Crime Week book extract: Australian Outlaw - the True Story of Postcard Bandit Brenden Abbott, by Derek Pedley

CRIME WEEK PART 3: Bank robber. Fugitive. Womaniser. Conman. How the Postcard Bandit executed his last and most audacious prison break. Part 1 | Part 2

The "Postcard Bandit" Brenden James Abbott, left, before his incarceration.

BANK robber. Fugitive. Womaniser. Comedian. Conman. Chameleon. How the Postcard Bandit put his stamp on Australia ... and paid the price. Read an extract from Derek Pedley's book.

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IN the lead-up to a surreal night that made international headlines, Brenden Abbott's long-lost love Jackie Lord was thrilled to be corresponding with him again. She says:

"Brenden and I started writing again in 1997. We used to write a lot and he would call every weekend. He was supposed to go to Woodford. That was why he wanted to break out. He said: 'I'm getting a transfer to Woodford and I don't want to go there. So if you don't hear from me for a while, don't panic'. He kind of even hinted to me that he was going [to escape]. He said something about someone having organised him passports. I said: 'What are you talking like this for? You're locked up.' He said: 'Yeah, but that can change.' And I thought: What is he up to now?"

Abbott: "There wouldn't be a day that goes by in maximum-security prisons where escape is not talked about. On this day, in the 4B exercise yard, someone raised the possibility of an escape being pulled off by getting outside assistance. It was an idea that had been raised by many - and on one occasion, even tried, with those involved coming undone at the fence. I spoke up with an idea, saying something like: 'It'd be easy to do, but the biggest hurdle is finding someone who'd be prepared to help from the outside and be prepared to shoot at the perimeter vehicle'. A bloke speaks up, saying he'd do something like that. You hear people talk shit all the time in prison and on hearing that, I didn't think any different. Someone else told him what I was just thinking and the bloke who claimed he'd do it again speaks up: 'What's so hard about that? As long as you've got the right gun, you could take the vehicle out'.

I was already aware that he was due out in a few weeks and after what he said, I thought I'd have a quiet word with him later. I pulled him aside and asked him if he was serious. Without hesitation, he says: 'f**king oath, I'd do it.' I said to him: 'You have a think about that for a few days and if you have no doubts about it, there's a few of us that would appreciate some outside help.' He told me he didn't need time, but I told him to think it over anyway, and also not to mention it to anyone. After a number of days, I approached him again and he was as keen as mustard. From then on, a new plan was in the making. I then told [convicted killer] Jason [Nixon] about the help from the outside. For the weeks prior to [the volunteer] being released, he was briefed over and over again in the role he was to play. News_Image_File: Brenden Abbott in a police photo from 1994.

I still had my doubts about him pulling it off, even to the night it went down. He soon managed to get hold of an M14 7.62mm rifle and six spare magazines, an SKS 7.62mm rifle and four spare magazines and a .22 automatic pistol and a silencer and ammunition. He was to get two pairs of large side cutters or small bolt cutters to throw over the fence (two pairs each, just in case the first go in throwing them over failed); and at least two cars, the second car to be parked some distance from the jail. The plan was he would come to the fence at a specified time and flash his torch. If for some reason we couldn't go from our end, a piece of burning paper would be dropped out of mine or Jason's cell window. On seeing this, he was to clear out. If it was all go, he'd get a flash with a lighter … But as I've found on many occasions, things rarely go to plan."

On September 17, 1997, Brendan Luke Berichon, 19, walked out of Sir David Longland Correctional Centre after serving his sentence for armed robbery. Herald Sun crime reporter Paul Anderson later profiled Berichon in his book, Dirty Dozen - 12 True Crime Stories That Shocked Australia. Abbott and the teenager who became known as his apprentice had much in common. Brendan Sjuka was born in Newcastle on December 30, 1977. After his natural parents separated, he and his two-year-old sister Linda were moved by their mother Julie to her hometown of Townsville. Julie remarried in 1982 and young Brendan was given his stepfather's name, Berichon … But things started turning bad for the youngster when the family moved to the Brisbane suburb of Sunnybank in 1988.

It was at Sunnybank State School where troublesome peers led the impressionable teenager astray, introducing him to marijuana, among other things. By Year 9, it became obvious that he was heading for trouble and he was expelled for violence. Welfare authorities deemed that the fifteen-year-old needed guidance. On the advice of Children's Services, Berichon was sent to the Boystown home for troubled youths near Beaudesert, about 50km southwest of Brisbane.

