
Speaker 1: Again, I don't remember call. I mean father wouldn't have
Speaker 1: been there, he wouldn't have gone. He didn't go. I
Speaker 1: mean he didn't go. I suspect mother would have been there.
Speaker 1: But again I don't know that. That whole period, believe
Speaker 1: it or not, is really really almost out of my mind.
Speaker 2: I know that's what happens that mind does.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I don't really remember that. I have snippets
Speaker 1: of memories of being at his house afterwards, So we
Speaker 1: all went back to Ian's house or ray Lean's.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you were quite friendly with ray Leane. Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: where was she from? Was she from out there? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Their family lived in park Or, which is not far
Speaker 1: from local. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, so I met her sisters.
Speaker 1: She had a couple of sisters and a father. I
Speaker 1: don't remember meeting a mother. I don't know, but that
Speaker 1: was just incidentally. You meet people while you're at the
Speaker 1: place and stuff like that. But Rayling was a very
Speaker 1: beautiful woman.
Speaker 2: How did she go later? How was she? I had
Speaker 2: a heap of kids.
Speaker 1: They had two, yeah, and that was it. So she
Speaker 1: never had more what else. Yes, she had some other acquaintances,
Speaker 1: and I think she actually did get married remarried. At
Speaker 1: one stage they moved again, I'm not going to talk
Speaker 1: about where they moved to, but they moved out of town. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and obviously their children are still live. So again I
Speaker 1: don't mention them in the Book's one thing for me
Speaker 1: to tell the story. It's another thing to interrupt other
Speaker 1: people's privacy. So of course, so I've tried to avoid.
Speaker 2: That fair enough to I think we'd not mentioned it
Speaker 2: that this stage were clearly the Bookie robbery was a
Speaker 2: calamity for most people involved, nearly nearly everybody. Yes, and
Speaker 2: in fact, even the one survivor, the one that you
Speaker 2: know or knew, Vinnie Michelson, I doubt it did him
Speaker 2: a lot of good. And all the other bugs ended
Speaker 2: up dying young with their boots on.
Speaker 1: Ye. So yeah, there's constantly the talk about the curse
Speaker 1: of the book He robbery.
Speaker 2: But they don't end well, most.
Speaker 1: Of these, No, they don't. And to me, to me,
Speaker 1: it was an inevitable I think what happened to them.
Speaker 1: People who live that type of life of violence, they
Speaker 1: die by the sword. They died by the sword it
Speaker 1: really is, and it's not a curse. It's just where
Speaker 1: they were headed.
Speaker 2: Where they were headed, And of all of them, Cox
Speaker 2: is one that has survived. He ended up pulling his
Speaker 2: head in while in jail and sort of walking and saying,
Speaker 2: I'm out of here, ye no more, I you well,
Speaker 2: until one day we find out otherwise. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well I've got different views of Cox, but obviously I'm tainted.
Speaker 1: So but yeah, the parole board thought he had mended
Speaker 1: his ways and they released him.
Speaker 2: And he Cox the fox. He wasn't a mad dog.
Speaker 2: He was a no.
Speaker 1: No, that was really not a not a very good
Speaker 1: name and accurate no.
Speaker 2: And I know the bluck They didn't And he concedes
Speaker 2: that he said it was just just one of those
Speaker 2: things we used to do. But he realizes that he
Speaker 2: was really more a fox than that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In fact, from my experience with Cox was that he
Speaker 1: was a chameleon. Apart from the fact that he changed
Speaker 1: his appearance all the time, his nature. You see him
Speaker 1: with different people, and he was a totally different person.
Speaker 1: And this is like a barbecue or was that with him?
Speaker 1: You know, he go from person to person as a
Speaker 1: different person. Yeah, And I don't even know if it
Speaker 1: was acting or it was just him in him, but you.
Speaker 2: Would wonder what pressures on some of these blogs as kids,
Speaker 2: what happened to them as kids boys homes Let's say, yeah,
Speaker 2: well that turned a lot of them into very violent
Speaker 2: and strange individuals, and he might especially if they're intelligent, which.
Speaker 1: I mean, to be on the run for eleven years
Speaker 1: is quite remarkable.
Speaker 2: An extraordinary achievement and says a lot about being a chameleon.
