‘He is the most peaceful so-called killer I’ve ever met.’
Russell ‘Mad Dog’ Cox is one of the biggest names in Australian crime. He escaped from Long Bay’s maximum security Katingal division in 1977, and spent 11 years on the run with his de facto wife, Helen Deane. Cox, an accomplished armed robber, was serving a life sentence for the attempted murder of a prison officer when he escaped.
A vegetarian and fitness fanatic, Cox was known to run 15 kilometres a day with his dog, Devil.
He was born Melville Schnitzerling on September 15, 1949, and nicknamed ‘Tim’ by his family because he was the smallest. In 1972 he started using the name Russell Cox. According to police intelligence, he once tapped a telephone line into a police station so that he could be up to date on the search for him.
Cox is a keen student of bushrangers and was an avid reader of Ned Kelly and the ‘Wild Colonial Boy’ and other bushrangers.
Cox was a master of disguise and kept books with chapters on theatrical makeup. He was caught in Melbourne in 1988 with another NSW prison escapee, Raymond John Denning, who turned out to be a police informer.
Cox was sentenced to five years in 1989 on charges of using a firearm to resist arrest and reckless conduct endangering life. He was acquitted of the murder of Painter and Docker, Ian Revell Carroll, who was killed in Mt Martha in 1983.
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FOR quite a few years now there have been rumours and rumblings from Melbourne and Sydney of trouble between myself and Russell ‘Mad Dog’ Cox, rumours and stories re Cox going to kill me and me out to kill Cox. Police have even jumped on this band wagon, believing it to be true.
I’m glad to say that Cox and I got to clear the air in H Division in 1991. Both understanding that we have been victims of a scallywag rumour mill. Personally, I have found Coxy to be quite a nice chap, considering he is a vegetarian, a yoga freak, and a bit of a greenie.
I’ve nicknamed him the ‘skinny hippie’ and the ‘Gloria Marshall Graduate’, and he thinks I’m a comical nutcase. Instead of murdering each other we’ve had quite a giggle over it all. We suspect the rumours were started in the hope that one would kill the other, or we’d kill each other. But that was not to be.
We both feel there are people out there who are broken hearted that Coxy and myself have gotten together. Russell Cox ended up taking over all the cooking in the laundry yard. It’s curried vegies for breakfast — on toast, curried vegies and noodles for lunch and curried vegies and cheese for tea. When I sit on the toilet at night it’s like a Bombay hurricane. I’m starting to wonder if the rumours that Coxy wanted to kill me were true after all.
My small stomach ulcer protests violently and I wash it all down with hot coffee or iced water, to try and settle my guts. Coxy had the laundry yard smelling like Calcutta. I’ll walk out of here looking like Mahatma Gandhi. His jail house curries with garlic and paprika are so hot, you don’t know if you’re eating meat, fish or veges. Craig Minogue, where are you when I need you? Even one of Slim’s tuna fondues sounds good.
Cox can’t walk past a frypan without wanting to shake hands with it. The first thing I’m having when I get out is a big steak with chips, eggs and mushrooms and some good old Aussie tomato sauce. I will do bodily harm to anyone who comes near me with a curry. The things I’ve had to suffer in the name of good manners. Jail house lawyers and cooks, they will be the death of me.
I don’t know if there is such a thing as a cooking psychopath, but I’m starting to wonder about Coxy. The man is possessed. But the curry lunches do have their moments. The other day Rusell invited a mate of his, Peter Clune, to lunch at the laundry yard. Clune had just been convicted over armed robberies. We sat their eating one of Russell’s curries, the sweat pouring out of us.
Peter was telling Russell about how much money he made from the armed robberies. He said that at one time he was driving a Porsche that he paid $93,000 for in cash.
Without missing a mouthful of curry I mumbled, ‘I wish I had known you then’ and gave a little giggle. Both Russell and Peter looked at each other, then at me. ‘What did you mean by that, Chopper?’ asked Russell. Realising that I had said the wrong thing, I said, ‘Oh, I’ve never ridden in a Porsche before’.
As the conversation continued on money, I looked down at Peter’s feet and asked, ‘What size shoes do you take?’
That was it. Peter said, ‘A man gets convicted of bank jobs one day, gets invited to lunch the next, only to have his stomach set on fire with an Indian curry while Chopper Read cracks toecutter jokes. I’m not coming to the restaurant again.’
The toecutter is the natural enemy of the bank robber. That is why the friendship between Russell and I is a strange one. But Peter Clune is a friend of a mate of mine in Tassie, so his feet are safe under the old mate’s act. Clune’s mob made a million or two but where has it got him? He says he is broke, but I’m not so sure. He sits in here with a half finished hair transplant. Most of those in the criminal world end up broke, dead or dying day by day.
