GREAT train robber Ronnie Biggs has tied the knot with his Brazilian lover in the top-security Thamesmead jail.

The 72-year-old, who returned from his Brazilian bolt-hole in May, last year, married Raimunda Rothen at Belmarsh Prison, Belmarsh Road.

Biggs, who is in poor health after suffering a series of strokes, and the mother of his son Michael exchanged vows in a low-key ceremony in the prison's chapel building.

Despite being hardly able to speak and partly paralysed, Biggs managed to sign his name to seal the marriage during the 20-minute wedding.

He has 28 years of his sentence left to serve and, due to his health problems, is in one of the 38 beds in the prison's medical unit and has been treated at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, on Woolwich Common.

Biggs was part of the notorious gang which robbed a mail train in Buckinghamshire, 39 years ago. He was sentenced at Buckingham Assizes in 1964 but escaped into a waiting open-topped prison van outside Wandsworth prison 15 months into the term.

If he had served the full term of his 30-year sentence, Biggs could have been released in 1994.

July 16, 2002 17:00