Australian Who Escaped From Klong Prem Prison Writes A Book

[Prakanong]

After all the debate, I have decided to buy it and have a look it. I will post my comments on it when I have read it.

I hope that by purchasing this book I am not now classed as a dipstick.

I will buy it an read it too - I have read some of the worst trash possible due to a Thai connection.

What is worse I have a pile of Thailand related books where I could only read the first few pages and left it unread they were so bad.

Some of Christopher Moores books come to mind and David Young

[funfun]

After all the debate, I have decided to buy it and have a look it. I will post my comments on it when I have read it.

I hope that by purchasing this book I am not now classed as a dipstick.

In some peoples eyes, im affraid so!

.

[mrtoad]

After all the debate, I have decided to buy it and have a look it. I will post my comments on it when I have read it.

I hope that by purchasing this book I am not now classed as a dipstick.

In some peoples eyes, im affraid so!

.

- Yes, from the literary snobs.

[qwertz]

In my view posters positions are driven more by not wishing to contribute money to the 'author', rather than the book, or for that matter his right to write it.

Having scanned it some while ago in Asia Books, and not wishing to turn the shop into a library, my view was that it was factually questionable {the remand centre is not 'Bangkok Hilton'}, the life style he bought himself while there was hardly the stuff of Papillon, and his money allowed him to purchase his 'way out', through forged documents from 'Chinatown'.

It also didn't strike me as terribly readable, so for that reason, as well as not wishing to add to his retirement fund, I'll not be buying it.

Regards

It's just another example that disproves the saying "Crime don't pay".

[gburns57au]

Chris Parnell has the scars to prove it....his book is reasonably factual... compared to others I have read.

Not saying it would not be a very rough hole - they all claim (the Aussies ) to be innocent

At least Sandra Gregory puts her hands up, admists stupidity, apologises to the Thai people, lectured to schoolkids on the badness of drugs and went to Oxford and got a 2.1

I work in a jail here....only a handful of them are guilty...according to them..

I wasnt commenting on his guilt/innocence....just that I found the book to be more factual than most of this genre, taking into account that all stories like this are given the treatment by the writers to make them more interesting. I really enjoyed the Sunday Smuggler...and with the other Aussies in Indo jails at the moment, it gives an insight to the conditions they live in.

[sriracha john]

Escape by David McMillan

These satellite maps from Google Earth are for people reading "Escape" by David McMillan and published by Monsoon Books. Visit Thai-Blogs.com for an exclusive interview.

This first picture shows the area around Klong Prem Prison and also Don Muang Airport. At that time, in August 1996, Don Muang was the international airport. The distance by road from the prison to the airport is about 9.5 kilometres.

This is Klong Prem Prison. We have rotated it a little so that it fits square on this page. You can see that there is a moat that goes around the outside of the walls. If you look closely on the wall you can make out the watch towers. Number 1 shows the main entrance to the prison. The grassed areas are restricted for the contact visits with the prisoners that take place a couple of times a year. Number 2 is Building 6 which is where David had his cell and where he started his escape. The red roof building to the right is the bakery. Number 3 is the main hospital.

Google Earth Maps and article continued here:

http://www.thailandphotomap.com/maps/escap...d-mcmillan.html

[sriracha john]

The one who got away

The man I glimpse in London seems innocuous enough. Used to hiding in crowds, he now travels to work against the morning commuter rush to Dorking, a small town in Surrey. His job is filling tins of health supplements, and his boss says he's a quick worker.

He should be. David McMillan is a notorious drug trafficker. He still faces the death sentence in Thailand for heroin smuggling.

He's better known as "the only Westerner to have escaped the notorious Bangkok Hilton'', as Lad Yao Prison is unaffectionately known. He did so in the middle of his trial in August 1996.

In the decade before that event McMillan was at the centre of a daring plan to escape by helicopter from Australia's Pentridge Prison, a stunt for which he was willing to pay half a million Australian dollars.

His story, "Escape", has been selling well at Asia Books and in airport lounges throughout Southeast Asia. It has not been released in Australia, where publishers fear the cash might be seized as the proceeds of crime.

Britain will not allow extradition to a country that still uses the death penalty, so at 51, McMillan remains safe from Australian clutches, and Thailand, busy with a higher-profile fugitive, seems to have all but forgotten him.