He lived there for about two years, where interest in BMX bikes and boxing bloomed. His fellow inmates voted him mayor of Boystown and he earned the nicknames BB and Bags. "He really enjoyed it there after the initial upheaval," his mum told the Courier Mail. It was upon his release that he began a series of court appearances that would inevitably lead him to meet Brenden Abbott. By the end of January 1994, Berichon had been charged with crimes including burglary, car offences, breaking into homes and carrying weapons. While on probation, he started sheet metal work and was developing a positive attitude. But it all soon fell apart. When he witnessed the stabbing death of a friend at a party, he lost his way again. News_Image_File: Superintendent Colin Smith outside the Darwin laundry where Brenden Abbott was apprehended. Picture: Susan Bown

While still on probation, Brendan continued to commit crimes, graduating to a service station hold-up. In early 1996, he was convicted for armed robbery and sentenced to two and a half years jail with a six-month minimum. He was released on home detention. But trouble brewed between him and his sister and, after breaching the home detention order, he was sent to Sir David Longland jail to finish his sentence. It was there that he would meet his criminal idol.

It wasn't until November 1 or 2 that Brenden Abbott found out fellow 4B resident, convicted killer Oliver Alincic, regularly phoned Berichon to place bets on the horses. That meant Abbott could speak directly to Berichon, even though he wasn't on his approved list of callers. Alincic was brought in on the escape plan and on November 2, he rang Berichon again. Part of the conversation went like this:

ALINCIC: 'I'll pass you on to an old mate.'

ABBOTT: 'Hello, hello, hello.'

BERICHON: 'How you going mate?'

ABBOTT: 'Hey listen, whenever you see that f**kin' Lyn mate, tell her to get her arse in. F**kin' … visit wouldn't f**kin' … go astray, you know?'

BERICHON: 'Hey?'

ABBOTT: 'When you see Lyn, tell her to get her arse in one day and visit.'

BERICHON: 'Yeah, uh, Michelle's coming up on Thursday. [Michelle was code for Monday November 3, 1997.]'

ABBOTT: 'Oh, is she?'

BERICHON: 'Michelle.'

ABBOTT: 'All right. Oh yeah. Yeah, f**kin' oath, I'll see her. Make sure she's wearing something appropriate so she can give me a flash. [Don't forget to signal].'

BERICHON: 'Yeah, yeah.'

But things did not go to plan. A fuming Abbott called Berichon the next day:

BERICHON: 'Hello?'

ABBOTT: 'How ya going?'

BERICHON: 'How ya going mate?'

ABBOTT: 'All right.'

BERICHON: 'I'm glad you rang … f**king, uh, you know how I said f**king Michelle was coming up?'

ABBOTT: 'Yeah.'

BERICHON: 'She f**king had car trouble, man. She can't come up.'

ABBOTT: 'Ah, right.'

BERICHON: 'But, ah, f**king … f**king Toni said she was coming up.' [Toni was code for that night.]

ABBOTT: 'Ah, did she?'

BERICHON: 'I was f**king spewing.'

ABBOTT: 'Oh. Were ya? … You reckon … you reckon I would've been f**kin' spewing if she didn't rock up?'

BERICHON: 'Shit, mate.'

ABBOTT: 'Ah right, that'll be fine. Not a problem.'

BERICHON: 'It's a bit of f**king shit mate, you know what I mean?'

ABBOTT: 'All right, ah, that's no drama.'

Abbott said later that relying on an inexperienced nineteen-year-old to get it right was one thing, but keeping the escape plan from the authorities was worse.

"Initially, there were to be only three of us to escape - Jason, myself and one other. Once out, the three of us would pull off a few jobs and then go our separate ways. As for the outside help, he got paid off a nice figure and no-one was to be the wiser to who he was. Diamond wire was required to cut the bars at either AGCC or SDL. Hacksaws were useless. The bars have a high carbon content in them that makes them hard as f**k to cut with hacksaws, as well as noisy. With diamond wire, the harder the steel, the better it seems to cut it. A brace was needed for the diamond wire. A handle off a drawer did that job. It was removed from a drawer from the kitchen. The screws that held the handle to the drawer were threaded on the whole length. Cutting both to a short length allowed them to be screwed into the handle to their heads.

(I already had the diamond wire required to cut the bars. I was allowed to have a stereo sent to AGCC, but I didn't get to have it in my cell. I was transferred to SDL a week or so after it arrived at AGCC. No security check was done on it at either centre. Even so, the chances of finding it were slim.)

