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- Herausgeber: Naked Eye Creative
- Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
- Sprache: Englisch
And how do you think you’d turn out if your father was a convicted heroin trafficker? ‘For a reasonably smart guy I’ve done some dumb shit, but I’ve got nothing on my father. His choice in Bangkok, to not flush the heroin, was how my life started. But I’ll be damned if it’s going to define me. Don’t get me wrong – I’m no angel, ask anyone who knows me, but I had to get completely lost so I could find myself.’ Adrian Simon, Milk-Blood This is not your standard memoir. I am the son of Warren Fellows, the infamous heroin trafficker who was imprisoned in the Big Tiger in Bangkok, and who later published his internationally bestselling memoir The Damage Done. There is a good chance you, or someone you know has read it, but like all good stories there are two sides. Milk-Blood tells the other side. While my father languished behind foreign bars for 12 years, I was forced to grow up fast, and my mother had to take on some pretty soul-destroying stuff in order to keep us above ground. Thing is, when the flash cars, the big bucks, and the international lifestyle are stripped away, people who claim to have had your back turn on you. Society, the media, they didn’t care that I was just a kid. But unlike my father’s choices, the risks my mother took were out of love, not greed. As soon as I was able, I took off overseas to “discover” myself, along the way pushing all limits, both mind and body. Turns out I inherited the same wild streak both my parents have, and I learnt first hand how to turn an average set of cards into a winning hand. Albeit at a high cost. There are natural storytellers and then there are people who have lived a story. The real question that faced me every single day: Would I grow up to repeat the mistakes of my father? Everyone expected me to crash and burn. Who wouldn’t, through all this dysfunction? If you enjoyed watching Breaking Bad and the story of Pablo Escobar in Narcos, then I think you’ll enjoy this family epic - a powerful read, if I may say so myself. No bars are held here – I tell you, intimately, how it really was. And I don’t come out the hero, trust me! But I don’t turn out too damn bad, either. Why did I write this? Honestly? To shine a light on the invisible people, like my mother who endured the unimaginable. I’ve been humbled by life but now I’m staking my claim. A person’s reach should always exceed their grasp.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018
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About Milk-Blood
Milk-Blood: A Father’s Choice, the Family’s Price
This is not your standard memoir. I am the son of Warren Fellows, the infamous heroin trafficker who was imprisoned in the Big Tiger in Bangkok, and who later published his internationally bestselling memoir The Damage Done. There is a good chance you, or someone you know has read it, but like all good stories there are two sides. Milk-Blood tells the other side.
While my father languished behind foreign bars for 12 years, I was forced to grow up fast, and my mother had to take on some pretty soul-destroying stuff in order to keep us above ground. Thing is, when the flash cars, the big bucks, and the international lifestyle are stripped away, people who claim to have had your back turn on you. Society, the media, they didn’t care that I was just a kid. But unlike my father’s choices, the risks my mother took were out of love, not greed.
As soon as I was able, I took off overseas to “discover” myself, along the way pushing all limits, both mind and body. Turns out I inherited the same wild streak both my parents have, and I learnt first hand how to turn an average set of cards into a winning hand. Albeit at a high cost.
There are natural storytellers and then there are people who have lived a story. The real question that faced me every single day: Would I grow up to repeat the mistakes of my father? Everyone expected me to crash and burn. Who wouldn’t, through all this dysfunction?
If you enjoyed watching Breaking Bad and the story of Pablo Escobar in Narcos, then I think you’ll enjoy this family epic - a powerful read, if I may say so myself. No bars are held here – I tell you, intimately, how it really was. And I don’t come out the hero, trust me! But I don’t turn out too damn bad, either.
Why did I write this? Honestly? To shine a light on the invisible people, like my mother who endured the unimaginable. I’ve been humbled by life but now I’m staking my claim. A person’s reach should always exceed their grasp.
To my mother, and my grandparents Colin and Alma.
Contents
Author’s Note
Till recently I never thought of myself as a writer, just someone with a big story to tell. In writing this book I was motivated by events that shattered my heart into thousands of dysfunctional and bloody shards. Tired of band-aiding my flesh, I decided to face it and rebuild the damage within, along the way discovering not everything was as it seemed; a facade. My father’s life, the man the world heralded for trafficking heroin, was a mere shadow compared to that which my mother and I were forced to lead.
Life indeed takes us down random roads, sometimes for reasons that aren’t clear until we take a hard look at ourselves. I’m here to prove that sometimes the apple falls very far from the tree. Usually in our darkest hours, when direction abandons us, we discover who we are and what we are made of.
Some names and places have been changed to protect individuals’ privacy. This story is solely my perspective of events and how I saw the situations that arose in my life. This is just how it is!
For more, please check out www.adriansimonauthor.com
Prologue
This place was madness: streetlights whizzed past, car horns blared. I sat between my mother and her best friend Toni in the back of a tuktuk as it jockeyed for position in the chaotic back streets of Bangkok. A questionable place for a two and a half year old at night. Women hung provocatively out of bars, flagging down potential customers from all parts of the world. My mother Jan and Toni squeezed me tight. I could feel their love protecting me from such a manic place.
We arrived at the Meridian hotel in a central part of the city. Her face covered by oversize sunglasses and a large hat, my mother whipped me up onto her hip and carried me straight through the foyer while Toni checked us in. As quick as flicking a switch we were up in the elevator and I was asleep.
The next morning the three of us went out shopping. I didn’t know why we were in Thailand. My mother didn’t want me there, but she had no choice, this was to be the last time. To me it was like an adventure, but it was an adventure stained with pain. Jan and Toni had been around the block more than once, but even these street-smart women were scared by the men who followed us around every corner — into the hotel, into restaurants, in the street in their cars. They weren’t letting us out of their sight.