In the book McMillan gives some details on how he operated during the 30 years he was moving heroin from the Golden Triangle and from Pakistan and Afghanistan's Golden Crescent to markets in Australia and Europe - and about his amazing Bangkok jailbreak.

But the book is not a testimony to inhumanity and depravity in Thai prisons, like so many others on the shelves. In fact, it's almost the opposite. McMillan played the system and won. He was an Oriental Hotel regular; others who write of Thai jail horrors seem to be more Nana Plaza types.

At the peak of his career in the '80s McMillan was a multimillionaire with homes and offices in London, Melbourne, Hong Kong and Brussels, as well as Bangkok.

But as he came to the attention of British, American and Australian authorities, he never took a direct route anywhere. He lived a life of switching cabs, entering and exiting department stores, and carrying a seemingly endless variety of mobile phones and passports.

After finishing school McMillan did actually try to get a regular job, but then started his own company. It was called Kilo Productions.

He was busted for his first kilo of cannabis at London's Heathrow Airport in 1979 and served six months in jail.

"I started dealing among friends, but of course, with the profits being so good it went much bigger," he says. "I am not going to pretend what I am not ... It is inevitable that ... I will be labelled a 'Merchant of Death' or something like that. I make no justification for my actions.

"Actually the reason I wrote the book was not to make money. It's because so many people asked me during dinner conversations how I escaped from the Bangkok Hilton. I just thought I'd put it down on paper."

McMillan writes that he wanted "a life of adventure. The drug world provided that opportunity ... Travelling to exotic locations, devising ways to cheat customs, and being handsomely rewarded seemed ideal."

And he admits to paying a high price: His wife was arrested along with him in Australia and died in a fire at the remand centre a few weeks later.

"Was it worth it? The answer is that such a life is not quite worth the suffering. All of us have less than 50 years of quality, and so many were spent imprisoned or locked in a losing battle with police agencies of different kinds. Most of my friends from those days are dead and coped less well, I think ...

"I've got no time for most of the people who write these whining books about Thai prisons," McMillan says. "I understand the Thais and the way they work. I do not see what they do as corruption, in the same way that other prisoners did."

Of course, McMillan was not just a lowly courier, as are most foreigners at the Bangkok Hilton. His banker on the outside knew exactly how to look after him.

While the foreign prisoners in the prison's Building 2 were waging a battle against vermin, worms, tuberculosis and Aids on a diet of soup with an occasional fish-head, McMillan in Building 6 had his own chef and servants and dined on goods bought in the local supermarket.

"I had access to television and radio and my own office, and instead of 70 to a cell we just had five. This all cost about Bt10,000 a week each.

"I did not see it as bribery. The guards saw themselves as helping and I was just showing my gratitude. We wanted it to be a bit more like a hotel and we were willing to pay."

One of his privileged fellow prisoners was former police general Chalor Kerdthes, jailed for murder in the Saudi gems fiasco. McMillan refers to him in the book by a pseudonym, but is happy to talk on the record.

"General Chalor had an even more comfortable time than I did. He was like royalty. He had taken over the prison's [intensive Care Unit] as his own suite."

Chalor refused to help McMillan, and that's when the Briton decided it was time to go.

"I knew I was going to get the death penalty," he says, and a move to Bangkwang Prison was imminent.

Using hacksaws smuggled into prison in a box of pornography that served to distract the guards, McMillan got from his third-floor cell to the jail's outer wall.

He built a pair of ladders from bamboo poles and the picture frames that the prisoners make to earn some income, and cleared two smaller walls and the outer electrified wall. He says he felt only two surges of electricity on his rubber soles before dropping to the ground below.

Then, using an umbrella to shield him from the guards in the towers, he followed the path around the prison. Other guards were just arriving for the morning shift as he strolled out to the main road and hailed a taxi.

By 10am, McMillan had picked up a passport that was waiting for him in Chinatown and was boarding a flight for Singapore.

Having escaped the death penalty - or at least the minimum 100-year sentence - he might have considered quitting the drug trade. He didn't.

He fled to Pakistan, and there was arrested on another charge of heroin trafficking. At Karachi Central Prison, McMillan befriended the husband of deposed president Benazir Bhutto, and a bank executive jailed for fraud.

