Prison break : Shantaram to the Bangkok Hilton : the world's most wanted Australians

Dapin's words cut into the organs of the criminal underworld like a surgeon's knife!' DAVID McMILLAN, Klong Prem Central Prison Bangkok escapee 'Mark Dapin has built a rapport with some of Australia's most serious criminals. It is a rapport that gives him an edge over other authors that cannot be replicated.' BERNIE MATTHEWS, Long Bay Correctional Centre escapee On a Sunday afternoon in 1980, armed robber Gregory David Roberts abseiled down the front wall of a maximum-security prison in broad daylight. He spent a decade on the run in West Asia before writing his own legend in the bestselling semi-autobiographical novel, Shantaram. In the late nineties, Melbourne-based drug dealer and gangster David McMillan became the only Australian ever to escape from the so-called 'Bangkok Hilton' in Thailand. And in 1999, armed robber John Killick was airlifted out of a maximum-security prison by his beautiful Russian-born girlfriend - after she hijacked a helicopter with a machine gun. With unprecedented access to ex-prisoners, prison officers and police, as well as ASIO files and witnesses, Mark Dapin brings to life a hidden criminal world of prison brutality, courage and legend. Prison Break tells the real story behind Australia's most audacious prison escapes and proves that sometimes the truth is even more compelling than the myth. The true stories behind the myths of Gregory Roberts, John Killick and Australia's most wanted men.'Dapin's words cut into the organs of the criminal underworld like a surgeon's knife!'DAVID McMILLAN, Klong Prem Central Prison Bangkok escapee'Mark Dapin has built a rapport with some of Australia's most serious criminals. It is a rapport that gives him an edge over other authors that cannot be replicated.'BERNIE MATTHEWS, Long Bay Correctional Centre escapeeOn a Sunday afternoon in 1980, armed robber Gregory David Roberts abseiled down the front wall of a maximum-security prison in broad daylight. He spent a decade on the run in West Asia before writing his own legend in the bestselling semi-autobiographical novel, Shantaram. In the late nineties, Melbourne-based drug dealer and gangster David McMillan became the only Australian ever to escape from the so-called'Bangkok Hilton'in Thailand. And in 1999, armed robber John Killick was airlifted out of a maximum-security prison by his beautiful Russian-born girlfriend - after she hijacked a helicopter with a machine gun. With unprecedented access to ex-prisoners, prison officers and police, as well as ASIO files and witnesses, Mark Dapin brings to life a hidden criminal world of prison brutality, courage and legend. Prison Break tells the real story behind Australia's most audacious prison escapes and proves that sometimes the truth is even more compelling than the myth. The real stories behind Gregory Roberts, John Killick and Australia's most daring prison escapes. In his global bestselling novel Shantaram, Gregory Roberts based his fiction on fact. He was once Australia's most wanted man - a prison escapee who went on to live an extraordinary life in India and beyond. John Killick's helicopter escape from Silverwater Jail in 1999 was the most spectacular and daring prison break in Australian history. But what is the truth behind these two legendary men, and the escapes that have become folklore? Mark Dapin, author of the critically acclaimed Public Enemies, has had unprecedented access to Killick himself, numerous former prisoners and associates from as far away as Mumbai, and a wealth of new evidence including ASIO files to help him uncover a hidden criminal world of prison brutality, courage, violence and myth. Prison Break tells the real story behind Australia's most daring prison escapes, and shows that sometimes the truth is more compelling than the myth.