Gangster

Linda, Mickey and the kids are living the high life when he agrees to take on a job with a new gang - a raid on a cash collection at a London supermarket just before Christmas. As Linda waits at home, armed police are lying in wait outside the supermarket. When the police rush towards them, the rest of Mickey's team flee, leaving him alone on the crowded street clutching his weapon. He is shot dea...

Linda Welford was raised in London's East End in the 1960s; a tight and tough community with a reputation for a thriving criminal underworld, ruled with an iron fist by gangsters like the Kray twins. One of nine children, Linda lived a sheltered life with her family in Stepney until she met armed robber Mickey Calvey. This was the so-called golden age of armed robbery and Mickey was making a fortu...

Livvy Haydock explores the extraordinary life of Linda Calvey, the woman they call "the Black Widow." She rose through the ranks of London’s criminal underworld to become the UK’s most notorious female gangster. We follow her journey from humble beginnings in East London to time served in the infamous H Wing, alongside killers like Myra Hindley and Rose West. It’s a story of love, loyalty, betraya...

Livvy Haydock examines the recent deaths of Eddie Lyons Jr. and Ross Monaghan, who were shot dead outside Monaghan’s Bar in Fuengirola on the Costa del Sol, on 31 May 2025. Spanish police believe the killing was a targeted gangland hit linked to the decades-long conflict between the Daniels and Lyons crime families in Glasgow. Livvy tracks down eyewitnesses to the double shooting, retraces the get...

After months of undercover work, the police in London start moving in their targets and claim their first victory against the hooligan mobs. But the celebrations are short lived. A new piece of science raises doubts over the evidence gathered as part of the police operations. Trials begin to collapse. The police and prosecutors are rattled and start scrutinising other cases yet to go to court. Doz...

With the police under pressure to get a grip on the hooligan epidemic, an ambitious young copper comes up with a plan. To infiltrate the firms and go undercover. Covert police operations in London, Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds soon get underway. Michael Layton is a former detective with West Midlands Police. In the mid-80s, he set up an undercover unit which infiltrated the Zulu Warriors, a fi...

With firms doing battle up and down the country, it was only a matter of time before innocent people got hurt. Even some players were attacked as the hooligans went looking for their weekly adrenaline rush. Ordinary football fans were also caught up in the violence. Darts, bottles, fireworks, even sharpened coins would be thrown on the terraces. This episode also hears from the families of those w...

In the aftermath of the Heysel tragedy, Margaret Thatcher declared war on the hooligans. It was a watershed moment for English football. Tough new laws were called for - and the incident led to English clubs being banned from Europe for 5 years. But there was more trouble on the horizon. The mobs had found a loophole. Friendlies. And in August 1986, that led to a full blown riot on a ferry in the...

1985 saw some of the biggest and bloodiest hooligan riots in British football history. In March, Luton hosted Millwall in an FA Cup tie. Millwall’s notorious mobs rioted before, during and after the game. The Kenilworth Road ground was ripped to pieces, and the town was trashed. Police officer Andy Clarke was left fearing for his life as pieces of concrete and plastic seats were used as missiles....

What turns a fan into a fighter? When faced with a choice, do you turn and run, or stand and fight? We meet the men who found themselves drawn into a world of running battles and riots during the 1970s and 80s. For some, joining a firm and fighting gave them a new identity. For others, it was the first time they truly felt they belonged. From a young age, Bill Gardner, also known as Mr West Ham, f...

Former boxing champion and proud Evertonian Tony Bellew delves into the brutal world of football hooliganism. At its height in the 1970s and 1980s, it was labelled ‘the English Disease,’ a time when violence on the terraces was as much a part of the game as a half-time Bovril. Bellew hears from those who lived for the trouble, the men and women whose Saturdays weren’t complete without a brutal pun...

A brutal attack on a Daniel family member results in lengthy jail sentences for a number of Lyons associates. The feud continues in prison and there are fears it could go on for generations to come. It was an attack so brutal that police initially thought the victim - a Daniel family member - had been shot in the face or injured by an explosive device. The attack was the culmination of the latest...

After his public assassination in a supermarket car park, the hunt for Gerbil's killers begins. A death in the Daniel family heralds a brutal new chapter in the never-ending feud. With such a high-profile murder, police are under pressure to catch Kevin Carroll's killers, and the manhunt takes an international twist. A high-profile member of the Daniel family dies and after a period of relative ca...

