Great train robber Ronnie Biggs was today being treated in a London hospital after a suspected heart attack.
The 74-year-old was said to be "very sick" following the latest of several health scares since he returned to Britain in May 2001.
He was rushed to the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Woolwich, south London, last night. "The initial diagnosis is a suspected heart attack with very heavy pneumonia," Biggs's spokeswoman said.
His son, Michael, who is by his father's bedside, criticised the British government for continuing to hold him at a high security prison despite his ill health.
"My father is a very sick man and I have absolutely no doubt that the nature of his imprisonment has contributed greatly to this," he said.
"To see my father so seriously ill and be unable to be with him is extremely depressing."
Michael, 29, said his father, who cannot read or speak and has to be fed through a tube, posed no threat to society.
Biggs had been held in Belmarsh prison since he returned voluntarily to the UK in 2001 - 36 years after escaping from jail and fleeing abroad.
PA