We tried to blend in with the hustle and bustle of Bangkok and acted like we didn’t have a bullseye on our backs. As we manoeuvred through the crowds I spotted the pig. A technicolour papier-mache pig. I had to have it. I tugged on Toni’s dress, pleading with her to buy it for me. She succumbed to my boyish pout and purchased us matching pigs.
‘How do you plan on carrying that, little man? It’s twice your size,’ Toni asked.
Jan was thinking, Shit, how am I going to get that through two sets of Customs?
Later we rested and ate lunch in a beautiful garden, the sun beaming down on us. Toni picked a branch of orchids for me. This place could be mistaken for a tropical paradise.
At 2 p.m. the three of us got out of a taxi out in front of a dirty cement compound, its walls topped with razor wire. We all embraced, and Jan and I left Toni watching our backs. I could feel the tension in my mother’s grip. We slowly approached the hugest gate I’d ever seen.
We stood waiting for what felt like hours among a crowd of Asian faces. The humidity was stifling, the flies and the smell even worse. Eventually, after what seemed an eternity, the monstrous gate swung open and Jan and I passed through. Men grinned down at the white girl and her boy. Guns hung from their shoulders. We were led through a series of doors and corridors, guards present at every turn. All around us were the thundering sounds of metal on metal, of steel doors slamming, keys clanging. The guards seemed to enjoy pushing and pulling at my mother, taking the opportunity to grope a Western woman. Finally, we were shut inside a room full of dripping humidity and biting insects, and told to wait. All we could do was sit and stare at the door, willing it to open. I had no idea what lay behind it. I wish I never had to find out.
*
An hour passed. Restless and crying by now, I needed feeding and sleep. Suddenly the door opened and two men appeared, waving at us to come, no questions. On the other side of the door was horror: steel bars separated the room into four parts, and behind each set of bars were coils of barbed wire.
In the middle of the room was gangway for the guards to pace up and down. The other side of the divide had the same set-up of steel and wire. I could hear men shouting in a language I couldn’t understand. The head guard held his hand out, waiting for it to be filled with cash. That’s how it worked: you pay, you gain — otherwise you leave. Jan stuffed notes into his sweaty hands. He then opened the first gate, then more hands were out, more money was paid. Three times this happened until we had gone as far as we could and no amount of cash or cigarettes could get us any further.
‘You wait,’ the guard said sharply in broken English.
Then I saw the silhouette of a man through the all the bars and wire. A familiar outline. He came into view, partially shadowed. It was my father, my daddy. Instinctively my arms stretched out to him, and I fought to be released from Jan’s grip. But she couldn’t let me go, I would have been cut to shreds on the razor wire, if not beaten back by firm hands. My father also had his arms out, desperately wanting to hold his son. Father and son had been inseparable; now corrupt prison guards and tonnes of steel and wire stood between us.
‘Daddy!’
Despite my blubbering cries, we could get no closer than three feet from each other. Our hearts were separated by rusty bars. Was this a bad dream?
Part One
Baby Food
Chapter 1
Warren paced the corridors nervously, excited and hoping for a boy. Jan was prepped for the C-section. Warren called out to his wife through the door, telling her he loved her, encouraging the doctors and nurses. They all laughed at his cockiness, not used to this kind of behaviour. For my mother and father, this was the biggest moment of their young lives.
I arrived at 8.30 a.m. on 10 March 1977 at the hospital in Manly, a beachside suburb in Sydney’s north. It was a sunny autumn day and to my parents’ delight, I was a boy. Jan had already named me while I was still in her stomach: Adrian Simon Fellows. Now it was written officially on my birth certificate. Jan’s parents Colin and Alma joined Warren in the waiting room. There were cigars and they were the happiest people alive. Colin was beside himself with joy. I was his first grandson. As he didn’t have a son of his own, I was the next best thing.
Finally Warren could hold his son. Jan’s stomach was black and blue from the surgery, but the two of them shared a powerful moment as Warren cradled me while holding Mum’s hand.
‘A boy!’ everyone said again and again.
‘He’s going to be a prince. That’s my boy,’ Warren announced proudly.
Even the nurses laughed.
Jan stayed in hospital for a week. I was kept in a separate ward with all the other newborns. Warren was desperate to hold me, but for the most part could only look at me through the glass of the viewing room. He instructed the nurses how to lay me in my cot to ensure that I was breathing correctly, zealous that I receive the best attention.
Hospitals had different rules about babies back then. To his displeasure, Warren was only allowed to visit during family visiting hours. So he would stand on a box outside Jan’s window and talk to her for hours on end until he was shooed away. When he wasn’t at the hospital, he was celebrating with his mates, happy as punch.
*
When the week was up, we were all together at our family home: a penthouse apartment in one of the white tower blocks perched on top of the hill overlooking both Sydney Harbour and Manly beach.
Becoming a mother was fantastic for Jan. She had wanted a love child, to settle down and raise a family. Her precious Adrian was to be the first, with hopefully more on the horizon. She and Warren had plenty of money, now it was time to create the future. Theirs was a dream lifestyle not many 24 year olds could reach. The flash young couple with their baby boy. What could be better? They were young and healthy and had the world at their feet.
Warren was in his element as a new father. He literally took me everywhere and did everything with me; he bathed me, we fell asleep together. If he ate an olive, I would — to Jan’s disapproval. Jan couldn’t get me out of his arms. They would playfully argue about whose turn it was to hold me. He was proving to be an incredible father; he adored his wife and child.
Warren wasn’t far from his business, working out of a pub under the majestic Sydney Harbour Bridge owned by my godfather, at the time a successful SP bookmaker. Warren worked closely with him. Bookmaking was a natural progression for Warren, having grown up trackside with his father. It was second nature to him and didn’t even feel like work. A fast track to fat stacks of cash. When it came to punting, picking a winner and knowing the field, there was none better than my father. He could turn ten dollars into ten thousand without breaking a sweat. Jan loved it when he came home tossing his winnings in the air. Cool as you like, he knew he was good, no — great. I would crawl around in the money.
