Chopper Unchopped by Mark Brandon "Chopper" Read Page B

out loud. Dave handed me the urn and I removed the lid, lifted it up high and said: ‘Goodbye Cowboy. We love you, brother’. Then I tipped the ashes into the water while Dave fired off 21 shots in the air with the cut-down .22.
    I had tears running down my face. So did Dave. We didn’t care if anyone came along. We stood until ‘Sea of Heartbreak’ ended. Then we turned and walked away.
    When next you use the Prahran swimming pool, spare a thought for Cowboy Johnny.
    *
    Three of the main offenders who took part in nearly killing me and killing the Cowboy are now dead themselves. ‘Revenge is a dish best eaten cold’.
    Terry the Tank had left the Surrey Road gang and I was getting around with Mad Charlie. However, the offenders in the Richmond kicking matter had a Jewish problem which they didn’t realise. Dave the Jew took care of the three ringleaders over a period of years.
    I am sorry to say I was in jail for all three ‘goodbyes’ — but nobody escapes the Jew. He watched and waited, slept under houses, stood in the rain and cold for hours and travelled by foot for days. He didn’t rest until Johnny had been revenged. The Jew felt that because he had been late arriving to the Richmond blue that my near-death and Johnny’s death fell on his shoulders — and that it was his debt of honour to get even.
    The mind boggles at how those three died, as all three simply didn’t come home. One by one, they vanished. But if you can envisage a Mien Kampf-reading Jew being treated for a mental condition you might imagine what happened.
    We were a hard crew, and followed violent rules. Loyalty without question and revenge or death was the creed we agreed upon. The Surrey Road gang made the mafia look like poofs.
    It is no secret that from time to time in jail over the years I have not enjoyed the best of mental health.
    There was a high pressure point in late 1983 after I was released from Jika. As I walked from Jika up to the mainstream of Pentridge, I was convinced I was walking into a blood bath. Then a familiar voice spoke to me.
    I looked over my shoulder and there was Cowboy Johnny Harris walking behind me. I was told by prisoners and prison staff that for a few days my face and eyes had a crazy look. I spent two days talking to a dead man. In my mind I was convinced he was walking with me. I was in a highly dangerous state of mind.
    THE COWBOY
    His friendship I can’t forget, I’ll remember him ’till I die,
    And sometimes in the dead of night I think of him and cry.
    He fought his way into my heart, head butt, fist and tooth,
    His shadow always with me, a memory from my youth,
    No-one’s guts were stronger, no-one’s heart more true,
    And no-one loved him more than me and Dave the Jew,
    He gave his life that I should live,
    And the dogs who killed him we don’t forgive,
    That’s a tale the Jew won’t tell,
    But all of them now rest in Hell,
    The man without a name, a father or a mother,
    Cowboy Johnny Harris, you’re not forgotten. Brother.

Chapter 6
Mad Charlie
    ‘Charlie studied Mafia crime books like a priest studied the Bible.’
    ‘MAD Charlie’ was a friend from my teenage days. He looked and sounded like a comic book gangster as a young man. He had dreams of greatness within the underworld. Once, in 1974, he went to America with his Mum and Dad, where he got to shake hands and say ‘hello’ to Carlo Gambino, the boss of bosses of the American Mafia. Carlo Gambino was head of the Gambino crime family, the largest of New York’s five Mafia crime families.
    Charlie was only 17 years old then, and returned with a heart full of dreams and a head full of big ideas. We saw the ‘Godfather’ movie together. Charlie studied Mafia crime books like a priest studied the Bible. As a young up-and-coming criminal he had guts, brains and a small gang. Even as a teenager he was noted for his horrific violence in a street fight. He dressed expensively and had a style and class and flair that drew the