Cutting the bar was a long and slow process that took me over three nights, but in actual time to cut the bar almost right through, about two and a half hours. Before cutting the bar, I had to dismantle the hinge connected to the bar and the louvred window. I'd acquired the allen key needed to do this some months earlier for the initial escape plan, which also included us cutting our way out of our cells. Once the hinge was undone from the window, it would be slid along the bar and the cut made where the hinge normally sat. When back in place, it would hide the cut in the bar.News_Image_File: The cover of Derek Pedley's book Australian Outlaw: The True Story of Postcard Bandit Brenden Abbott

I made my cut through the bar and left about 2mm of the bar to cut. On the night of the escape, just a good hit would snap the section still intact. It was during one night while cutting the bar that the bloke in the cell next to me heard me working. This bloke was [convicted killer] Andrew [Jeffrey], one of the eventual escapees. As most confide with friends, he did so about me cutting my bar. Unknown to Andrew, his friend was also my friend. He wasn't sure if he should've told me about Andrew's discovery, but knew the consequences of jail talk eventually getting to the screws and gave me the mail. After a talk to Jason, it was decided to bring Andrew in on the escape. He was doing life and when the offer was put to him, he didn't hesitate for a moment. He was in. He was drilled not to mention it to a soul.

After I'd done my bar, the cutting equipment went into Jason's cell. The diamond wire ended up breaking in half while he was doing his, obviously by putting too much pressure on it. Of course, he blamed the tool. We now had another problem - there was just the one diamond wire. How the f**k were we to get some more? One idea was to get it thrown on to the oval, another was to push it into a thong on a contact visit. The diamond wire is very fine, about 2mm thick. Pushing it into a thong would've been easy to do, but first it had to be bought and it wasn't the easiest thing to find in Brisbane. While that search continued, just by chance, I overheard a bloke talking about the non-contact visits area. He was only allowed non-contact visits due to a positive drug test. He mentioned how someone had used a lighter in an attempt to burn a hole through the perspex screen [separating prisoners from visitors]. He reckoned the hole was almost through. We could get the diamond wire in and by a way the screws would least expect. The non-contacts area had no camera and wasn't under constant watch.

We had another tool handy that was to be used for the initial escape plan - an 8mm drill bit with an iron bar welded on the top so you could drill by hand. They tried it out on one of the perspex louvres in the unit and it worked a dream. Next problem was how to get it to the visiting area. It was eventually smuggled over by someone who stuck it up his arse [inside a pen casing] and later, someone used it to drill a hole through the perspex that divided the inmate and the visitor.

After a search for diamond wire was exhausted in Brisbane, a call had to be made to another state to get it. But even then, there were delays. Then a person doing the shopping in Brisbane came up with carbide rods. They are sold at many hardware stores and are cheap. The girl who brought them in smuggled them in up her pouch and threaded them through the hole in the perspex. From the visits area, they were brought back in a pair of thongs. All went well.

The carbide rods were about 4 to 5mm in diameter and cut the bars okay, but made far more noise than the diamond wire. Jason cut his bar first and then the gear went into Andrew's cell. It was around this time that [convicted rapist] Peter Sterling was brought in on it and Ollie [Alincic]. Ollie moved into the cell with Jason, and Peter went into Andrew's cell. There would've been another if I was allowed to have someone in a cell with me. But management would never allow me to be 'two out' for security reasons. News_Image_File: Brenden James Abbott at Woodford Prison in 1998.

Next was the getting over the razor wire that surrounded B block. It was a jump of four feet to clear the razor wire. An idea someone had was to use the plastic chairs we had in the cells. Getting a number of them stacked up gave us the launching pad to get over the wire. But to get them outside with us [through the window] required us cutting the backs off.

After the bars were bent out the way, they could be managed through. Cutting the backs off was done by heating a knife on the kitchen cooktop's gas flame and then slowly melting through and across the back of the chair. It took forever. The backs that were cut off were stored in the large wheelie bin.

Before we all escaped, it was made clear to all that I would only team up with one of the others. The rest knew they had to go their own way. For the first few days, they could stay at the unit on the Gold Coast to change their identity and to lay low. From then on, they had to make do themselves. It was clear and simple.

Most of these tools we had came from prison workshops. The tin snips came from a toolbox of a contractor who'd come into the prison. These tin snips would play a vital role in the escape. Another part in the plan was to use doona covers in making a rope. The material was a heavy drill-type fabric, heavier than bed sheet. It was thought that once the bar was free, it would need the extra help in bending it back far enough to make room for a body to fit through. The makeshift windlass would be threaded around the bar, cut and then around the bars above the cell door and the two ends of the rope tied together. Then, by snapping off the support post from the bottom bed to the top bunk and using this to wind the sheet up, this would eventually pull the bar away. It soon turned out on the night that making up the windlass wasn't necessary. (Well, if there were two in the cell together, since it was possible to pull the bar back. Alone, it was a different story.)

On November 3, around midnight, we were expecting to escape and the chairs with the backs cut off were divided up among the three cells and the ropes made were taken into the cell prior to being locked in for that night. Come midnight, no show, and by 2am, I knew it wasn't on. I came to the conclusion that this bloke was never going to show all along. There were a couple of things didn't go to plan that he was to carry out after his release and then the no-show confirmed it. But I still hung on to some hope that maybe there was a good reason.