Warren’s favourite story about me growing up was that I used to collect coins and notes of all denominations and wander off down the hallway with them. One day Warren, curious, watched my daily collection and followed me into the second bathroom.
‘Princess, come look at what your son is doing,’ Warren called to Jan.
I’d been stashing the money in the toilet bowl. My parents laughed.
‘That’s not a bank, my darling, it doesn’t go down there. You don’t want to flush your savings away,’ Jan smiled.
Never a harsh word or angry vibe was expressed towards me. I received nothing but love, protection and joy from my parents.
My grandparents Alma and Colin were regular visitors, wanting to take me on outings and smothering me with love. They instantly became my second parents, and when I was a little older Jan and Warren would leave me with them so they could go out for a dance and a party. Though my parents would rather not be parted from me and preferred dinner parties at home.
Ruby, Warren’s mother, came by on weekends. She would hold me and point out all the boats bobbing on the harbour that we could see from our penthouse balcony. The world was looking good. What a joyful time.
Warren would take me to my godfather’s pub and show me off and ask me to pick out a number on the form. This I did and one day won us over fifteen thousand bucks.
‘Look, the boy has the gift! A prodigy! What’s your hot tip for race six, Adrian?’ Warren’s buddies shouted jovially. Warren would simply smile and nod and raise his beer. As if he was genetically superior and had passed this on to his child.
Meanwhile Jan became quite the bookkeeper for Warren. He was earning ridiculous cash bookmaking and betting with the bookies at the racecourse. He wanted to expand into buying horses to race.
Race day at Randwick, the iconic racecourse in Sydney’s eastern suburbs. Kids back then weren’t allowed in the Members’ Stand, so Warren would run around like a madman darting back and forth between the Members and the Ladies section, where Mum, dressed to the nines and looking drop dead gorgeous, hung out with me and the other wives. Jan bought all Warren’s clothes for him, his suits, ties, linen jackets. She was one of the best-dressed women in Sydney and wouldn’t have been out of place on a movie set or in a magazine. There was never less than a thousand dollars in her purse — a lot of cash for the Seventies.
To an outsider we looked the business: young, dapper, cashed-up, fun and in the know. And in the racing business, everyone wants to be in the know.
Warren had a t-shirt printed for me that said ‘Look out, here comes trouble’, and all the girls thought I was the cutest. Warren loved the attention from the sexy girls who doted on me, especially when we were in Hawaii. I was his chick magnet.
Jan’s new favourite destination was Hawaii. We went to Queensland often, but Hawaii was it. Qantas first class was the only way to travel, upstairs in the jumbo lounge. My parents sipped on drinks while I played or slept. In the late Seventies the Royal Hawaiian was the most exclusive hotel in the Hawaiian Islands. Jan would book the plushest suites in advance, only the best.
Hiring cars was always a fun adventure for my parents, driving on the other side of the road provided many laughs. I sat in the back gurgling and giggling. I was told I enjoyed travelling. I loved the helicopter flights and small planes that flew us over the many incredible islands. Hawaii was paradise on earth, and Jan wanted to make it our home. She encouraged Warren to look into the racing industry there and in America. Warren loved the idea. He could train horses anywhere. Why not move? While Jan set about searching for properties to buy, Warren followed up on his industry connections. Whenever I was babysat, I always had two hotel babysitters, my parents couldn’t trust just one. Jan found an apartment to die for, overlooking a picturesque tropical beach. She didn’t hesitate to put a chunky deposit down.
We travelled to and from Hawaii several times in the following months, sorting it all out. The vision was to spend half the year in Sydney and the other half in Hawaii and the States. It seemed an achievable dream for Warren, who was in his element.
*
Jan and I came in from shopping one day when Warren bounded through the front door like he owned the world.
‘Come with me, my princess and my little prince,’ he said with a cheeky smile.
We followed him into the lift and down to the apartment’s garage where, wrapped up in a big pink ribbon, a brand new shiny red MG sports car was waiting for us.
‘This is all yours, babe,’ he said proudly to Jan. ‘I know you love MGs. I had it converted to automatic, just for you.’
He was all class, flashy. What woman wouldn’t love this gesture? To top it off, he pointed out another car next to it, a brand new Holden Statesmen, top-shelf driving.
Jan, being such a mum, said, ‘How’s the baby seat going to fit in?’ They shared a ‘didn’t think of that’ look, then laughed and hugged.
‘Red,’ I half gurgled out, pointing at the sports car.
Warren’s racing career was taking off to another level. Jan was still doing the books, but we’d started to outgrow the penthouse. We all went looking for another home. Jan had her eye on a massive house on a block in Mosman, a ritzy suburb on the north shore of Sydney. Warren purchased a huge block of land in Davidson with views overlooking the northern beaches. An architect was commissioned, and both Jan and Warren were free to create a three-level mansion overlooking the glorious Sydney coastline.
Warren was making plans for me. Colin was adamant that I have the best education, mindful that the best schools led to the best jobs; with all the right contacts, success would be mine. Warren wouldn’t have anything less for his boy. He wanted a father and son business, for us to become racing royalty in this country and overseas.
Looks perfect, doesn’t it?
Chapter 2
To a casual observer peering into the fishbowl of our lives, you couldn’t help but think ‘lucky bastards’ — the homes, the first class international travel, the finest clothes, the cash spilling out of our pockets. A happy, good-looking young family with all the joys of this world before them.
Truth of the matter is, fishbowls distort what you really see. The reality inside our tropical tank was entirely different. Our fiction of perfection was a façade that hid the dangers lurking behind the rocks, the sharks waiting to attack and consume us. Let’s get real. Who earns that much cash at the track? Warren was good, but a million dollars good?
