Arthur Taylor - Prison break : the extraordinary life and crimes of New Zealands most infamous escapee

PRAISE FOR PRISON BREAK

I really enjoyed Arthurs book. It is an intelligently written memoir written by a highly talented author, remarkable for its honesty, candour, and Arthurs obvious passion for natural justice. It is a fast and racy read, the pace of which never flags throughout.

The readers attention is grabbed from the start, with detailed and exciting narratives based on Arthurs obvious capacity for recall and the detail he includes to colour his stories. He comments with complete candour on the characters and personalities of many of the high-profile criminals with whom he has associated over the past 65 years, as well as many of the justice officials and judges he has encountered.

He also provides interesting and detailed explanations of some of the many legal battles he has been involved with against the Department of Corrections and some of its officials. Over the years I have read many memoirs of criminals and inmates, published in New Zealand and internationally. With the high quality of its writing, the intelligence of its analysis and the excitement of the subject matter, this book certainly stands out as one of the best.

Greg Newbold

Professor Emeritus

University of Canterbury

First published in 2021

Copyright Arthur Taylor and Kelly Dennett

Images authors private collection unless otherwise credited on page.

Disclaimer

This book is memoir and reflects current recollections of the authors experiences. Some details have been changed.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

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A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand

ISBN 978 1 988547 68 8

eISBN 978 1 76106 254 4

Internal design by Megan van Staden

To my brothers and sisters still in prison whose lives and that of their whnau are being blighted by the failure to offer them meaningful assistance to rehabilitate themselves.

Stone walls do not a prison make,

Nor iron bars a cage:

Minds innocent and quiet take

That for an hermitage.

If I have freedom in my love,

And in my soul am free,

Angels alone, that soar above,

Enjoy such liberty.

To Althea, from Prison, Richard Lovelace, 1642

GOOSE BAY, KAIKURA, 1975

It all started with a Holden Torana and a caravan, both stolen. I had driven up to Kaikura from Christchurch on a hunch that the cops, the fucking pricks, were after me. Id been staying in a Christchurch motor camp for a few months, sleeping in the caravan, doing a bit of paid work, but the newspapers were panicking about a burglary at a sports store in Hokitika where all the guns and high-powered rifles had gone missing. A disquiet descended on the South Island. The police put an alert on my name, and had my parents up about me. My poor parents couldnt tell them where I was; they didnt know.

Thats when I decided to moonwalk. I was nineteen, fresh off a jail stint in Australia. I packed up my caravan and drove north to the small settlement of Goose Bay, south of Kaikura, where there was only a campground to speak of. For a few days I had a good time there, enjoying the sun, watching the seals, perusing the township. Then, one day, I decided to practise some target shooting. I was shooting at these rocks in Goose Bay, and some bastard thought I was shooting at the seals. They must have rung the cops, right? The cops must have put two and two together and thought Shit, thats that bloody Taylor, because there werent so many people running around committing crime back in those days.

The local police called in the Armed Offenders Squad, which happened to be on an exercise at West Melton, near Christchurch. They knew I was armed, so they packed up their choppers and flew to Goose Bay. It was dark. A loud-hailer started kicking up and the power went off while I was watching TV in the caravan.

Taylor, throw out your firearms and come out with your hands above your head.

Christ, I thought, I wont give up without a fight.

DUNEDIN, 2020

I was born Arthur William Taylor in 1956. I have ten aliases. Terrence Brown. Herbert Chandley. Peter Dursley. Peter Greene. Peter Murphy. John Newman. Paul Richardson. Michael Smith. Alan Wilson. Mark Taylor. All names of real people who had a short start in life. It was easier to get a job if you didnt tell people who you really were, so I shopped around the sections of cemeteries reserved for newborns or stillborns, and registered a birth certificate in their name. Nobody checked. Nobody cared who you were. They just cared about whether you could do the job.

My criminal record, including traffic offences, runs to sixteen pages. From 1972 to 2012. Thirty-eight years in prison, or so the Parole Board tells me Ive lost track. And 155 convictions. Im fighting a few more. I was released from prison on parole in 2019, after being jailed for seventeen years and six months for kidnapping, escaping, and possessing drugs and explosives. My sentence officially ends in 2022. On the page it sounds bad, but the record doesnt tell you the whole story.

Lifes a bit different now. I live in Dunedin in a small tiny home, near Baldwin Street where the tourists come and take their photos. Right near student-town. Its semi-rural and you cant hear much except the lovely lambs and the birds and the occasional crunch of gravel when the police circle by. My cameras detect them crawling up and down the road, maybe once a day, sometimes once a week.

A security car swooped by at midnight the other day. Fuck knows what theyre looking for. Im inside, typing on my computer; preparing submissions, writing letters to Corrections and answering calls from prisoners. There are cherry tomato plants growing on my deck. Theyll be beautiful in summer if the Dunedin snow doesnt get to them first. A family of ducklings walked past the other day.

When I look back, I think: Be careful. Slow down. Take things slowly. Think things through. When I was young, I was cocky and brash. We have choices in life and we are responsible for them, but sometimes our ability to lead a happy, productive life is taken away from us. It took me a long time to learn that there is always something you can do to change things if you have the right encouragement and support, and the will.

What Im left with, though, if not memories of a life on the outside, is a world of adventure and a path thats led me to help others. My will is iron. A sniff of injustice gets my back up. Prisons are failing our inmates. This book is for them. The stories are for me.

Qualities that were considered good in my old world, such as empathy, kind-heartedness, and helping those in distress or need were seen as signs of weakness, and had to be relegated far into the background if one were to succeed in this new world. This new world was ruled by violence, constant fear and anxiety Beatings, fear, tears, and an aching void where your whanau used to be, seemed the norm.

Arthur Taylor writing to Dame Susan Devoy in support of Royal Commission of Inquiry into state care abuse

APRIL, 1968

I think they must have told my parents they were coming to get me. They must have just said, Were taking Arthur. Its a court order.