"Both men had been allowed to build their own houses in the prison complex, complete with gardens. I dined at their typically British Sunday lunches, at which all sorts of influential people from the outside, including leaders of industry and police, attended."

McMillan was ultimately acquitted for lack of evidence and by the late 1990s was back in England, still unwilling to quit.

He was last arrested in 2003 at Heathrow for bringing in half a kilo of heroin. He got four years and is currently out on parole.

McMillan can only console himself with a statement made last week by Australian lawyer Philip Dunn: "McMillan was very charming, a dashing buccaneer, very different from your average criminal."

- Andrew Drummond, Special to The Nation, Andrew Drummond is a Bangkok-based British journalist and correspondent for the Times of London.

[Neeranam]

Lad Yao Prison

Bang Kwang

Klong Prem

I've heard all the above referred to as the notorious Bangkok Hilton - let's get it straight - it's Bang Kwang.

[lazeeboy]

Lad Yao Prison

Bang Kwang

Klong Prem

I've heard all the above referred to as the notorious Bangkok Hilton - let's get it straight - it's Bang Kwang.

crime does pay ,own chefs and servants ,better life than most of us ,normally dont read this type of stuff but maybe i'll give this one a go .......

[womble]

his past will catch up with him.

He thinks he's too clever.

[lazeeboy]

his past will catch up with him.

He thinks he's too clever.

how long will he be filling tins with supplements ,before the itch for big bucks return ........

[Paul123456]

I tried to look up the book review on Thai blogs but couldn't find it.

But anyway what a load of crap.

So this guy escaped and is now allowed to live in Britain and write books about it despite being a convicted criminal. Doesn't sound right.

Used SAS members to fly him out of another prison? Really - hate to spoil your fantasy, but SAS don't fly helicopters. They are ground troops. Aviation Corps fly the helicopters. And I think their CO would be a bit pissed if they went around getting drug traffickers out of jail. Don't think that one is true either.

What else? - I am sure maybe 1% of what this idiot writes is accurate but like the others have said I won't give him an income by reading his crap.

Paul

[nikster]

This is a pretty good story. My bet that he'll sell the film rights for his life to hollywood soon. I picture Leonardo di Caprio as notorious smuggler.

It's perfect also because drug smuggling has very harsh penalties yet no one's harmed. **

** Drug laws are just the state playing nanny for its citizens, and throwing a fit when they don't obey. People can drink themselves to death but are not allowed to use other drugs to do so, how does that make sense. Let's say I sympathize with Mr McMillan, even though as he said he did betray his cell mates as he escaped.

[nikster]

Being old-fashioned is no excuse for thinking like a guard dog.

Rain, it's not an argument, It's reality.

It is natural law that you can't control other people's private behavior

and its a waste of time if you bother others for things that don't affect you.

If you're against drugs, you and your dog can be drug free.

I am, too by the way. I'm also against smoking and sitting in a bar

all day half drunk and talking nonsense. When I was young, I experimented,

but now I have only 1 or 2 beers per week.

But I have no right to stop you - and its not my concern - unless you're forcing your

behavior on me.

If we were close friends and I wanted to help you, I might try to talk with you

about your drug/alcohol/cigarette abuse and try to be supportive. That's called

nurturing. Creating non-sensical and arbitrary laws about other poeple's private

lives denotes a sense of arrogance (you know better than others about how they

should behave an have a right to force your way upon them) and ignorance (its

counter-productive and ineffective to try).

The only people I know that are so overbearing as to try to dictate others'

actions are self-righteous delusionists that believe in some imaginary entity

that give them a right to control others, paranoid police types and those that

are afraid of what they would do if all drugs were legalized.

If you really believe in controlling others, go to Baghdad and see how effective it is.

Frankly, since I don't know you, I don't care if you are a junkie and I'm not going

to waste my time chasing you down or the guy that sold drugs to you. There are

people in this world that truly need help while you stake out the apartment across the way

because somebody smokes pot there.

Do you I know how many children die every day because of the world's neglect?

One child dies every 5 SECONDS because of lack of clean water, basic food and/or

cheap and common medicines.

That's where you should be putting your energy - not condemning and chasing and

imprisoning people that don't want or need your help. There are plenty of people that

really need it. Check out the World Food Program. Do some good.

