Paul Ferris has avoided a life of crime for 21 years after being spooked by MI5 probing his gangland activities, he has revealed.
Former enforcer Ferris was one of the country’s most feared men during a criminal career in which he walked free from a murder charge and was caged for gun-running.
He was a trusted associate of Glasgow crime lord Arthur Thompson, who was dubbed “The Godfather” and had links to London mobsters the Kray twins.
Ferris followed in the footsteps of his mentor, forging his own links down south which led to him being jailed in the 90s. Now the 59-year-old has revealed that the gun-running case led to him turning his life around.
The gangster-turned-author said he made the decision to ditch the criminal world after being tailed by MI5 in an operation which led to him being jailed in London and serving time in the city’s Belmarsh Prison.
Ferris revealed he found out about the surveillance when his lawyer brought boxes of documents to the jail.
He said: “When I saw all the MI5 stuff on it – when you’re involved in criminality, you don’t think you come to the attention of these people.
“What I saw, what I heard and what I read, I thought, ‘I’ll get on with my sentence, I’m putting my hands up, and I’m going out and I’m going straight’.”
Ferris revealed he is working on a new book about his two decades as a clean-living citizen.
The ex-hoodlum was a key ally of Thompson for years but the pair fell out in the 80s, resulting in a bloody feud.
Thompson’s son, Arthur Junior, was executed outside his dad’s notorious Ponderosa home in Provanmill.
Ferris was found not guilty of the murder after a trial at the High Court in Glasgow in 1992.
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