Throng

macintyre’s underworld
lucky tucker
22.00–23.05

In tonight’s edition of the investigative documentary series , Donal MacIntyre meets Ian ‘Lucky’ Tucker, a famous name in the Kent underworld. Despite numerous accusations, Tucker has never been convicted of a serious offence – but with an upcoming trial for firearm possession, is his trademark good fortune about to change?

A former doorman, debt collector and minder to the Kray twins, Ian Tucker was once dubbed one of the UK’s most wanted men and has been under the watchful eye of the Kent police for years. When MacIntyre asks him what his police file says, Tucker replies with a wry smile: “Six foot two; scar above left eye; approach with caution”.

Tucker’s turf, known as the ‘corridor of crime’, is a stretch of road along the Thames Estuary linking the gangs of southeast London with the lucrative docks of north Kent. Here, Tucker has carved out a niche specialising in resolving underworld disputes. In the 1990s, he teamed up with ‘celebrity gangster’ Dave Courtney to create a formidable debt-collecting partnership. The pair soon became inseparable, providing muscle at West End nightclubs, making cameo appearances in ‘The Bill’ and promoting clubs. Their status in the underworld reached dizzying heights in 1995 when Reggie Kray asked them to organise security for the funeral of his brother Ronnie.

macintyre’s underworld
mad dog and nazi nick
22.00–23.05

Two years after profiling exiled terrorist Johnny ‘Mad Dog’ Adair, investigative reporter Donal MacIntyre returns to find out what happened when Adair met up with a reformed neo-Nazi in search of a new cause.

After serving prison time for directing acts of terrorism, Johnny ‘Mad Dog’ Adair was living in exile in Scotland, forced out of Northern Ireland by his own people, when he got a message from a man he had never met: Nick Greger, the head of a neo-Nazi group in Dresden, Germany. While in prison for plotting an act of terror, Greger had heard that his idol Adair was vulnerable from attack by his enemies and organised a team of bodyguards to protect him and his family. Now, two years later, Greger has been released from prison and has big plans for himself and the man he idolises.

Greger’s fascination with Adair developed while he was in prison. Paroled after two years, Greger ended up in South Africa where he aligned himself with the AWB white power group to get what he describes as “a paramiliatary education”. He says that heading to Angola to buy weapons to use in the race war, Greger encountered someone who would change everything. After picking up a black hitch-hiker, Greger met the man’s sister and was awed by her beauty. “One day I couldn’t hear my own Nazi music,” he explains. When he eventually returned to Germany, he was thrown back into jail – but found that his experiences had shaken his Nazi convictions to the core. Looking for new inspiration, Greger found it in the charismatic Adair and became infatuated with him, creating a cult of similarly star-struck fans in Dresden.

macintyre’s underworld
wayne’s world
monday, 22.00–23.00

Donal MacIntyre returns with a new run of the documentary series that delves into the murky depths of Britain’s underworld. In this opening edition, Donal heads back to the Midlands to follow up his award-winning investigation into Nottingham drug dealer Wayne Hardy, ten years after his original ‘World in Action’ report.

A decade ago, Donal spent 12 months working undercover in Nottingham, secretly filming the illegal activities of the fearsome Wayne Hardy. The evidence he gathered put Wayne behind bars for three and a half years and damaged the gangster’s reputation in the underworld. Now, after a period spent living in fear because of death threats from the Hardy gang, Donal is back in the city, this time with open access to his subject’s life. Wayne claims to have changed his ways, but does his world still revolve around drugs, money and death?

After a first meeting in which Wayne lets Donal know exactly how he felt about being set up ten years earlier, the two bury the past. Wayne, while still a formidable figure, shows signs of vulnerability and remorse: “It’s not a nice life –having to watch over your shoulder all the time,” he says. But glimmers of the old gangster are never far away: “It was reckless of your employees to put you in that situation,” he says of Donal’s initial investigation. “I don’t suggest you do it again.”

macintyre’s underworld

Donal MacIntyre returns with a new run of the programme that delves into Britain’s underworld. In this new series, Donal follows up his awardwinning investigation into Nottingham drug dealer Wayne Hardy, ten years after his original ‘World in Action’ report.

Donal once again takes personal risks to revisit Hardy’s gang and interview the charismatic criminal. He finds out how Hardy has fared in the intervening years and poses the ultimate question: does crime pay? The resulting film shows that Hardy has had to deal with human tragedies along with the wealth that his activities appear to have brought him.

Also in this series, Donal finds out about the next generation of criminals, with an investigation into an underworld crime family. Four years of filming culminates in a frank and disturbing picture of the teenagers in the clan as they face jail, puberty, electronic tagging and life on the run. The series also incudes a profile of Ian ‘Lucky’ Tucker, a Kent criminal with a fearsome reputation, while another episode follows former terrorist Johnny ‘Mad Dog’ Adair and Nick ‘The Nazi’ Greger as they join forces on a trip to open an orphanage in Uganda. Along the way, the unlikely pair must confront their former prejudices and resist the temptation to revert to illegal ways.