GREAT POST!

QFT!

[Neeranam]

This is a pretty good story. My bet that he'll sell the film rights for his life to hollywood soon. I picture Leonardo di Caprio as notorious smuggler.

It's perfect also because drug smuggling has very harsh penalties yet no one's harmed. **

** Drug laws are just the state playing nanny for its citizens, and throwing a fit when they don't obey. People can drink themselves to death but are not allowed to use other drugs to do so, how does that make sense. Let's say I sympathize with Mr McMillan, even though as he said he did betray his cell mates as he escaped.

Some people on this thread don't believe in rehabilitation. Good luck to the man.

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug. Alcohol on the other hand.... how many lives does it ruin direcly and indirectly.

[bendix]

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug.

And in nine small words, a valued poster wantonly throws away all his accumulated credibility . . .

[sylviex]

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug.

And in nine small words, a valued poster wantonly throws away all his accumulated credibility . . .

Some medical doctors would agree with him, though. They say that, if properly managed (and there's the rub, but it seems some people are able to do this (-- ensure quality is good and don't keep increasing dosage). If handled with care, they say heroin causes less long-term damage & impairment than alcohol. I am told it's well known that a small % of medical practitioners are heroin users, though you'd never suspect them of it.

[bkkjames]

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug.

And in nine small words, a valued poster wantonly throws away all his accumulated credibility . . .

Some medical doctors would agree with him, though. They say that, if properly managed (and there's the rub, but it seems some people are able to do this (-- ensure quality is good and don't keep increasing dosage). If handled with care, they say heroin causes less long-term damage & impairment than alcohol. I am told it's well known that a small % of medical practitioners are heroin users, though you'd never suspect them of it.

The above sentence I have bolded interests me. Could it be that heroin addicts don't live long enough on average to suffer long-term damage and impairment?

[sylviex]

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug.

And in nine small words, a valued poster wantonly throws away all his accumulated credibility . . .

Some medical doctors would agree with him, though. They say that, if properly managed (and there's the rub, but it seems some people are able to do this (-- ensure quality is good and don't keep increasing dosage). If handled with care, they say heroin causes less long-term damage & impairment than alcohol. I am told it's well known that a small % of medical practitioners are heroin users, though you'd never suspect them of it.

The above sentence I have bolded interests me. Could it be that heroin addicts don't live long enough on average to suffer long-term damage and impairment?

I think most heroin-related deaths are due to either overdose or impurities (something other than heroin). Also infection from dirty needles/acquiring other diseases such as HIV.

Hence my two disclaimers above.

The issue of purity is one of the pro-legalisation arguments.

What are the long-term effects of heroin ? I am not sure -- vein problems may be one.

BTW, I should have said alcohol abuse in my post above.

Please note I am not by any means suggesting anyone take up heroin use -- far from it.

[kmart]

Its the other chemicals that illegal drugs are "cut" with, that causes the most damage to users. This is why doctors and loaded rock stars like Keith Richards(e.g.) can remain relatively healthy; due to the purity of their supply.

Injecting yourself regularly with "Drain-O" will soon do you a bit of damage. I imagine.

[sylviex]

Its the other chemicals that illegal drugs are "cut" with, that causes the most damage to users. This is why doctors and loaded rock stars like Keith Richards(e.g.) can remain relatively healthy; due to the purity of their supply.

Injecting yourself regularly with "Drain-O" will soon do you a bit of damage. I imagine.

Isn't it "Drayno", kmart ?

[Mosha]

According to a recent report on the Taksin/Man City deal in the UK's Guardian newspaper, an extradition treaty exists between the UK and Thailand. Are the Thai authorities pressing for his return?

It seems a fair number of British villains are nicked here and returned. Surely, it must be time for Thailand to call in a favour or are they just hoping he'll appear at a book signing in Asia Books?

I watched a program last year on Discovery, about this guy ( a European ) who would befriend tourists to scam them, then murder them. Interpol were involved, he ran. He was later arrested in India for crimes there. He got time. Just before he was due to be released, he escaped, then let himself be recaptured. He got extra time. This however took him past a 10 spell since his crimes in Thailand. The program claimed that if someone evaded arrest or sentencing for 10 years the crime was wiped from the sheet. Luckily this guy got arrested in Bhutan I think. He was awaiting trial for capital crimes so hopefuly he is no longer using up valuble oxygen.