Speaker 2: Greg Of course, the reason we're here, apart from wanting
Speaker 2: to know more about one of the major crimes of
Speaker 2: Australian history, really is that you've produced this rather good
Speaker 2: book eleven Minutes, which for those who are out there
Speaker 2: might want it. It's by Gregory M. Carol and you
Speaker 2: wrote it since over some time after twenty twenty two. Yes,
Speaker 2: and you've explained to us that you'd spent a lot
Speaker 2: of time wanting to do a biography about your brother,
Speaker 2: but realized really a'd be better to novelize it and
Speaker 2: use some real facts and delve into your own intuition
Speaker 2: and snippets of knowledge that you did have sort of
Speaker 2: educated guesses in many ways, and some of them better
Speaker 2: than that.
Speaker 1: Perhaps I mean just the process of going through a
Speaker 1: writing book was quite cathartic, drawing out the feelings you had,
Speaker 1: and that was the main thing. The reason I went
Speaker 1: for a novel is I wanted to show to show
Speaker 1: that these were real people, show some emotion, and discuss
Speaker 1: why people did things. I mean, it's really easy to
Speaker 1: look at the Bookie robbery and talk about it as
Speaker 1: almost a caricature, and it wasn't like that at all.
Speaker 1: Obviously the robbery itself was quite dramatic, but these were
Speaker 1: people who had loves and lives, and even the whole
Speaker 1: ray thing was a degeneration of probably the wrong words.
Speaker 1: He is it was, he went down into the point
Speaker 1: of killing Leskane, then his own death at Brian's hands.
Speaker 1: It was kind of a spiral.
Speaker 2: Even minutes. It took a lot more than that to
Speaker 2: write it. How long did it take you to write it?
Speaker 1: Well, once I decided to write it as a novel,
Speaker 1: which is basically just using the other information as background information,
Speaker 1: it's probably eighteen months to write, and then it probably
Speaker 1: went through about eight or ten drafts redrafts.
Speaker 2: Did you get some professional help with any of that?
Speaker 1: No, The editing of the book's been praised by a
Speaker 1: lot of people, including professional editors. It's tight, Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1: It was actually my wife.
Speaker 2: Okay, good. So what's her background?
Speaker 1: Her background as a bookkeeper or accounting. Oh, okay, but
Speaker 1: obviously she's very good at English, as she always was.
Speaker 1: But yeah, she had a lot of input to their shaw.
Speaker 2: Two heads are better than one.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, Ian was actually my best man in my wedding.
Speaker 1: Was it to my wife? Yeah, so that's how close
Speaker 1: we were.
Speaker 2: What were her thoughts about Ian and the whole thing. Well,
Speaker 2: she liked it.
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't think she actually knew k you
Speaker 1: about a lot of the problems. Until his death, the
Speaker 1: Times and I would have together at his house. She'd
Speaker 1: be with ray Lane and they'd be drinking or having
Speaker 1: coffee or whatever they're doing, and I'd be doing things
Speaker 1: go up to the barn, to the shed and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. And so a lot of our discussions were
Speaker 1: one on one, so she wasn't really involved in it.
Speaker 2: I'm going to ask you to read the opening sentence
Speaker 2: or to your book so that our listeners can get
Speaker 2: a taste of what it's like from the man who
Speaker 2: wrote it.
Speaker 1: It happened just after midday the Wednesday following Easter Long weekend,
Speaker 1: six mast Man appeared out of nowhere, bursting into the
Speaker 1: settling room of the Melbourne Victoria Club. Dressed identically in overalls,
Speaker 1: faces hidden behind balaclava's. They moved like a military unit,
Speaker 1: armed with heavy weapons, machine guns, tommy guns, automatic assault
Speaker 1: prifles and listeners.
Speaker 2: If you want to hear the rest by the book,
Speaker 2: thanks for listening. Life and Crimes is a Sunday Herald
Speaker 2: Sun production for True crime Australia. Our producer is Johnty Burton.
Speaker 2: For my columns, features and more, go to Heroldsun dot
Speaker 2: com dot au, forward slash andrew rule one word. For
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Speaker 2: And if you want further information about this episode, links
Speaker 2: are in the description.