A CRIMINAL HISTORY OF MANKIND

the trial, alleging that she had been ill. Cooney’s girlfriend, Joan Bending, was forced to flee from
London; during the course of the next few years, she changed her address repeatedly. The general
impression left by the case was that British justice had been slightly less than triumphant.
In 1956, when sentencing two gangsters for a knife attack, the judge remarked: ‘It sounds like the
worst days of Prohibition in Chicago rather than London in 1956.’ The remark showed prescience.
Although the police were still unaware of it, London already had two gangs who had consciously
modelled themselves on the Mafia: the Richardsons and the Krays.
Charles Richardson, born in Camberwell in 1934, spent his first term in approved school when he
was fourteen - the year in which his father deserted the family. In 1956, he set up the Peckford
Scrap Metal Company in south London; it was, in fact, a front for receiving stolen goods.
Richardson had considerable talent as a businessman, and could probably have made a fortune by
legitimate means. Instead, he and his younger brother Eddie practised large-scale fraud. The
method was to open a wholesale business and order goods from a manufacturer. These were
promptly paid for. So were subsequent orders - each larger than the last. Finally, they would place
an enormous order - for perhaps £20,000-worth of goods - and then disappear. The goods were then
sold at cut rates, usually to market dealers.
Even in 1956, the police were aware of the fast-growing empire of the Richardsons. But none of the
West End club owners to whom they hired out one-armed bandits - and from whom they exacted
‘protection’ - dared to complain. Charles Richardson made sure of that by terrorising anyone he
even suspected of crossing him. The evidence suggests that he was a sadist who enjoyed inflicting
physical injury. A childhood friend named Laurence Bradbury described his methods. When
Richardson asked him to use his trucks to move stolen goods, Bradbury became nervous and made
excuses. One night, Charles and Eddie Richardson came to the club that Bradbury was running for
them, and stayed on until it was closed. Then Bradbury was held down on a table and his sleeve
rolled up. His forearm was cut from the elbow to the wrist with a razor, which was run up and
down in the cut several times. Bradbury abandoned all idea of trying to leave the Richardson gang.
In 1966, he was accused of killing a business associate of Richardson’s in South Africa - a man
Richardson believed had double-crossed him - and was sentenced to life imprisonment.
At these torture sessions, Charles Richardson dressed himself up in judge’s robes, and conducted a
mock trial. Then the victim was stripped naked, and a device known as ‘the box’ was produced.
This was an electric generator with clip-on leads. These were attached to various parts of the body,
including the genitals, and the handle was turned. Buckets of cold water were thrown over the
victim to lower his electrical resistance. Teeth would be pulled out with pliers, and cigarettes would
be stubbed out on the bare flesh. An electric fire would be held close to the body, and slowly
moved around. One man named Harris was tortured for an hour in an attempt to make him reveal
the whereabouts of a man the Richardsons wanted to interview. Finally convinced that he did not
know, Richardson allowed him to put his clothes on; then he suddenly plunged a knife through his
foot, pinning him to the floor. Then, unexpectedly, Richardson admitted he had made a mistake and
said he was sorry; he handed Harris £150. All this suggests that Richardson was deriving pleasure
from the torture, and was unable to resist driving the knife through his foot; then, with the urge
satisfied, he became conciliatory.
In July 1965, a man named James Taggart was asked to visit the Richardsons to discuss ‘business’.
He was, in fact, accused of holding back £1,200 on a business deal. Taggart was stripped, beaten,
cut and given electric shock treatment. An associate named Alfred Berman, who walked in while