Contact was made the next day and without explaining the details to me, it was obvious he had some drama. Giving some name [Toni] he indicated he'd be there that night. During that day, I was sweating on the screws finding the rope, chairs and the support bar on the bed that one of the others got ahead of himself and snapped off. After lock-up, the wait began. I was feeling the effects already of lack of sleep. The night before, I only managed an hour's sleep, if that. Then around midnight, there came the flash from his torch and then the response from us. Then I set up my windlass, removed the window hinge, snapped off the bed support and started to wind away. The bars in the cell either side of me gave way with enormous cracks that sounded like gunshots. I thought this alone would bring the screws. Next thing, there were four people outside my cell and my bar hadn't given way yet. The windlass was getting to the point where something had to give. I was straining in twisting the bed support around and if I'd let go, it would've unwound like a spring. Then, all of a sudden, the rope snaps.

Ollie was sent back into his cell to get his rope. I wrapped it around the bars again and started winding again, until I got to the point of something giving way. The four outside were also pushing on the bar and with an almighty bang, it gave way. I then grabbed the bar and pulled it around as the others pushed the bar, then it broke off completely in my hand. Where the other support bar was welded to it, it broke off there. I slid my chairs out and put my head and arms through and they pulled me out.

We stacked the chairs up next to the razor wire that surrounded B block and took turns in jumping over. When I got on top of the chairs, Ollie gave out a yell when his finger got crushed from my weight. Ollie was the last to jump over. Because there was no-one to hold the chairs steady, he almost landed on the razor wire. When we got to the fence, the plan changed. One of them was already using the tin snips to cut the wire on the first barrier. This was a sensor fence made up of taut wire that surrounded the entire prison. This fence was about two and a half to three metres high and as soon as this was cut, the alarms would've been ringing at the front gates security monitoring area.News_Image_File: Fugitive Brenden Abbott wears a balaclava with his brother Glenn in Thredbo, NSW in 1993.

Three barriers bordered Sir David Longland Correctional Centre, including an inner boundary wire strung about one and a half metres high. The second fence was the taut barbed wire fence, about three metres high. The third barrier was a duraduct fence, about six metres high, built from weld mesh, fitted with an alarm and four rolls of razor wire at both the top and the base.

Then the bloke outside had the boltcutters ready to throw over the fences, but they were far larger and heavier than what was needed. We watched them sail towards us and then hit the drum atop the fence and land a metre or so in front of us, but on the other side of the fence. The next pair he tried to throw over were even larger. These didn't even make it over the outer fence and got caught up in the razor wire.

I was still waiting for the pistol to come over and I felt like we were sitting ducks under the floodlights. None of us realised he'd thrown the gun over before we made it to the fence and it was sitting just metres from us. Without the boltcutters, I thought we were f**ked. Jason tells the young bloke to f**k off out of there, no point in him hanging around and getting caught as well. But he didn't want to leave us posted and grabbed the large boltcutters caught up in the first fence and started cutting it. Gutsy effort, I thought.

Meanwhile, the bloke cutting the sensor wire with the tin snips had cut a few strands and we were through that in no time. Then he started to cut into the fence that had the drum on top of it, but no way was this going to be as easy; it played havoc with the finger muscles."

Earlier in the evening, the prison's daily ritual had run like clockwork. Lockdown at 6.15pm, followed by a head count of blocks B, C and K between 7.15pm and 7.30pm. The same again at 9pm, then at 9.30pm the various officers returned to their posts. They brought a prisoner across from C block to cook the officers' evening meal in the B block officers' mess. The next head count was due at 1am. The regularity of the checks greatly benefited the escape planning.

Officers Helmut Fritz and Leigh Dixon were relieved from the perimeter vehicle and came over for a meal with C and K block officers. The alarm trilled in the main gate control room just before 12.30am, and three of its TV monitors automatically focused on zone 7. Acting control room officer Derek Bax rushed to the screens and saw inmates between the inner and middle perimeter fences. He pressed the touch screen on another computer and brought up the fence map. All three fences in zone 7 were red. Through the microphones mounted around the perimeter, he could hear someone struggling to cut through the fence wire. Bax grabbed for his microphone and said: 'Crims on the oval or tennis court'.

This alerted the other ten SDL prison officers on duty that something was seriously amiss. Bax was not a regular in the control room position and didn't instantly know the procedures. He tried the local police station first, spending precious seconds establishing that it was closed before dialling 000. The phone's placement meant he did not have a clear view of the monitors, so while he worked the phones over the next half hour, he couldn't keep anyone updated on events at the perimeter.