And there were the trips to Bangkok. What reputable horse trainer considers Thailand a prospect? Maybe Warren liked the cheap girls, the seedy bars and tropical beaches, or maybe he had his fingers in a very dirty pie. Rubbing shoulders with gamblers was one thing, smuggling shed loads of drugs is another.
In comparison, winning big at the track was becoming a dead bore for Warren. Like any addiction, his thrillseeking had to be fed, and my father found pleasure in deceiving the law, the overwhelming shot of adrenalin he got as he slipped into the country with bags of drugs right under Customs’ nose. No, he didn’t just love the enormous payday, the fat money, the backslapping of charismatic crooks. No, he was addicted to a fantasy life, not realising that his greed would surely ruin everyone close to him.
When is enough, enough? When does someone pull up and say, This is it, shit is getting too heavy, if I walk now, we all could leave, get out of this life, live comfortably anywhere, anywhere we want. That’s precisely what should have happened.
We all experience something that rocks our world. Warren’s choice not to flush the bags of heroin down the sink in that Bangkok hotel would shape the rest of my life in ways it would take many years to understand.
*
I was just 18 months old on 12 October 1978, the day that changed our lives forever. Mum and I had been staying with her parents for a few days to have some family time while Warren was on one of his business trips to Thailand. He always came back showering us with gifts. He loved buying Mum jewellery, and giving me little toys to play with.
At 5 a.m. the phone rang. It almost rang out before Alma answered. A deep stern voice asked for Jan. The speaker’s tone was calm, though menacing. Jan took the phone from Alma. She immediately knew who it was — Warren’s business partner Neddy Smith. The gangster.
‘Bad news. Heard overnight Paul Hayward has been caught with heroin in Bangkok,’ he said.
Paul Hayward was a rising sports star in Australia, a famous rugby league player and professional boxer. Paul was a family man with a wife and three children and just happened to be the gangster’s brother-in-law. Paul had escorted Warren to Thailand. Jan’s heart sank.
‘What about Warren?’ she forced out.
‘I don’t know, not sure. Just be wary, be careful. All I’ve heard is that Paul is busted.’
Panic set in. And fear. The room spun. What to think?
‘What about Warren?’ Jan asked again.
‘Don’t know.’ Was that all he was going to say?
She knew this type of man, and Jan knew she was being fed a line. How had he found out before any of this broke on the news? At this time of the morning? She automatically thought the worst, rapidly connecting the dots. What the hell was her husband up to? What had he done?
Her mind went back to the phone call she had had from Warren the night before. He had been distressed, shaken, even scared. Jan pressed him for answers, but all he would say was that he had a bad feeling. Things weren’t adding up.
‘What’s not adding up, Warren? Tell me.’
But Warren wasn’t composed enough to string a sentence together. Between answers he was swigging from a bottle of whisky. The tension was unbearable.
‘Whatever you’re doing, Warren, don’t. Just stop, leave it behind you. Just come home, for fuck sake.’
Then the phone had gone dead.
Now the gangster concluded the conversation by saying, ‘I’m sure Warren wasn’t involved.’
Jan tried to keep her cool whilst getting me dressed. Alma was more than concerned and followed Jan around, bombarding her with questions. We were expecting to pick Warren up from Sydney airport at 8.30 a.m. We flew out the door, drove down Epping Road and over the Harbour Bridge. Jan was listening intently to the radio, waiting for updates about Paul or anything about her husband. This was insufferable. They were saying nothing. Was no news good news? Jan needed something, anything that could shed some light.
Meanwhile I was in the back seat screaming my little head off sensing my mother’s panic. She started to cry while rubbing my leg, trying to calm her boy. Our world was caving in. All Jan could do was hope and pray that somehow Warren would be waiting at the airport. Then we could all go back to the penthouse and play happy families again.
*
As we passed Central station and reached Broadway, a news flash came on the radio. Jan hit the brakes and pulled over. Cars whizzed past us as the newsreader announced:
‘Three Australian men have been arrested in Thailand with over eight kilograms of heroin. Officials are saying this is the biggest bust in Australia’s history. The three men are William Sinclair, the footballer Paul Hayward and Warren Fellows.’
Jan switched the radio off. The world receded: the city, the traffic, my fearful sobbing from the back seat — all became simply background noise. Jan sat frozen. Paralysis of this type can’t be measured. You could die in those moments, or wish you would.
What the fuck? What do I do? Where do I go? Fuck, are the cops behind me? Will they arrest me? All this was racing through her head. Then the adrenalin kicked in and she smacked the steering wheel with her fist. We had to move, drive somewhere. But where? The only place that made sense was to go and see Warren’s gangster partner in Sydenham. The drive was torture. Everything was a blur — the road, other cars, people passing by. At the front door this fucking giant of a man let us in, an imposing figure with a notorious — and feared — reputation on the street.
Inside his house a gathering of sombre people awaited us. No one said a word, their body language expressing what they knew had gone down. The gangster’s wife, his brother, his kids, a few other guys and Paul’s wife were all there. Neddy told Jan to go to the Manly penthouse and clear out the apartment before the cops got there. What could have been in the place?
‘Go to Manly and search the place,’ he said.
‘What you talking about?’ Jan reacted.
That’s when he dropped the H-bomb — heroin. Warren may have stashed bricks of it there in the apartment.
Can you picture what Jan was feeling? Desperation, anger, confusion. What would her innocent parents think? A million thoughts and emotions swirled through her all at once.
We drove to Manly around ten in the morning. The police hadn’t caught up yet. Jan had expected to see flashing red and blue lights, the penthouse wrapped in police tape and units of cops swarming all over the place. She knew where stashes of money had been hidden around the unit. Jan gave me some toys to keep me occupied and began frantically going through the whole apartment. The flat was clear of any dope; if previously stashed, it had been cleared out.
