David McMillan (smuggler)
Encyclopedia
David McMillan is a British
British people
The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...

-Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n drug smuggler
Smuggling
Smuggling is the clandestine transportation of goods or persons, such as out of a building, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations.There are various motivations to smuggle...

 who is best known for being the only Westerner on record as having successfully escaped Bangkok
Bangkok
Bangkok is the capital and largest urban area city in Thailand. It is known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon or simply Krung Thep , meaning "city of angels." The full name of Bangkok is Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom...

's Klong Prem
Klong Prem
Klong Prem Central prison is a high-security prison in Bangkok, Thailand. The prison has several separate sections. The greater complex houses up to 20,000 inmates. Within the complex perimeter are the Women's Central Prison, often referred to as "Lard Yao" or "Lard Yao women's prison"...

 prison. His exploits were the subject of the 2011 Australian telemovie, Underbelly Files: The Man Who Got Away
Underbelly Files: The Man Who Got Away
Underbelly Files: The Man Who Got Away is an Australian made-for-television movie that aired on February 21, 2011 on the Nine Network. It is the last of three television movies in the Underbelly Files series, the other two being Tell Them Lucifer was Here and Infiltration.It recounts the true story...

.

Early life

McMillan was born in Saint Marylebone
Marylebone
Marylebone is an affluent inner-city area of central London, located within the City of Westminster. It is sometimes written as St. Marylebone or Mary-le-bone....

, London, England on 9 April 1956. He is the son of John McMillan CBE
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...

, who was the controller of Associated-Rediffusion
Associated-Rediffusion
Associated-Rediffusion, later Rediffusion, London, was the British ITV contractor for London and parts of the surrounding counties, on weekdays between 1954 and 29 July 1968. Transmissions started on 22 September 1955.-Formation:...

 Television. After emigrating to Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 with his family, the younger McMillan attended Caulfield Grammar School
Caulfield Grammar School
Caulfield Grammar School is an independent, co-educational, Anglican, day and boarding school, located in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Founded in 1881 as a boys' school, Caulfield began admitting girls exactly one hundred years later...

 in Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

, Victoria
Victoria (Australia)
Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....

. As a child, 12-year-old McMillan appeared nightly on the Nine Network
Nine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...

's 'Peters Junior News', presenting news stories for children in a regular 5-minute TV bulletin. After working as a cinema
Movie theater
A movie theater, cinema, movie house, picture theater, film theater is a venue, usually a building, for viewing motion pictures ....

 projectionist
Projectionist
A Projectionist is a person who operates a movie projector. In the strict sense of the term this means any movie projector and therefore could include someone who operates the projector in a home video show or school. In common usage the term is generally understood to describe a paid employee of...

 and camera operator in Sydney, he began a short-lived career in advertising with Masius Wynne Williams in Melbourne.

Criminal career

A part-time job at a city cinema introduced McMillan to the fringes of the underworld; a group of safe-crackers who had turned to narcotics when police surveillance curtailed their traditional profession. Connections with the free-marijuana hippie lobbyists brought those two worlds together and a tempting opportunity for someone who was well-travelled. McMillan then began a career as a drug smuggler, during which he developed the bag-duplication system at Sydney's Kingsford-Smith airport in the late 1970s as he smuggled hashish
Hashish
Hashish is a cannabis preparation composed of compressed stalked resin glands, called trichomes, collected from the unfertilized buds of the cannabis plant. It contains the same active ingredients but in higher concentrations than unsifted buds or leaves...

 from India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

. In 1979, McMillan fell out with disgraced peer, Lord Tony Moynihan
Antony Moynihan, 3rd Baron Moynihan
Antony Patrick Andrew Cairne Berkeley Moynihan, 3rd Baron Moynihan was an English hereditary peer.-Biography:Moynihan was born on 2 February 1936 to Patrick Moynihan and his wife Irene Helen Candy. Patrick Moynihan later that year became the 2nd Baron Moynihan. Patrick's father Berkeley Moynihan...

, after the exiled lord attempted to trap McMillan in a gambling-sting operation using the large-scale bets of the Chinese
Han Chinese
Han Chinese are an ethnic group native to China and are the largest single ethnic group in the world.Han Chinese constitute about 92% of the population of the People's Republic of China , 98% of the population of the Republic of China , 78% of the population of Singapore, and about 20% of the...

-run cockfight
Cockfight
A cockfight is a blood sport between two roosters , held in a ring called a cockpit. Cockfighting is now illegal throughout all states in the United States, Brazil, Australia and in most of Europe. It is still legal in several U.S. territories....

s in Manila
Manila
Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

.