Even Coxy agrees that if you walk across a busy street back and forth, you’ll get bowled over in the end. Clune’s nickname inside is ‘Piggy Bank Pete’ as we suspect he really does have plenty of dollars. I joke to the boys that Piggy Bank Pete should be put under heavy questioning. He laughs and says that he is just an honest tax avoider.
Although I have put a lot of shit on Sydney crooks the exception is Russell. Coxy is probably the greatest bank robber in the history of the nation. America had Willie Sutton and we have Russell Cox. Coxy puts his hero, Ned Kelly, to shame. But in the real world of blood and guts violence, Russell would front up with a note from his mother saying he could not attend. He is a top bloke and the only Sydney crook that I like. But ‘Mad Dog’ is a nickname the police or reporters gave him down here and, I can tell you, he was badly named.
Russell is a warm-hearted, wouldn’t-hurt-a-fly type. He is polite, good mannered and gentle natured. He admits he did all his fighting from a distance of about six feet with a gun in his hand. Blood and guts, rip-tear violence was not his cup of tea whatsoever. For a man with such violent reputation I have found him to be a friendly, non-violent fellow.
He loathes the mainstream prison population as much as I do. For two men who lived with stories and rumours that one was going to kill the other, it is quite funny the way things have worked out. We both hate the two-bob type gangsters in the criminal world and we both hate drugs and the men who deal in them.
We are both well read — him more than me — and we have some ‘interesting’ conversations. He knew Jimmy ‘The Pom’ Driscoll years ago and he was a great friend of Ray Chuck. Intelligent conversations are hard to find in prison so I like talking to Russell. I am glad we got together and sorted out fact from fiction.
It would have been sad to have to kill a good bloke because of some bullshit rumour. He was told that I was out to kill him and I was told that he was going to kill me. We both felt that our first meeting would be in the streets with guns blazing. I didn’t know it at the time, but in 1987 some crims were taking bets and giving odds on who would kill who first. The whole thing got right out of hand. Now that we are friends, the only thing that Coxy and I fight about is when he puts too much garlic in our lunchtime curry.
Russell’s favourite song is the 1964 classic, ‘King of the Road’ by Roger Miller. He sings it over and over to himself when he is cooking. I suppose for the 11 years he was on the run he really was the king of the road.
Russell used the name Mr Walker when he was on the run. He liked the name because it was the code name used by the Phantom in the comic book series. Russell’s dog, Devil, even had a code name. He was known as Butch when they were on the run.
Russell was always cool. He was pulled over for licence checks and breath tests and was never fazed. Once, when there were police screaming all over the place, he just drove off. The police didn’t notice the dog running after the car. Russell just opened the door of the car and Devil jumped in, barking out the back window at the police, who were blissfully unaware.
On the day Russell was caught it was one of the few times he didn’t heed the advice of his beloved wife, Helen. She said, ‘Don’t go, I have a bad feeling about it.’ Raymond Denning was there. Denning is a dog but Russell doesn’t blame anyone but himself. Regardless of how treacherous Denning turned out to be, the fact was Russell failed to take notice of the alarm bells he heard in his head and the warning he got from his wife. Denning was a police informer — a dog. But a dog can’t bite you unless you drop your guard.
There is something almost Zen in Russell’s thinking. What will be, will be. It is all in the hands of fate. He is the most peaceful so-called killer I have ever met, and one of the most interesting people I have known.
Not many people know that the turning point in Russell’s life came when he was just ten years old. He had the winning ticket in a raffle for a brand new, beautiful bike. He wasn’t at the draw, but he was told by some other kid that his number had won. Filled with boyish excitement he ran to town to collect his prize. When he arrived he held his ticket in his hand and said that he had won. ‘Here’s my ticket — where’s my bike?’
The man in charge told him he was too late and because he wasn’t at the draw, the bike had been raffled again. The kid protested in vain, but was sent away empty handed. So he stole a brand new bike and told everyone he had won it in a raffle. However, he never forgot being cheated out of the bike.
The turning point in my life was never so clear, but I think Russell’s story would bring a tear to a glass eye.
Personally, I think he has had better luck on his worst days than I’ve had on my best. He even won $15,000 on Tatts Lotto when he was on the run, and collected it. Jesus Christ, I’ve shot people for less money than that.
RUSSELL
There was a wild Australian boy,
Russell was his name,
He was born in Sydney town,
Five miles from Balmain,
Born to be an outlaw,
He loved robbing banks,
He loved to rob the money,
And tell the tellers, ‘thanks’,
The coppers missed him a hundred times,
He left them in a mess,
With Russell running down the street,
Wearing a lady’s dress.