Knowing we may never return to our home, Jan didn’t look back. When we returned to Sydenham, we were all locked inside in the gangster’s fortress-like home, just waiting for the police to break in. The house was geared up for security, with cameras throughout and steel bars on all the windows. It was the tightest security money could buy. The gangster had truly fortified his home and it was set up to withstand an invasion.
Jan and I waited with the others while the police tried all their usual methods to get into the house. We just sat back listening as attempt after attempt failed. Cops surrounded the house and lined the street. It was rather embarrassing for them, all these men and they couldn’t break into this inner-city semi-detached house. Jan and the others were strongly advised what — and what not — to say. This was not a man you said no to easily.
Eventually the senior cop knocked politely on the door. It was like a game for the big man.
’What’s wrong, fellas? Having a few troubles getting in, are we? All you had to do was ask. Come in,’ said cocky as you like.
Cop after cop filed in, guns raised, pissed off they had been made to look extremely foolish. They yelled at us to hit floor, and handcuffed the men. Jan sat on the lounge holding me tight. She wasn’t going to get on the floor, you never knew what you’d pick up.
The cops rummaged about, searching high and low for anything. Jan was feeling sick at what was unfolding. Her parents, the whole world would know. The police found nothing. The gangster would never keep anything in his house, and the cops knew that, they just had to show some force after being embarrassed.
Jan and I were taken to police headquarters in College Street, opposite Hyde Park in the city. Jan was interrogated for hours, but she wasn’t saying a word and wouldn’t sign a statement. To her surprise, the cops didn’t ask her to. They were playing this very coolly. No threats. No heavy tactics. Yes, she got the standard treatment, a female officer watching her while she used the bathroom, but overall they treated her quite respectfully — suspiciously so. All the while I was running amok throughout the police station. I badly needed a nappy change, but they didn’t allow it, so Jan let me stink up the place. I tapped and bashed on the all the typewriters, ripping up papers and causing a right mess. Jan didn’t stop me. If the cops weren’t prepared to get a nappy for me, fuck them, let me run loose.
The gangster organised a solicitor for Jan, and a cop came over and gave Jan the name and number to ring. When you desperately need a criminal lawyer, you get a criminal lawyer. When he finally showed up he demanded the cops return the $1500 they had confiscated from her purse. Jan knew they were going to divvy it up among themselves. This was the heyday of rogue cops.
They weren’t bad to Jan, but there was something fishy about these cops, and that stench followed these men for years.
*
Eventually, around 9 p.m. Jan was released without being charged. Back then you couldn’t testify against your husband, and the police hadn’t yet figured their own story out.
A fresh-faced officer picked our car up from Sydenham then drove it back to the cop shop, and Jan was then allowed to drive away. The journey back to Colin and Alma’s in North Ryde was one of the longest of our lives. The car stank of dirty nappy, dirty police and dirty crooks. I was restless and tired. What was Colin going to say? This strict man could cut anyone down with the Simon stare.
We pulled in to our street to see half the neighbourhood out the front of my grandparents’ home. Everyone in the street knew what had happened, and they were all standing around. Some were talking to Colin. Karen, Jan’s childhood friend who lived across the road, had heard the news on the television that morning, apparently before we had heard on the radio on our way to the airport, and she and her family crossed the street to tell Colin and Alma. Terrific. No sliding under the radar for us, everyone made it his or her business. Can you imagine that conversation? ‘Oh, Colin, did you hear?’
Since everyone thought they were an expert, Colin and Alma had to deal with neighbours whispering and poking and prodding around, wanting to be part of this crazy international news event.
The news service is never ever completely reliable, so who knew what had been told to the nation. In the haste to break news, the reports are often cocked up, full of half-truths before all the evidence has been gathered and sifted. Rumours. Chinese whispers had run the length of the street and around the block before we had returned, making matters worse. We still weren’t even clear about what had happened in Bangkok. Jan kept saying maybe it was all some sick mistake. Wrong place. Wrong time.
Keep in mind that in the 1970s attitudes were vastly different to today. There was a very religious, overly moralistic vibe and if you were connected to the putrid drug business, you were no better than Satan himself.
Alma came running over to the car, her eyes puffy and red. Obviously she had been worried sick all day. The police hadn’t let Jan ring home; her one phone call had been to her lawyer. Alma hugged Jan, who said, ‘Please just get a nappy for Adrian.’ Alma grabbed me and went inside, while my mother summonsed the courage to face her father.
Colin was in a foul temper. He couldn’t look his daughter in the eye. The idea of being connected to an international drug-running syndicate sickened him to the bone. This respectable, upstanding man was livid. Alma’s response was much softer, holding her daughter and absorbing the pain. Jan was pretty cool considering the enormity of the situation.
Five days later the police finally tracked Jan down at her parents’ house in North Ryde. They hadn’t been able to find her earlier. Not exactly ground-breaking detective work! In the mean time they’d turned the Manly apartment upside down looking for evidence, and now they wanted to arrest Jan. They said they had found a receipt for a safety deposit box.
Warren’s gangster partner was the person who suggested to him that he should organise a safety deposit box, even suggesting which bank in George Street in the city it should be in, and further, keeping it under Jan’s maiden name for security reasons. No paperwork regarding the safety box was to be kept. All you have is the one key. So when you think about it, how did the police find out about the safety deposit box? Makes the mind boggle. Warren had destroyed every piece of paper concerning the box.
They arrested Jan over the money they found in the safety deposit box, and told her to dress warmly as it was a cold lonely cell she’d be in.
As she sat in the back of the police car, the officers calmly and politely ran her through the procedures and what to expect. She would face a judge first thing in the morning.
On arrival she was processed then charged and locked up for the night. There was no sleep that night while she stared at the cold bleak walls. Her thoughts kept her alert and awake, preparing for all possible eventualities the following morning. Jan thought about her boy, about both his parents facing prison. This wasn’t something she could accept. What was Warren going through? There was too much to absorb.