An officer in K block rang 000 when he saw the escape was in progress, but as a prison inspectors' report later noted: 'The emergency operator initially regarded his call as frivolous'. Operations Senior Malcolm Harper, who took charge of the prison at 7pm, was completing paperwork in the main gate area, downstairs from the control room, when the first alarm sounded. He rang Bax, who informed him that five inmates were at the fence in zone 7.

Harper rushed to the control room monitors to see it for himself. He told Bax to ring police and everyone else on the contingency plan contact list, not updated since 1993. Then came a chilling radio call from the armoured Toyota Land Cruiser - it was disabled and taking heavy gunfire.

While the officers in B block waited for the C block inmate to finish cleaning up after their dinner, the radio message came from the control room. Prison officers Leigh Dixon and Helmut Fritz responded immediately, running towards zone 7, on the perimeter on the prison's northwest side, about 220 metres behind and to the right of B block. In between zone 7 and B block were two tennis courts, one on a higher level. Fritz went towards the lower side of the tennis courts and Dixon went towards the upper side and then they saw the prisoners, standing almost casually beneath one of the fence lights. Fritz twice yelled: "Get down on the ground." One of the group, possibly Jason Nixon, pointed menacingly at them and yelled: "You c**ts stay down, or you'll f**king go down." As if to back up the statement, shots rang out in the darkness, but they came from outside the prison. News_Image_File: A police roadblock on the Stuart Highway, near the Arnhem Highway turnoff, in 1998, in the search for prison escapee Brenden Abbott, who was recaptured in Darwin. Picture: Dani Gawlik

Abbott: "The bloke outside came close to the fence holding the M14 rifle. He was told to put a round over their heads and did so. The first round gave everyone a fright - we all took a slight dive. The screws decided to dive for cover completely. Who can blame them? Be an idiot to do otherwise. As the first round went off, Jason and myself were hit by something. I copped something in the arm and Jason in the leg. A day or more later, I picked a fragment of brass out from above my wrist area. Jason later also found what appeared to be a brass fragment in his leg." [Abbott suspects Berichon got soil or stone in the rifle's flash suppressor when he dropped it on the ground. The flash suppressor then blew apart, causing bullet fragments to hit the nearby Abbott and Nixon.]

Dixon and Fritz dropped to their stomachs, unarmed, without cover. They continued to monitor the prisoners over the next few minutes as they milled around the fence, becoming increasingly agitated. Fritz heard someone yell from outside the fence: 'I can't cut the wire. I can't cut the f**kin' wire'.

Officers Mark Irvin and Mark Fritz heard the call on the radio and raced around the perimeter towards zone 7 in the black Land Cruiser. They were much better equipped to handle the situation than the guards inside.

"Moments later and we were still trying to get through the drum fence when finally the perimeter vehicle shows up. It was coming around from our left as we faced the fence and was some twenty metres from us when the bloke outside opened fire on the vehicle. After the first or second shot, it came to a sudden stop. The bloke using the rifle was manually reloading the rifle each time he fired it and I yelled out to him that he didn't have to keep reloading it, it did it by itself. Didn't have to tell him twice. He let go with a least half a dozen rounds and left a number of live rounds on the road."

The Land Cruiser contained a shotgun, rifle, two pistols and tear gas. But then gunfire hit the motor and they rolled to a halt. Peering down the road, they saw a muzzle flash about 75 metres away, near zone 7. Irvin contacted the control room on the radio as Fritz turned the vehicle's spotlight on a darkened figure in the area near the bright flash. As he did, bullets whistled past the Toyota and one came through the left windscreen. Fritz later told investigators: 'I could see what I thought was muzzle flash coming from just inside the tree line, northwest of zone 7 on the rise. I could distinctly remember seeing it coming from near a large tall ghost gum tree.'

Irvin ducked in the driver's seat while Fritz dived in the rear compartment to get the 9mm Marlin carbine. He looked out and saw the five inmates running across the road into the bush.

After the last prisoner went through the fence, the figure outside followed them. Fritz told investigators: 'At this time, he was side-on to us and then he stopped, turned to face us, brought a firearm to his right shoulder, aimed the rifle in our direction and fired two or three shots straight at us. I saw at this time that this person was wearing a dark-coloured balaclava. After this, he ran off in the direction of the prisoners. Every time I would put my head up to see what was going on, the vehicle was fired upon by the person near the ghost gum tree.'

Both officers in the Toyota believed two gunmen, not one, were attacking them. Fritz felt a bullet whiz past his face. After the volleys of shots, the officers sat there in eerie silence, unable to communicate with the control room, or defend themselves through the Toyota's gun ports, which were east-west, while the vehicle faced north.News_Image_File: Brenden Abbott with an outfit he won in a yo-yo competition in late 1975.