Gerbil is recruited for a kidnapping plot which doesn't go to plan. Meanwhile, he continues his reign of terror as he seeks to build his drug empire - leading to a growing number of enemies out to get him. Gerbil's reputation is such that he is recruited to carry out a kidnapping by a Liverpool drug gang. Meanwhile, he doubles down on his efforts to take control of the drug trade in parts of Glasg...

Gerbil is on the warpath after being seriously injured in a drive-by shooting. What followed next takes the feud to another level of violence, with the police searching for answers. Kevin Carroll is out for revenge, but seriously injured, he has to enlist others to exact retribution. This time, however, innocents are caught in the crossfire, and detectives have to employ all the tricks in the book...

As Jamie Daniels' drug empire continues to grow, a violent feud begins with a rival crime family - one that will lead to an all out bloody war on the streets of Glasgow. After serving time for heroin smuggling, Jamie Daniel is back in business. But a road rage incident involving a family member and a rival leads to a murder unlike any seen before in Glasgow. And there's more trouble on the horizon...

Jamie Daniel begins his rise from the tough streets of Possil in north Glasgow - first as a scrap metal dealer and then as a major player in the city's flourishing drug trade. One of ten children, Jamie followed his brothers into the family scrap metal business. But as heroin took hold in the city, he spotted a business opportunity that would catapult him into the big league - importing large quan...

A bloody and bitter feud between two of Glasgow's most notorious crime families which has raged for more than two decades, leading to violence and murder. Why the Daniel crime group and the Lyons crime group fell out isn’t clear. The story goes it was linked to the theft of a stash of drugs – or because the Lyons were encroaching on Daniel territory. Whatever the cause, the dispute exploded into a...

It’s New Year’s Day 1994 and Tyneside is waking up to the news of Viv Graham’s brutal murder. There is tension in the air and nobody knows what is going to happen next. What follows is a spiral of repercussions and tragedies which have spanned the decades and are still being felt to this day. In the final episode, presenter Livvy Haydock meets pathologist Dr John McCarthy, who walked the scene of...

Viv Graham is released from prison following a vicious assault on rival bouncer Stu Watson. He needs to make up for lost time and remind everyone who is boss. But while he’s been away in jail, Tyneside’s nightlife has been transformed in an explosion of ecstasy. This is one fight Viv Graham won’t be able to win. In this episode, we follow Viv Graham as he tried to reassert his dominance on Tynesid...

It’s the summer of 1989 and the atmosphere on Tyneside is febrile. The economy is shrinking and tumbling towards recession but at the same time the nightlife is bouncing. And among the criminal underworld battles are raging to control the supply of drugs into pubs and clubs. Viv Graham is right in the firing line and danger lurks on every corner. This episode tracks Viv Graham as he linked up with...

Viv Graham is right at the peak of his powers. After starting as a nightclub doorman in Gateshead, he has grown to become the most powerful figure in Tyneside’s booming nightlife, with a vast pub and club protection empire. But trouble is brewing because a new party drug is landing and it’s going to turn his world upside down. This episode charts the arrival of ecstasy in the North East and the dr...

Viv Graham, a young man from the country, is about to land in the city and make a very big impression. In fact he’s going to take over the town. This episode charts Viv Graham’s meteoric rise. It follows in his footsteps as he went from being a complete unknown, to single-handedly controlling a pub and club door protection empire, which spanned Newcastle and beyond. Viv’s first move was to approac...

On New Year's Eve 1993, Viv Graham, a 17-stone man mountain, stepped out of a Tyneside pub and walked a few yards towards his Ford Sierra Cosworth. But he never made it. Lurking in the shadows was a gunman who fired three shots at him from close range. Viv, who ran a pub and club protection empire which spanned Newcastle and beyond, dragged himself back to the pub but his life was slipping away. T...

A new series of Gangster tells the story of Viv Graham, a man who ran a protection empire which spanned Newcastle and beyond. Viv Graham, a 17-stone man mountain, a man feared and revered in equal measure, came to dominate Tyneside’s nightlife through brutal and uncompromising violence. His murder, in an organised hit on New Year’s Eve 1993, sparked recriminations and repercussions which echo to t...