*
The next morning the police escorted her up to the courthouse. They had expected her to be hanging out from heroin, but to their resentment she wasn’t, she was straight. As was to be expected, a media mob had gathered around the entrance. Cameras flashed and journalists fought each other like seagulls squawking questions. Jan showed no interest in any of it, it was all just background noise. Besides, the police didn’t want her to utter a word, and they navigated her through the ruckus.
Facing the judge was daunting, to have this man looking down at my mother’s bowed head while Colin and Alma listened intently at the back of the room. The judge slammed the hammer down, the sound echoing through the room, and announced the charges. Jan was charged with ‘goods in custody’ — specifically, the $190,000 that had been found in the safety deposit box. The judge was reluctant to offer bail, but Colin came through and put his house up as surety for her.
The bail conditions were for Jan to stay at her parents’ house and to report three times a day to Eastwood police station during the months leading up to her trial. Thankfully she had a top gun solicitor, and when you need a criminal lawyer, you get a criminal lawyer, I say again. Nothing less.
Over the course of the next few months the media followed Jan and my grandparents. Every few days there would be a knock on the door from another journalist wanting to beef up the story. They didn’t care about the families, only getting a hot scoop. We never gave an inch. ‘Leave us alone,’ was all they got.
The court case was held at the Central Criminal Court in the city. The prosecution case rested on the money found in the safety deposit box. Their argument was full of holes, but they were hell bent on sending Jan to prison to make a public statement about the evil of drug trafficking. Jan gave evidence that she wasn’t privy to how much was in the box, her involvement was simply to pick up the box from a bank in the city, bring it home, and then hand it to Warren. He would then hand it back to Jan, who would return it to the bank. Jan said she never opened the box, and the money would have been from gambling and the family racing business. The prosecution thought this was ridiculous.
But when Jan went to the bank to pick up the safety deposit box, she was often with her best friend, Toni. The pair looked very similar, both had thick curly hair. Witnesses from the bank’s staff couldn’t identify precisely who had actually picked up the box.
Nevertheless, the judge determined to convict Jan and handed down a four-year prison sentence for the crime of goods in custody.
Something seemed amiss, the process felt rushed, and during proceedings many sideways glances were exchanged between the cops and the prosecutors. Jan’s lawyer was dumfounded.
Leave Adrian without his mother for four years? Jan didn’t think so. Alma was crying and Colin was dismayed. Outside the court the media scrum jostled to get their pound of flesh. Jan called them parasitic lowlifes, blood-sucking leeches.
An appeal date was set, and Jan was released on bail once more. We moved out of Manly, put everything in storage and, as per the bail conditions, went back to live with Colin and Alma at North Ryde. Again Jan had to report to the police daily.
*
Finally the appeal date came. At the court in Macquarie Street, Jan stood in the witness box for nearly two days. By the end of the three-day appeal the prosecutor had two lawyers and two QCs. Compared to one QC and two lawyers for Jan. My mother was under extreme pressure. The QCs were licking their lips, grilling her from every angle, trying to get her to slip up. The judge also fired off questions. Jan’s QC and lawyers shook their heads in disbelief, objecting to every attack on her.
Jan didn’t succumb. She was as cool as ice. Some people can deal with all types of pressure — and besides, Jan was never going to let me grow up with two parents behind bars, one in Bangkok, one in Australia. Fuck that.
At the end of it the judge faced her and spoke through gritted teeth.
‘You’re either an extremely good liar, or you’re telling the truth. On the legal side, I have to give you the latter. You are found not guilty.’ Then slammed down the hammer.
The key to the safety deposit box had been critical to the case and it was never found.
Listening to the verdict, Jan’s astonished lawyer grabbed her hand. The QC grabbed her other hand and whispered in her ear.
‘I can’t believe this. Thank God.’
They then went downstairs so Colin could get his bail money back. As they did so, they saw people exchanging money. There had been betting on the outcome of the case. Jan was facing the harshest judge in the court’s history and it seemed everyone believed she would be found guilty. The few who had backed her acquittal were yahooing in victory and mocking their colleagues. Most had expected she would end up with a longer prison sentence.
‘This is disgraceful! Did you hear that?’ Colin was aghast.
‘Colin, be quiet. We just got found not guilty. Just leave it at that. Go home and celebrate,’ the QC advised.
Colin didn’t look at Jan the whole way home. You could have cut the air with a knife. Before leaving the court, Jan rang Alma,
‘Not guilty, Mum. Can you believe it? We won,’ she said, almost in disbelief.
Alma’s sigh of relief said more than words could express. When Jan arrived home, Alma and I wrapped our arms around her. This was great, she was free. Free to look after me.
‘You do what you got to do, and that’s it,’ she told me several times over the years.
Overall, Jan said, the police didn’t harass her. After the appeal the media backed off. Jan had skilfully concealed her face in public, always wearing big hats and dark shades. The only time she was caught out by a photographer was in a Thai court with Warren, in a Thai paper.
Chapter 3
‘Higher, Grandma, push me higher,’ I yelled joyfully.
‘You can’t go higher, Adrian, the swings will break,’ Ruby replied.
‘Higher, higher,’ I insisted and laughed.
Ruby was pushing the swing and laughing with me.
‘No, Adrian, that’s high enough.’
As I reached the top of the swing’s arc I looked skyward and saw a plane flying overhead.
‘Look, Grandma, a plane to Bangkok.’
Ruby and Alma exchanged a glance as if to say, Where has he learnt that?
Perhaps Jan was on that flight. My little mind absorbed everything — don’t for a second believe your children aren’t aware of what’s going on around them. Sometimes they see more than adults.
After the appeal we stayed on with Colin and Alma. It was an opportunity for some respite, a chance to stop and think and regroup for a few weeks. This situation wasn’t just going to go away overnight. Quite the opposite.