Fritz later told Brisbane's Sunday Mail: 'It was only luck that stopped us from losing several officers. These people meant business.' The following day, the prison officer returned to work, only to be taunted by inmates, who dubbed him 'Target'.

Abbott: "Those working on cutting the fence called me over to have a go at it. I put the makeshift bag I made earlier that night from a windcheater (holding a '96 - '97 diary and sunglasses) on the ground next to the fence and started having a go at it. Soon we had a hole big enough for the smallest of us to get through. The bloke outside grabs the boltcutters and continues to make it big enough for all of us. Then we had to make our way through the razor wire. Suddenly, I've got claret all over my right hand. I look at the palm and then back to see where it was coming from. Couldn't see the wound and didn't give it a second thought. The tin snips were useless in cutting the razor wire, as were the boltcutters. The best we could do was remove a clip that held some of the wire together and spread it apart, which gave some opening through. I was wearing a long sleeve windcheater and track pants and remember pushing through the razor wire and feeling it catch on my clothes and ripping as I continued through."

Police records released under Freedom of Information laws show that the bundle containing Abbott's 1996 and 1997 diaries - which later mysteriously disappeared - his sunglasses and prison ID, were found near the fence breach.

"There was also an enlargement of Queensland's coat of arms on a piece of paper, of which I had plans to use for something. And in my 1997 diary for that day, I drew a small 'happy face' and a small 'sad face'. Whatever the result from the escape, I'd be having one of these expressions."

After crossing the razor wire, Abbott was again a free man. But how long would it last this time?

"The moment I was on the perimeter road, I felt vulnerable, a sitting target for the screws in the perimeter vehicle. I felt better once in the bush and heading in the direction of the dark figures moving some distance in front of me. Sterlo was near me at this point and we were both having problems keeping upright while running through the scrub. I ran across some corrugated iron that made a hell of a racket.

By the time I got to the car, the others were already in it and as I got to the rear door and went to open it, they drove off. Then someone in the back yells: 'Hang on, he's not in yet', and the car stops. I got in and next we're on the road that goes past the prison."

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DETECTIVE Sergeant Paul Mason and Constable Ian Wells of Oxley police responded immediately to a radio message about the escape. They saw the Falcon driving towards them and switched on the high beam, lighting up the crowd of brown tracksuits inside the car. The officers threw their car into a U-turn and the chase began. The Falcon turned left on to Ipswich Motorway access road and then a person appeared at the driver's side rear passenger window with a rifle pressed to his shoulder. The police prudently dropped back and got busy on the radio.

"Jason pointed the M14 at them and tried to fire it, but nothing happened. He passed it back to me to see what was wrong with it. As I later found out, none of them had any experience with this type of firearm, or firearms in general. The magazine was empty and I asked the driver where the spare mags were, and he said they were on the floor somewhere in the back. Sitting four across the back seat was a tight squeeze and searching for the magazines proved difficult. I was handed a magazine for the SKS (semi-automatic high-powered rifle) and explained the one I needed was a square type. One was found and handed to me, but the f**ker was empty.

Then I got a full magazine, reloaded the M14 and sat myself outside the car through the door. The patrol car was sitting back some distance and I gave a burst of gunfire way, way above their car as a warning that they'd best f**k off. They got the message and faded away in the distance. Their statements would claim they saw sparks on the road in front of them and heard shit fly up and hit the car. Yeah, f**kin' sure it did."News_Image_File: The kit used by bank robber Brenden Abbott during his robbery in Mirrabooka, NSW.

The Falcon was about 200 metres short of Boundary Road when the shots were fired over the officers' car and forced it to drop back out of sight.

"After the cops disappeared, the driver was told to turn down the first road we came upon and after a few more turns, we had no idea where we were. I told him to find a block of flats so we can pull in and park, because we couldn't keep driving around the area, which would soon be swarming with cops. I was then told there wasn't a second car and there wasn't enough fuel in the car we were in to get to the Gold Coast anyway.

Eventually, I convinced them to pull up somewhere and we parked beside a shed and killed the lights and engine. Someone opened a car door and then a dog at a nearby house started going apeshit. Then everyone wanted to get moving again and away we went. I didn't like the move, but I was outnumbered."

City Security Services owner Paul Flanagan was patrolling the Acacia Ridge area when the call came across his scanner on a police channel. He turned his car around and headed for Wacol, and en route began following the Falcon, which had just shaken off the police car. He lost sight of it briefly and then came across it parked in the middle of Forest Lake Boulevard, Forest Lake.

