The Golden Boy of Crime by Jim Brown

Author:Jim Brown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Published: 2019-04-07T16:00:00+00:00

Penitentiaries then, as now, were no places for lads of our age. . . . While there we associated with hardened criminals, some of the most vicious type, and all we heard while in prison was boasting about the “jobs” they had pulled, and what they planned to do in all channels of crime when they got out. It was a thoroughgoing school of crime.

The same day that piece ran, a letter to the editor was printed in the Globe recommending that, immediately after the next election, the new prime minister appoint Ryan as chief administrator of penitentiaries for Canada, “with full power to make whatever reforms he thinks best.” “I do not believe there is one person who has been interested in ‘Red’ Ryan’s case, that is not of the same opinion,” wrote Alex Macpherson of Toronto. And he probably wasn’t far off.

The next piece from Ryan recounted his jailhouse meeting with the prime minister. Ostensibly written as an expression of his gratitude to Bennett and the others who worked for his release, it’s really just an excuse to brag: about the cleanliness of his room, about the books he was reading, about his forbearance and virtue, and, mainly, about the fact that the prime minister of Canada visited him in jail.

Roy Greenaway wrote these pieces bylined NORMAN “RED” RYAN. In his autobiography, he wrote that he liked Ryan in many ways, but always remained a little suspicious of him. Just not suspicious enough, apparently, to prevent him from writing the pieces that helped get Ryan sprung in the first place, and not suspicious enough to stop him from cranking out more self-indulgent, maudlin shite once Ryan was free. If, at any time in his life, Greenaway tried to come to terms with the rather substantial role he played in this ugly business, there is no evidence of it in his memoirs.

Jocko Thomas, who worked as a police reporter at the Star for sixty years, wrote at the end of his career about meeting Ryan when he was a young reporter just starting out. The story gives you a sense of just how big a deal Ryan was during those early days of freedom.

Thomas was working in the press room at police headquarters one night, shortly after Ryan’s release, when Ryan came in looking for Athol Gow. Thomas and Ryan had been talking for a few minutes when the police radio went off with a fire call. As Thomas prepared to leave, Ryan asked if he could tag along. Thomas picks up the story:

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