*
Colin came from a very strict upper class British background. He wouldn’t acknowledge Jan’s presence in the house, and would walk right past her. No communication, nothing. All he did was come home from work, pick me up and take me down to his huge backyard to get away from everything. His silent treatment tormented Jan, who really needed a father then, when she was at her lowest. Alma recognised the tension and did her best to soothe her brooding husband. Of course he wouldn’t do or say anything against Jan in my presence. Alma, on the other hand, while disgusted and disappointed by Warren’s actions and asking millions of questions, was really only concerned about her daughter’s health. Alma hoped my father’s recklessness wouldn’t stain my life forever.
Colin’s hundreds of employees all knew what had gone down, and like any workplace, gossip was rife. Second- and third-hand information circulated, blurring the truth, all of it digging in humiliating for Colin even further. Whenever he felt uncomfortable, he’d pretend nothing had happened. He couldn’t deny the fact that his son-in-law continued to be the biggest news in the country, shit, the world. Right under his nose his daughter’s husband had become an infamous international heroin smuggler. It affected him profoundly, as if his life force had been burnt, tarnished and disgraced. And he made sure his daughter felt his internal emotional wreckage.
Yes, Jan was to blame for bringing such shame onto the Simon family. She knew it and acknowledged it repeatedly. But sorry would never be enough.
Again the phone rang. Alma answered, this time to Warren’s voice. Jan bolted over. Warren had managed to pay off a guard to gain access to the courthouse phone. The guards had turned a blind eye, counting their money for a few moments so he could contact his wife in Australia. The call was put through a telephone exchange in Bangkok, connected to a Sydney exchange centre then linked up to our home phone line in North Ryde.
Warren was almost breathless, saying he only had a second, a guard was right behind him. He told my mother how desperate he was, begging her for money. ‘Please babe, you got to help me, I can’t handle this.’ His desperation was almost too much to bear. Jan’s husband was broken. She could hear a commotion behind him and just before the phone went dead he managed to tell her he loved her and his son. A haunting call from inside a place of despair. Mum’s heart ached as I held tight to her leg.
’That was Daddy. He loves you very much, my darling boy. He will always love you.’ My mother wiped away a tear.
I can’t imagine how painful moments like that were for Jan, her heart and soul must have been ripped from her chest. Colin didn’t show any support, just asking, ‘What did he want?’
The following morning my parents’ conversation made headlines in the national newspapers. The person working at the telephone exchange had sold the bloody story to the papers. A journalist had paid for the information, and then reconfigured the truth, sensationalising it to sell newspapers.
Jan couldn’t believe it. She got straight on the phone to the paper, and then tracked down the operator who had connected the call and listened to the original conversation and had them fired. A huge breach of privacy.
*
Soon after Warren got busted he needed money. In Asian countries it is the family’s responsibility to look after an inmate. The Thais didn’t believe they should have to feed the scum of society. Consider that for a moment when next time you see an Australian complaining about the creature comforts in our resort-style prisons in comparison.
Jan contacted the Department of Foreign Affairs in Canberra to wrap her head around how she could send money over, and a thousand other questions. Straightforward questions to you and me, but as she was dealing with a prisoner held in another country, Jan was slapped with more red tape than a ticker tape parade.
Foreign Affairs opened the official dialogue with its counterpart in Bangkok to get the connections. They provided Jan with a direct phone number for the official in Bangkok responsible for looking after my father’s case. Or at least, trying to keep him above ground. With this number Jan felt a little bit closer to her husband. At least now she could get him aid one way or another.
In my experience, most people just look out for themselves, or tend only to help when it suits their interests. From time to time a person appears from nowhere who goes above and beyond to help out. This unbelievable lady worked for Foreign Affairs in Canberra, and she would help guide Jan through the darkness, providing insights into how to deal with all the complex machinations of international relations.
With the close assistance of this lady, Jan was able to set up a bank account, connected to the Australian embassy in Bangkok, which could provide the funds for Warren’s needs. If she were to send money directly to the prison, Warren would never see a cent of it. Jan sent over roughly $500 a month, which was big bucks for the Thais, who would be lucky to earn $200 a year in the late Seventies.
The sad reality was Warren only ever received a small portion of this money. Too many grubby hands were held out down the chain of command. All took a chunk, and didn’t care. The embassy couldn’t do anything about it, this was the Thai way. Like it or lump it.
The money was sent so Warren could buy a blow-up mattress and maybe a blanket; so he wouldn’t have to eat prawn heads soaked in water and instead put real food in his mouth. Then there were the ever-mounting legal costs Jan had to fork out for. And she did.
Warren’s letters were anguished, and at times so edited by the prison authorities that Jan could only read two or three lines, the rest redacted.
He also told her that Paul was receiving no money from back home, that he’d been left to rot. Whether that was true or not isn’t for me to say. Out of the goodness of her heart she did the right thing and opened an account at the embassy to provide for him as well as for Warren. Paul wrote her many letters thanking her. Jan’s help meant Paul could eat and purchase a few luxuries. Much later I read some of these heartfelt letters, before Jan decided to burn them in the attempt to burn away some of the past.
Jan was told daily by Foreign Affairs and by Warren’s solicitors that the three men — Warren, Paul and William Sinclair — were going to get the death penalty. The Thai government was determined to make a statement to foreigners that the trade of illicit drugs in and out of Thailand spelt death.
*
While this was going on, Jan and I moved to her best friend’s flat in the beachside suburb of Coogee in the eastern suburbs of Sydney. I wasn’t at school yet, so moving around was no problem.
It was all becoming too much for Jan, a young woman of 27 with her world in tatters. Things hadn’t always been easy or happy in her life, but now her mental and physical health was being tested to the maximum. Under the mounting pressures, she started drinking like a fish at the Coogee Bay Hotel, in there as soon as the doors opened at ten in the morning till ten at night.