[lifeisrandom]

drug dealers dont force people to take drugs

do u also hate people who sell hamburgers ?

[lifeisrandom]

alcohol is addictive and dangerous to health but drinking it is okay

heroin is addictive and dangerous to health and doing it makes you the scum of the earth

lol

[Super Hans]

The damage a drug causes to society is generally determined by its legal status. Opiates do very little damage to internal organs, an enormous contrast to, say, alcohol, which is brutal to say the least.

Using hacksaws smuggled into prison in a box of pornography that served to distract the guards

Is there anything more gloriously Thai than this? It is truly the mark of a great country when you can escape from prison armed with nothing but a box of Razzle.

[dotcom]

I watched a program last year on Discovery, about this guy ( a European ) who would befriend tourists to scam them, then murder them. Interpol were involved, he ran. He was later arrested in India for crimes there. He got time. Just before he was due to be released, he escaped, then let himself be recaptured. He got extra time. This however took him past a 10 spell since his crimes in Thailand. The program claimed that if someone evaded arrest or sentencing for 10 years the crime was wiped from the sheet. Luckily this guy got arrested in Bhutan I think. He was awaiting trial for capital crimes so hopefuly he is no longer using up valuble oxygen.

Charles Sobhraj. Indian decent & very nasty piece of work.

He escaped in India by having a friend bring a box of chocolates for the guards laced with a sleeping drug.

He was shit scared of being brought back to Thailand because he knew he faced the gallows here. A Dutch Embassy officer cracked this case & chased Sobraj (the serpent) all over the world.

Sobhraj

Edited October 20, 2008 by dotcom

[sylviex]

Using hacksaws smuggled into prison in a box of pornography that served to distract the guards

....

Is there anything more gloriously Thai than this? It is truly the mark of a great country when you can escape from prison armed with nothing but a box of Razzle.

Indeed !

This sentence caught my attention, too. There's a massive implication there I that can't get -- bribery, I suppose ? How on earth could pornography conceal hackshaws ?

Not telling so we have to buy the book ?

Edited October 20, 2008 by sylviex

[unomi]

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug.

And in nine small words, a valued poster wantonly throws away all his accumulated credibility . . .

http://www.reason.com/news/show/28809.html

[brahmburgers]

Why do all the posters so far hate drug smugglers so much?

And no, the answer isn't obvious.

I've tried heroin, and in my experience (granted it wasn't typical, i.e., leading to addiction robbery, etc), it was not a big deal. In fact it was one of the most relaxing and enjoyable experiences I've had.

In comparison, I can think of a multitude of human behaviors that are more harmful than doing heroin. I currently don't do any drugs; opiates, fermented sugars (a.k.a. alcohol), nor uppers, nor downers, ....but that's another story.

Some readers will take the US gov't stance (which Thailand copies note for note, as they do all US dictates on drugs) ....and state that heroin is horrible in all scenarios. That's like saying handguns are horrible in all ways, though even handgun haters can admit there are times when handguns (in some scenarios) are not altogether horrible - such as a handgun-wielding good guy chasing off a bad guy bent on doing harm.

Granted, there are bad scenarios related to heroin, but there are bad scenarios related to drunk drivers, crazed husbands, predator uncles, twinkie'd assassins (Harvey Milk comes to mind), as well as bad scenarios related to over-the-counter drugs, suicide airline pilots (Egypt Air comes to mind) and a slew of other activities.

For some users, heroin is a downer that's done by adults in privacy - with no one else knowing, no one else being affected.

Thai authorities would do themselves a favor by looking squarely at all drugs, and deciding for themselves (without heavy influence from Uncle Sam) ....which are harmful, and to what extent. A blanket policy that states all recreational drugs are dangerous and therefore deserve the death penalty is a stupid policy that, among other things, unwittingly criminalizes vast segments of society.

[MKAsok]

Although illegal, heroin is not that dangerous a drug.

And in nine small words, a valued poster wantonly throws away all his accumulated credibility . . .

A surprisingly ill-considered remark for you Bendix. I'd expect better.