Villains : it takes one to know one

Murder, gunrunning, drug trafficking, kneecappings - Paul Ferris has been accused of many things in his life, some true, some not. What's not in dispute is that he spent twenty-five years as one of Britain's most feared gangsters. Out of prison and straight for five years, Paul still hasn't forgotten the common thugs and big-time players that surrounded him or the world of violence, fear and uneasy alliances that he inhabited with them. Now Paul Ferris recounts the stories of a tough existence that nobody knows better. The brutality you'd expect, the strangeness you might not. There's the man wanted by everyone from the Old Bailey to Glasgow High Court but who might just be a figment of the cops' imagination; the rise of women in the underworld, with unheard-of power and loaded pistols in thigh holsters; or the betrayed Manchester face who visited a gang's club and sprayed it with bullets, only to become the gang's hero overnight. The stories cover the underbellies of London, Liverpool, Glasgow, Manchester and beyond, but the material couldn't be closer to home - from the job Paul's father, Willie Ferris, pulled with a school bus full of kids as the getaway vehicle, to the war Paul got caught up in between two of London's biggest teams. And, as you'll discover, when it comes to villains, it takes one to know one.