To escape, Jan hit the Sydney clubs most nights. Life seemed easier when she was really out of it. Dancing, laughing, smoking, partying, drinking and spending cash. Anything to blunt the sharp reality that her husband could be shot any day. My mother has always had a strong constitution and been able to out-drink and out-party most big men, but even for this formidable woman, life was becoming too loose.
Eventually Jan lost the plot and crashed, literally. Luckily for her, in the late Seventies there was no random breath testing on the roads. One night she and Toni were driving back from the Bondi Hotel, drunk as skunks, laughing and carrying on, when they suddenly found themselves on the wrong side of the road and swerving out of control. The car flipped and Jan was catapulted through the windscreen. Her face slammed onto the gravel and she went sliding down the street. Jan was a bleeding mess, shredded from the glass. Sixty stitches held her face together and she was lucky to be alive.
By no means did the accident tame my mother’s wild and chaotic life, though it did put some perspective back into things, which led us to move from Coogee to a unit in Rose Bay. I was getting older, ready for kindy and the like. Yes, Jan still went out to the clubs and frequented the Bondi Hotel, but she did start toning it down.
You’re probably asking yourself who was looking after me during all this. The truth is Jan always had me looked after, whether Colin and Alma babysat me, or Toni’s teenage daughter, I was always cared for and never once neglected.
Our Rose Bay apartment was nice. Jan decorated it with exotic artefacts and there were palm trees and flowers inside and on the balcony. The scent of incense filled the air — or was it marijuana? Smelt nice, whatever it was.
I was starting out in kindergarten and I had my own personal chauffeur. A towering mountain of a man drove me each day. I’d sit between him and Jan on the back of his Harley Davidson and ride down New South Head Road in the eastern suburbs. This guy was one tough dude who could easily handle more than one attacker at once. There wasn’t a man in the country who would feel confident going toe to toe with him. He was a brutal street brawler who feared no one. But he was also caring towards Jan and me. A gentleman who had our backs at all times, and others knew it. He was like a big teddy bear for us, and he and Jan were best friends. He made me feel safe in a dangerous time. Kids absorb everything, and having him around felt good; in a way it made life normal for me. A strong male presence.
Imagine what the other parents were thinking when I hopped off the back of a Harley.
*
We settled as much as we could. Jan calmed her social life and spent more time with me. What wasn’t settling was the issue of Warren in Thailand. The Thais wanted him killed and they wanted Jan’s head on a platter as well. Jan would drop me off at Colin and Alma’s and fly off on one of her many visits to Bangkok. In Thailand she would be followed from the airport to the hotel. These cops were blatant. They didn’t care if they were spotted. Jan knew that all she could do was stay in the hotel, otherwise these men would set her up somehow. They were always waiting outside her hotel room, down corridors, in the hotel restaurants, in cabs. You name where she went and they would be there, stalking five feet away, eyeballing her every move.
Jan spent hours at the embassy and eventually was given the green light and the paperwork necessary to enter the prison and see her husband. She was made to wait outside the prison gates for five days. The guards had the power and no embassy papers could control how they operated. On the fifth day, after a large payout, the front gates opened. Even though she had a pass, in Thailand money bought everything.
Door after door, payment after payment, Jan was finally within sight of her husband. As always in this prison, they were separated by barbed wire and steel gates. Warren looked clean enough, no black eyes, he could walk and didn’t appear physically beaten at all. But he was an emotional wreck. Jan tried to keep it together as long as she could. Warren was freaked out to the max. This was a guy who had had everything all his life, never without handmade suits and shoes. Now here he was, inside one of the filthiest, most abhorrent places on earth, surrounded by killers, thieves, paedophiles and the worst kind of scum. And Warren, well, he was considered the worst kind of foreign scum. A scum on borrowed time, according to everyone. Though in comparison the Thais were treated far worse than any foreigner.
Warren pleaded with Jan to send more money and find a way to get him out. Whatever it took. Keep in mind Jan was a complete mess internally. It cuts very deep for me to try to visualise this encounter between two young, intelligent people reduced to such degradation and desperation. Yes Warren made his choices, but still, he was my flesh and blood.
My mother finally erupted in tears and the two of them broke down sobbing. It was apparent they loved each other, but they couldn’t embrace. So close but so far. Jan believed he would never survive this place, let alone a firing squad. No amount of money and packets of smokes could bribe him out of this nightmare. Jan had to walk away from her crying husband and leave him to an unknown future. The doors slammed shut behind her.
Jan returned to the hotel and walked past the same cops loitering around the place. Inside her room she was met by four Customs officials. The day before at the Australian embassy it had been arranged that Customs officers would come to the hotel to inspect her bags and then seal them with Customs tape, not to be opened until Sydney airport. This was for her protection, as her contact in Canberra had pre-warned her that Thai police might attempt to set her up with drugs — the Thais were on a roll in making examples of Warren and Paul, so Jan was in the hot seat. It was a prudent step to ensure the bags were sealed and witnessed. Thai officials were interested in monitoring her movements from the hotel to the airport just in case she was crazy enough to meet someone with heroin.
While lining up to go through Customs at Bangkok airport, Jan was taken out of the queue and led down a series of corridors to a secure room for a thorough body search. This was conducted by tough women Customs agents who weren’t shy about roughing her up.
On arrival in Sydney there was more of the same, though this time the seals on the bags were sliced open, all her belongings turned inside out, then inside out again, till they were satisfied no drugs were concealed. Once the agents were satisfied, Jan was again stripped and body searched. Jan calmly played out this game, she had nothing to worry about. As if anyone would be that stupid. The Customs men knew it. Rather this was a show of force. She knew the drill, took the physical harassment and stored the emotional torment deep inside. All she wanted to do after it was over was hold me in her arms and wish for a new life.
*
