Great Train Robber Goody Confesses Fifty Years On

AN oxygen tank by his side, ­Gordon Goody cuts a frail figure as he sits in his Spanish garden. Regarded by many as the mastermind behind the Great Train Robbery, the ­incredible story of his life is drawing to an end. But before he dies, Goody, 84, wants to tell the truth about his role in one of Britain’s most notorious crimes. And as the 50th ­anniversary of the robbery approaches next month, he speaks publicly for the first time. In an exclusive interview, he tells just how the gang pulled it off and claims that the police had to fabricate evidence to get him sent to prison. “I got away with the perfect crime, so the police fitted me up,” he says. “I’m not saying I was an innocent man being fitted up – I was a guilty man doing his best not to get fitted up, but they were ­determined to get me and they did.” The Great Train Robbery netted Goody and his 17-strong gang £2.6million – ­equivalent to more than £40million today. Some of those responsible, including ­Ronnie Biggs and Buster Edwards, were turned into folk heroes. But Goody’s role in the crime has often been overlooked. Suffering from emphysema and at times struggling to breathe, he says he wants to put his side of the story before it is too late. Goody, who still owns one of the original stolen mailbags, claims that officers from the Flying Squad were desperate to “get him” because he ­humiliated them several times by walking free after earlier robberies. Gordon Goody Leader: Good going into court after raid Getty It all stemmed from a job in November 1962 when Goody, along with Bruce Reynolds, Buster Edwards, Charlie Wilson and Roy James, stole the contents of a cash van at Heathrow airport and escaped with £62,000. When one of the getaway ­drivers was recognised, police pulled in the rest of the gang. “I was put on an ID parade and picked out, so was Charlie Wilson,” says Goody. “Charlie’s case fell apart but the one against me was pretty solid. I knew I had no choice but to get to one of the jurors. “In those days, judges would only accept a unanimous verdict so you only needed to get to one to get the case thrown out. I picked out a likely looking prospect and followed him home. It turned out he’d done time in the past and had no problems taking money to put a spanner in the works.” Goody was later retried for the crime and this time decided to take a different route. He says: “Charlie Wilson knew a crooked copper who had access to the prosecution exhibits. The witnesses that identified me said I’d been wearing a tweed hat. For £200, the bent copper agreed to steal the hat and replace it with one three sizes bigger. “When they made me try the hat on in court, it covered my eyes and nose. It was clear that I couldn’t have been the one wearing the hat. The jury came back with a not guilty pretty quick.” As he walked out of court, Goody ran into the chief prosecutor and couldn’t resist boasting about the fact that he’d got away with the crime. “I couldn’t resist taking the mickey,” he says. “It was a stupid thing to do and I feel ashamed that I did it, even now.” Despite the popular conception that Bruce Reynolds, who died last year, was head of the gang, it was actually Goody who was approached with the original information that would lead to the robbery. Brian Field, a crooked solicitor’s clerk who had been involved in Goody’s defence for the airport heist, passed the details to him. “All I was told was that there was a large amount of money in transit and that a well-organised gang could liberate it,” says Goody. Field ­arranged a meeting between Goody and a contact known as The Ulsterman. He says: “The Ulsterman had a friend who was a postal worker and had given him all the details about the train timetables and security. "He told us the carriage with the money was normally the second car from the engine. "The Ulsterman reckoned that at holiday periods we could be talking in the region of six million quid. I took it to Bruce and the rest of the gang.” Investigators at great train robbery scene End of the line: Train after heist ©Mirrorpix Goody and the others had robbed trains before and considered themselves experts. “I worked out we only needed eight people on the job, but the problem was how to stop the train,” he says. “Buster had a friend, Roger Cordrey, who worked for a South London firm that was always robbing trains. We hoped they’d tell us how they stopped them. "They agreed, but only on condition their whole firm got in on the job.” The gang also needed somebody to drive the train, so they called on Ronnie Biggs who’d done time with ­ Reynolds and said he knew a retired train driver. “Biggs was ­supposed to get a few quid for the ­introduction but he could smell the money and wanted in on the job,” he adds. “A few of us were opposed. He was an ar**hole. But we had no choice.” On the night of the robbery, Cordrey ­simply placed a glove over the green lens of the train signal and attached a battery to the red bulb to switch it on. “If we’d known it was as easy as that, we would have done it ourselves,” says Goody. The train stopped at the signal. Biggs and his friend climbed into the carriage to drive it to the bridge where it was to be unloaded, but the friend turned out not to know how to drive the train after all. Goody says: “We kicked Ronnie out and told him to wait in the van. He hadn’t been any use at all.” Instead the gang turned to the original driver, Jack Mills. When Mills refused to drive, he was coshed on the head and ­threatened until he agreed. That violence marred the gang’s reputation as gentlemen thieves. Mills never recovered from his injuries, suffering headaches for the rest of his life. He died from leukaemia seven years later. The gang always refused to say who had been responsible for the attack but last year James Hussey made a death-bed confession that it was him. Tony Thompson with one of the actual mail bags from the Great Train Robbery The original mailbag Philip Coburn/Sunday Mirror It took nearly half-an-hour to unload all the bags of cash and another half-hour to make the journey to Leatherslade Farm in Buckinghamshire where the loot was to be divided. Goody says: “All the money had been stacked up. That thing about playing ­Monopoly with real money... that never ­happened. We did have a few drinks though.” The farm hideout was later discovered by police who claimed it contained a wealth of evidence. Furious Goody says: “I had worn two pairs of gloves. We also paid someone to clean up, but they did a runner. There should have been nothing left for the police.” He was eventually arrested two months later in Leicester. He says he’d felt certain there would be no evidence to tie him to the robbery, but then police said that yellow paint found on a pair of shoes at Goody’s home matched paint found at the farm. “I knew they had planted the evidence because I hadn’t worn those shoes during the robbery,” he says. At his trial, the same experts Goody had mocked after the airport case admitted that while the paint on Goody’s shoes was similar, it wasn’t exactly the same. He says: “I thought it was going well, but then the argument became that if the police were going to fit me up, they would have used the exact same paint, so that became proof that the paint hadn’t been planted and I was found guilty.” He was sentenced to 30 years and was ­considered such an escape risk that the Army was drafted in to guard him at Durham Prison. He was then transferred to a high-security unit at Parkhurst prison on the Isle of Wight ­until his release in 1976. He later moved to Spain where he has lived ever since with his Spanish partner of 30 years, Maria. Asked what he did with the money he says he buried a lot of it, but most went on legal fees. He also claims some was stolen by people he entrusted to look after it while he was inside. Now he is set to tell all in a TV ­documentary this year and will even reveal the identify of The Ulsterman. On every anniversary of the infamous robbery – August 8 – Goody raises a glass to his gang. Fifty years on, he says the wine will taste that much sweeter now that he has told his side of the story of a heist that made c­riminal legends of them all. Check out all the latest News, Sport & Celeb gossip at Mirror.co.uk http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/great-train-robber-gordon-goody-2097638#ixzz2b5564aZv