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Authors: Bobby Teale
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control the Establishment too.
David told me about one night when he and Alfie went to a party down in Brighton. It was a big house, full of MPs, including Boothby and Driberg, as well as Ronnie and Reggie. Everyone was terribly drunk. Mad Teddy Smith was there too, with Driberg, who had a gold cigarette holder and was walking around like the Queen with his drink balanced in one hand.
My brothers discovered that Driberg used to tell Mad Teddy about the houses of rich friends he could burgle. He and Boothby would send Teddy or Leslie Holt out on housebreaking missions to turn over anyone who had crossed them.
It was around this time that the Krays got involved in a mad scheme to fund the building of a new town in Enugu, Nigeria. Ronnie had been introduced to the project through his new political connections and Leslie Payne encouraged him to take it on. David was driving Ronnie round for meets and he heard about it all first-hand. Payne had set up an investment vehicle for this building development in the newly independent African nation. Ronnie got flown out to Nigeria, where he was treatedlike royalty and given VIP treatment. He thought the deal would be his ticket to greatness. It all went wrong. The project collapsed, Payne was arrested in Nigeria and had to be sprung out of prison with a big pay-off. Boothby would later claim he’d only got involved with Ronnie because he’d been approached to be an investor in the Nigerian project. It was lies, rubbish. He got involved because they were sharing boyfriends.
Alfie knew the truth of it. He was taking round money from Boothby so Ronnie would keep quiet. Lots of money. Alfie saw it all.
On two separate occasions he was asked by Ronnie to go and get £5,000 from Lord Boothby for him. That was his share of the Mirror money. The way he had to do it was very complicated, but Ron insisted. He had to walk from Vallance Road to Aldgate East, get a taxi down to Victoria Station, jump out of the taxi and walk round to Eaton Place, a little way from Victoria.
He then had to go to No 1, press the bell and go in and get the money – an envelope stuffed full of cash. The first time he went, Boothby asked Alfie if he’d like a drink, but he told him: ‘No, thanks, Ronnie is expecting me back straight away.’
On the way back he had to go through exactly the same routine, all the while making sure he wasn’t being followed – getting a taxi at Victoria to Aldgate, and then walking down to Vallance Road. Ronnie got no money from the newspaper libel case, officially anyway, but this was his share.
After that Ronnie’s appetites just got wilder. And so did the parties. It was like he was untouchable. When Alfie was driving him round, Ronnie used to tell him to stop the car in Piccadillyand go up to some boy and get him in the back of the car. Then Ronnie would take him back and sleep on the floor with him in the kitchen of Alfie’s house in Millman Street, Holborn. Wendy and Alfie would sleep in a big double bed in one room with their two sons beside them, while Ronnie would order Wendy to make up a bed in the kitchen for him and the boy. Wendy hated it but they were too scared to refuse.
This wasn’t the first time my brothers’ wives got dragged into Ronnie’s dark world. Just before it was shut down, Ronnie was in Esmeralda’s one night when he called David over and said he wanted to go to his place – ‘to get away from everyone’. You couldn’t say ‘no’ to Ronnie so David jumped in a cab with him and they drove over to his flat in Bloomsbury. David was living there with his wife, Christine, and by now they also had two young children.
When they got there, Ronnie told him he wanted to spend the next three days, as he put it, ‘getting off booze and drugs’, seeing how he’d cope without his Stemetil. This was the powerful drug he had been prescribed after he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, used in the treatment of psychotic illness. He said that it
David told me about one night when he and Alfie went to a party down in Brighton. It was a big house, full of MPs, including Boothby and Driberg, as well as Ronnie and Reggie. Everyone was terribly drunk. Mad Teddy Smith was there too, with Driberg, who had a gold cigarette holder and was walking around like the Queen with his drink balanced in one hand.
My brothers discovered that Driberg used to tell Mad Teddy about the houses of rich friends he could burgle. He and Boothby would send Teddy or Leslie Holt out on housebreaking missions to turn over anyone who had crossed them.
It was around this time that the Krays got involved in a mad scheme to fund the building of a new town in Enugu, Nigeria. Ronnie had been introduced to the project through his new political connections and Leslie Payne encouraged him to take it on. David was driving Ronnie round for meets and he heard about it all first-hand. Payne had set up an investment vehicle for this building development in the newly independent African nation. Ronnie got flown out to Nigeria, where he was treatedlike royalty and given VIP treatment. He thought the deal would be his ticket to greatness. It all went wrong. The project collapsed, Payne was arrested in Nigeria and had to be sprung out of prison with a big pay-off. Boothby would later claim he’d only got involved with Ronnie because he’d been approached to be an investor in the Nigerian project. It was lies, rubbish. He got involved because they were sharing boyfriends.
Alfie knew the truth of it. He was taking round money from Boothby so Ronnie would keep quiet. Lots of money. Alfie saw it all.
On two separate occasions he was asked by Ronnie to go and get £5,000 from Lord Boothby for him. That was his share of the Mirror money. The way he had to do it was very complicated, but Ron insisted. He had to walk from Vallance Road to Aldgate East, get a taxi down to Victoria Station, jump out of the taxi and walk round to Eaton Place, a little way from Victoria.
He then had to go to No 1, press the bell and go in and get the money – an envelope stuffed full of cash. The first time he went, Boothby asked Alfie if he’d like a drink, but he told him: ‘No, thanks, Ronnie is expecting me back straight away.’
On the way back he had to go through exactly the same routine, all the while making sure he wasn’t being followed – getting a taxi at Victoria to Aldgate, and then walking down to Vallance Road. Ronnie got no money from the newspaper libel case, officially anyway, but this was his share.
After that Ronnie’s appetites just got wilder. And so did the parties. It was like he was untouchable. When Alfie was driving him round, Ronnie used to tell him to stop the car in Piccadillyand go up to some boy and get him in the back of the car. Then Ronnie would take him back and sleep on the floor with him in the kitchen of Alfie’s house in Millman Street, Holborn. Wendy and Alfie would sleep in a big double bed in one room with their two sons beside them, while Ronnie would order Wendy to make up a bed in the kitchen for him and the boy. Wendy hated it but they were too scared to refuse.
This wasn’t the first time my brothers’ wives got dragged into Ronnie’s dark world. Just before it was shut down, Ronnie was in Esmeralda’s one night when he called David over and said he wanted to go to his place – ‘to get away from everyone’. You couldn’t say ‘no’ to Ronnie so David jumped in a cab with him and they drove over to his flat in Bloomsbury. David was living there with his wife, Christine, and by now they also had two young children.
When they got there, Ronnie told him he wanted to spend the next three days, as he put it, ‘getting off booze and drugs’, seeing how he’d cope without his Stemetil. This was the powerful drug he had been prescribed after he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, used in the treatment of psychotic illness. He said that it
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