Abbott: "We thought it was cops. We turned left and just around the corner I told the driver to stop. The others played up, so I told them: 'We can't outrun them, so I'll put a stop to them'. The car stopped, I got out with the M14 and the car chasing us pulled up at the corner. I let go with a number of shots - again, well over the top of the vehicle. The car was put in reverse and quickly disappeared down the street. I got back into the car and we headed down a few more streets and parked at a vacant block next to some houses being built.

We all cleared out of the car. Jason, Ollie and Andrew headed off one way, Sterlo, the young bloke and myself went in the opposite direction carrying the M14. We were out of the car for only a few seconds when a cop car appeared in the street. Some bloke was out in the front yard of his house across the road and next thing a helicopter was hovering above us. We got as far away as possible, ducking for cover when vehicles headed up the street we were on. Eventually, we ended up in a bush area no more than a kilometre from where we dumped the car, and that area was getting grid searched by a helicopter.

At one point, we were all submerged in a pond and the spotlight from the helicopter went directly on us, but didn't make us. It cruised by and we're out of the water and trying to make as much ground away from the car as possible. The chopper went over us at least six times and missed us. We all huddled together when we could see and hear it coming towards us. If it was using the heat-seeking device, I'm none the wiser. If so, the only reason I can think of as to why it didn't pick us up was due to being drenched from the pond. I honestly thought we were f**ked. News_Image_File: Police escort Brendan Berichon off a chartered plane to face 10 charges over aiding Brenden Abbott's escape from prison in 1997. Picture: Channel 10

Before long, the scrub we were in came to the back of houses and the helicopter was still checking the area nearby for what seemed like hours before all started to quieten down and dawn was soon upon us. One of the others made a suggestion that we bail up people in a house. I wasn't going to take part in such a stunt; I would take my chances where we were. If it meant sitting another night out here, so be it. I might terrorise people during bank jobs, but be f**ked if I was going to terrorise a family in their home. I might be a c**t, but there's a limit to how much of a c**t I'll be. The bush we were in wasn't that thick with vegetation, but we found some cover and sat out many hours of the following day."

After risking their lives and losing custody of three killers, a rapist and a bank robber, the SDL prison officers faced one more indignity that day, highlighted on the Courier Mail's front page days after the escape.

While Abbott and the others sat it out in the scrub, police were bagging evidence in his old cell at SDL's unit 4B. Detective Sergeant Eric Giesemann reported: 'An inspection of cell fourteen revealed an application for transfer in the name of Jason Nixon, which was approved and signed by B Abbott. An inspection of cell twelve revealed an application for transfer for Brendan Abbott, which was approved and signed by Jason Nixon.'

That afternoon, Berichon went to the nearby Mount Ommaney shopping centre in Brisbane's south-western suburbs, with a shopping list: tracksuits, to replace their prison browns, sunglasses, chocolate and drinks. When he returned, he told them the area was still crawling with police and within minutes, a helicopter was buzzing directly above them again.

"The door on its left side was open and it was flying so low that it was possible to make out the face of the person behind the pilots. It flew directly above us, but we weren't spotted. After a few cruises over and near us, it moved on. We decided it was time to move on, too. We came out of the bush and walked up the street. A couple of women with kids were in the driveway of a house, one obviously about to get into her car and leave and the other one was seeing her off. They watched us walk out of the bush and kept their eyes on us all the way up the street. They would've been thinking: No, surely not. That wouldn't be them, would it?

I wrapped the M14 with garbage bags and hid it in the long grass with the intention of retrieving it some time later. It was later revealed on the news that it was found. I thought the cops f**ked up on that because it was obvious it had been hidden. They could have staked it out and waited for us to come back for it. Halfway up the street, some bloke was working on his XD Ford station wagon on the nature strip. Without warning, Peter headed off to the front door of his house and we followed. Another bloke was inside and met us at the door. Peter asked if we could use his phone and the bloke had no problems with that. We invited ourselves in and sat in the lounge room with this bloke. The cab was called and the destination I gave was Logan City shopping centre, but I intended getting the cab to go somewhere else.

Peter asked this guy for a drink and without waiting for a response, he went straight to the fridge. Then the penny dropped - the bloke was on to who we were. His heart was thumping that hard you could see his shirt shaking and he had difficulty controlling his breathing. The bloke who was working on his car out front came inside, none the wiser as to who the guests were. He grabbed something and headed back out to the car. I tried to get a conversation going with the other bloke to try to settle him down a bit, to make him feel he wasn't in any danger. None of us told him who we were, but something gave it away. The poor bastard would have felt like the taxi was taking forever.