Moynihan had hoped to employ McMillan's technical expertise to detonate an explosive capsule in the necks of fighting cocks, and so determine the winners. In fact, Moynihan planned only to swindle McMillan out of the betting stake after a test game. McMillan was alerted to the scam by his Chinese film-making friends and left the Philippines after cautioning Moynihan. Lord Moynihan would later move on to hoodwink smuggler Howard Marks
Howard Marks
Dennis Howard Marks is a Welsh author and former drug smuggler who achieved notoriety as an international cannabis smuggler through high-profile court cases, supposed connections with groups such as the CIA, the IRA, MI6, and the Mafia, and his eventual conviction at the hands of the American Drug...

 in the 1980s, resulting in Marks's conviction and imprisonment in Florida. Imprudent spending attracted the attention of federal police when a Clenet automobile was imported from California bearing papers that had greatly undervalued the vehicle. This slip-up led to a major investigation which eventually revealed houses, businesses and properties along the eastern coast of Australia bought with cash and valued in millions of dollars. These assets later became the subject of Australia's first important confiscation of drug-earned assets.

After three years, McMillian and business partner Michael Sullivan were arrested following Operation Aries, a Victoria Police/Federal Police taskforce operation reported to have cost over A$2 million. McMillan and Sullivan, along with their partners, Clelia Teresa Vigano and Mary Escolar Castillo respectively, had been arrested on 5 January 1982 for conspiracy to import heroin. The four had several false passports between them, and in addition to conspiracy to import heroin, they were also charged with importing, selling, trafficking and possession of heroin. McMillan stood accused of travelling under 30 false passports and keeping station houses in London, Brussels and Bangkok. The trial heard charges of an attempt to escape Melbourne's high-security Pentridge Prison by helicopter using former SAS personnel in a scheme engineered by a vengeful Lord Moynihan.

The prosecution opposed bail for Castillo, who had a four-month-old baby with Sullivan, because she had access to funds and it was thought she could flee to her wealthy parents in her native Colombia
Colombia
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

. The police surgeon reported that all four defendants were habitual heroin users. Clelia Vigano and Mary Castillo were two of three women who died in a fire at HM Prison Fairlea
HM Prison Fairlea
HM Prison Fairlea was an Australian female prison located on Yarra Bend Road in the suburb of Fairfield, Victoria, Australia. The first all-female prison in Victoria, it was built on the site of the Yarra Bend Asylum, with remnants of the walls and gates being used in the layout of the prison. In...

 on the evening of Saturday 6 February 1982. After her death, Castillo's baby went into the custody of Sullivan's mother. The consequent six-month trial produced 116 witnesses and a hung jury that finally returned a verdict after seven days sequestration. Despite being acquitted of 11 of the 12 counts, McMillan was found guilty of the remaining count and was sentenced to a long sentence before being released in 1993 on parole.

Thailand and escape from Klong Prem

While on parole, McMillan flew to Thailand. After a close-call at Don Muang airport, he was arrested in Bangkok
Bangkok
Bangkok is the capital and largest urban area city in Thailand. It is known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon or simply Krung Thep , meaning "city of angels." The full name of Bangkok is Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom...

's Chinatown, charged with heroin trafficking. He was held in Klong Prem Central Prison. Klong Prem, also known as the "Bangkok Hilton", is Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

's most notorious prison and housed 600 foreigners along with 12,000 inmates. For two years, McMillan watched as inmates fell prey to drugs
DRUGS
Destroy Rebuild Until God Shows are an American post-hardcore band formed in 2010. They released their debut self-titled album on February 22, 2011.- Formation :...

, disease
Disease
A disease is an abnormal condition affecting the body of an organism. It is often construed to be a medical condition associated with specific symptoms and signs. It may be caused by external factors, such as infectious disease, or it may be caused by internal dysfunctions, such as autoimmune...

, death
Death
Death is the permanent termination of the biological functions that sustain a living organism. Phenomena which commonly bring about death include old age, predation, malnutrition, disease, and accidents or trauma resulting in terminal injury....

, violence
Violence
Violence is the use of physical force to apply a state to others contrary to their wishes. violence, while often a stand-alone issue, is often the culmination of other kinds of conflict, e.g...

 and despair. Facing the death penalty and a transfer to Bang Kwang Central Prison, McMillan escaped from Klong Prem in August 1996. During the night he and a fellow inmate cut the cell bars with hacksaws, scaled four inner walls, then mounted the outer wall using a bamboo-pole ladder. The inmate helped McMillan cut the bars but did not join in the escape.

Four hours later, with a false passport, he was on a flight to Singapore. Future Australian attorney-general Robert McClelland
Robert McClelland (Australian politician)
Robert Bruce McClelland is the Attorney-General of Australia. He has been an Australian Labor Party member of theAustralian House of Representatives since March 1996, representing the Division of Barton, New South Wales...

 when praising Australia's embassy in Thailand remarked that McMillan: "… a prisoner… escaped from the Thai jail in quite exceptional and athletic circumstances. In terms of mere escape, it was really quite an achievement." An account of the Thai prison and his jail break can be found in his autobiography: ESCAPE (Mainstream Publishing 2008). After fleeing Thailand using false documents, McMillan was kept safe in Balouchistan
Balochistan (Pakistan)
Balochistan is one of the four provinces or federating units of Pakistan. With an area of 134,051 mi2 or , it is the largest province of Pakistan, constituting approximately 44% of the total land mass of Pakistan. According to the 1998 population census, Balochistan had a population of...

, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 under the protection of Mir Noor Jehan Magsi of the Magsi clan, from where he began operations to Scandinavia.

Pakistan

Some years later, McMillan was arrested in Lahore
Lahore
Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...

, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 as a result of the confession of a captured courier
Courier
A courier is a person or a company who delivers messages, packages, and mail. Couriers are distinguished from ordinary mail services by features such as speed, security, tracking, signature, specialization and individualization of express services, and swift delivery times, which are optional for...

. McMillian was flown to Karachi
Karachi
Karachi is the largest city, main seaport and the main financial centre of Pakistan, as well as the capital of the province of Sindh. The city has an estimated population of 13 to 15 million, while the total metropolitan area has a population of over 18 million...

, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

, and held in Karachi Central Jail
Karachi Central Jail
Central Prison Karachi is a prison in the city of Karachi in Sindh, Pakistan. It houses more than 6,000 prisoners including convicted terrorists that include militants who attempted to assassinate President of Pakistan Pervez Musharraf..-External links:* *...

. This jail maintained a class system for prisoners, through which McMillan kept servants and private rooms. Due to a financial dispute with the prison superintendent concerning his illegal cellphone, McMillan was transferred at night to the Hyderabad
Hyderabad, Sindh
is the second largest city in the Sindh province of Pakistan. It is the seventh largest city in the country. The city was founded in 1768 by Mian Ghulam Shah Kalhoro upon the ruins of a Mauryan fishing village along the bank of the Indus known as Neroon Kot...

 jail, where he was kept in the dungeons until being rescued by Lord Magsi. Not wishing to add to the existing Interpol
Interpol
Interpol, whose full name is the International Criminal Police Organization – INTERPOL, is an organization facilitating international police cooperation...

 warrants, McMillan returned to Karachi to stand trial, where he was acquitted by a Customs Court judge who found there was no evidence that McMillan had sponsored the courier. The courier, a former boxer from Liverpool, was sentenced to five years in custody, eventually released and has since disappeared.

During his time in Hyderabad, McMillan formed a friendship with the members of a Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 street gang, who were completing a ten-year sentence for the hijack of a commercial liner outside their Russian prison. The gang had been separated by the Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n prison authorities, a decision overcome by gang leader Andreas, who flew his hijacked aircraft
Aircraft hijacking
Aircraft hijacking is the unlawful seizure of an aircraft by an individual or a group. In most cases, the pilot is forced to fly according to the orders of the hijackers. Occasionally, however, the hijackers have flown the aircraft themselves, such as the September 11 attacks of 2001...

 to Krasnoyarsk
Krasnoyarsk
Krasnoyarsk is a city and the administrative center of Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, located on the Yenisei River. It is the third largest city in Siberia, with the population of 973,891. Krasnoyarsk is an important junction of the Trans-Siberian Railway and one of Russia's largest producers of...

 from where he freed the other members of his team before flying to Pakistan, then under the control of General Zia al Huq
Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq
General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq , was the 4th Chief Martial Law Administrator and the sixth President of Pakistan from July 1977 to his death in August 1988...

, known for his independence from both the Soviet Union and the US. The story of the Russian prisoners and their ordeal has been written by McMillan in White Russians.

England

David McMillan returned to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 in 1999. He was arrested in 2000 in Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...

. He was later arrested at Heathrow in 2002 for smuggling 500 grams of class A drugs. For this crime he served a sentence of two years. As of 2007, David McMillan is living quietly in England. The warrant for his arrest in Thailand for heroin trafficking was at that time still active and he was still wanted in Australia for breaching parole. However, the UK government refuses to extradite anyone to a country which carries out the death penalty, while breaching parole is not an extraditable offence.

In June 2009, McMillan appeared as a guest in a 50-minute episode of Danny Dyer
Danny Dyer
Danny Dyer is an English actor, media personality, and chairman of Greenwich Borough, a non-League football team.-Biography:Daniel John Dyer was born in Custom House, an area of East London, to Antony and Christine Dyer...

's Deadliest Men 2: Living Dangerously, which aired on Bravo TV. The episode includes interviews and presents McMillan as having settled peacefully with partner Jeanette and children. An Australian television company, Screentime, released a telemovie that aired on Chanel Nine in February 2011 very loosely based on McMillan's smuggling, arrest, and imprisonment in Bangkok and briefly outlined his escape from Klong Prem. The low budget film was the 3rd in the Underbelly Files series. McMillan is to see published McVillain: the Man Who Got Away, scheduled for launch April 1st, 2011. McVillain is the first in a series planned for the grand rises and deep falls in McMillan's life. Although launched on the springboard of the Underbelly telemovie, the books differ in almost every factual event according to McMillan.

External links

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