News_Rich_Media: The Postcard Bandit - the escape sequence

It pulled in the driveway within ten minutes and we left the bloke to change his jocks. He was on his phone as soon as we were out the driveway. I told the driver: 'Forget Logan City, mate, the city will do.' We drove past Arthur Gorrie and the driver told us about the prison breakout the night before. I asked him: 'Is this the place?' indicating towards AGCC. He said: 'No, a prison further over.' We eventually got on to a freeway and not far out of the city, we spotted another helicopter flying parallel to the freeway, heading in the same direction as us. Surely it's not on to us, I thought. As we pulled up in the city, we got out of the cab and saw the helicopter then hovering directly above us. Not good, I thought."

Police relied on the taxi's global positioning system to track it, but missed their chance to move in. It stopped at the corner of Albert and Elizabeth streets in the city centre, and the trio slipped into the late afternoon city crowds. The Roma Street transit centre was shut down after reported sightings at 5.30pm, causing peak-hour chaos. The hunt widened to South Bank, across the river, after a report three men were seen trying to conceal firearms as they crossed Victoria Bridge. Armed police scoured the Queensland Performing Arts Centre and floodlit the area, believing they had the escapees trapped. Diners in nearby restaurants were locked in. The net closed. But the sightings were all furphies; luck had somehow stayed on the escapees' side. And while they regrouped, the city of Brisbane locked its doors and shuddered. Anything could happen now.

After getting out of the taxi, Abbott and his fellow escapees walked around a corner and jumped into another one at a rank, ordering the driver to head for the Gold Coast.

"After some distance along the freeway, the computer screen in front of the driver beeps and a message comes across. I couldn't make it out, but something soon changed in the driver's demeanour. Peter asked the driver if he was married and had kids. I think he said no to both. Not long after, he switched off the computer screen and there was very little conversation during the trip down to the Coast. At the Coast he dropped us off at a drive-through on the Gold Coast Highway in Broadbeach. I gave the driver $100 and away he went."

One of them booked into a motel, then went across the road to buy food at a Hungry Jack's store. 'Deja vu for me,' Abbott joked later, referring to when he and Aaron Reynolds had gone to a Hungry Jack's in Perth hours after escaping from Fremantle Prison.

"The young bloke went over to get the takeaway and brought it back to the room. I had injuries from the razor wire and it was the first opportunity to attend to them. The worst was to my right hand, a deep cut to the soft area opposite the thumb. By then, the bleeding had stopped. The couple of nicks on the legs weren't an issue. I came through pretty good considering the state of a couple of others I later caught up with. After the feed and the shower, I felt it was time to move on. I wanted to head south towards Coolangatta. Walking was the best choice, but along the beach where we wouldn't stand out. By now, every person in the state would be seeing our pictures on TV. The young bloke was still the unknown.

We walked as far as Burleigh Heads. By now it was late in the night and the effect of sleep deprivation was taking its toll on me. In the past 72 hours, I had only had three hours sleep. We decided to catch the bus to Coolangatta, and stay at a 24-hour motel I knew. I'd catch the bus at one stop and Peter and the young bloke would walk up to the next stop and get on. But there was a misunderstanding and I thought Peter was going to make a phone call at the phone box next to the toilets at Burleigh Heads beach. Then he'd let me know before they started walking. I went and sat in the bus shelter and laid back on the seat. I thought I had dozed off for a few minutes, but I must've been out for an hour or more and be f**ked if I could find them when I woke. I managed to find out the time and realised I must have slept longer than I thought.

I'd already made arrangements with the young bloke just in case we split up, so I wasn't too concerned; midday at the Tugun post office if we split before noon, if not, at noon on the days that followed. Similar arrangements were made with Jason, on a certain day at the Kirra Surf Club at the car park of Pizza Hut. I was wondering if they'd both still remember. I eventually made my way to Coolangatta and found that the 24-hour motel was no longer open 24 hours. There was no sign of Peter and the young bloke. By then, all I was interested in was getting some sleep. There was an upturned lifesavers' boat on Coolangatta beach. It had drizzled most of the night and was still at it. I crawled under the boat and lay there, dwelling on the hectic past 24 hours or more; I'd had a lot of luck on my side. I went out like a light."

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From Australian Outlaw - the True Story of Postcard Bandit

Brenden Abbott, Derek Pedley (Sly Ink, RRP $24.95 - paperback; Amazon RRP $7.99 - ebook)

Available at the News Shop at 31 Waymouth St, Adelaide, at the specially discounted price of $14.95. For country orders, call 8206 3317.

Also available through bookshops, or to order a hard copy online, click here. For an ebook version, click here

Derek Pedley is a news editor at The Advertiser and a true-crime writer. He has more than two decades of experience as a reporter, sub-editor and news editor in Western Australia and South Australia. He is also the author of Dead By Friday - How lust and greed led to murder in the suburbs.

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MORE CRIME WEEK STORIES

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