Snatch! How a UFC fighter (almost) pulled off the biggest cash heist in British history

Lee Murray is a character straight from a Guy Ritchie film, a truly incredible tale of undeniable sporting talent and a life of crime that would eventually see his downfall.

Murray grew up in Bermondsey, London, an area that has produced many of the city’s most prolific criminals. Even today the area is rife with violent crime.

Like many young boys from the area, Murray found himself fighting a lot as a child, he was part of the ‘Buttmarsh Boys’, a group of friends from the estate they all lived on. They would often fight to defend their territory from others.

Murray’s father was a Moroccan man, Brahim Lamrani, who was barely present during his son’s early years. But when he returned he was an abusive presence and would demand his son respect his every word, happy to doll out physical punishment when needed.

On one occasion, Lamrani would punch his son only to see him turn around and knock him clean out. This showed Murray what he was capable of and according to a neighbour, “changed Lee into the man he is now – a thug."

Up until this point, Murray’s life had been tough but he was mostly staying on the right side of the law. This changed when he started to deal drugs whilst still at school, eventually winning a violent turf war to deal in his area.

Murray was arrested alongside his best friend and partner in crime Paul Allen. Eventually sentenced for various drug-related crimes, the pair found themselves in Feltham Young Offenders Institution where they dedicated their time to weightlifting.

Back on the outside, Murray continued his criminal ways, spending money as quickly as he could make it. Luxury cars and his now steroid-induced frame made him stand out from regular street thugs with the police seemingly wary to stop him as they knew he was “a very dangerous man."

After a particularly violent turf war clash, most of Murray’s associates were arrested and sentenced, somehow Lee escaped scott free and it was from this moment he would start to gain an interest in a more organised form of fighting.

Within a year of training, Murray entered into his first Mixed Martial Arts fight, knocking out Rob Hudson in the first round. His striking was so fast he earned himself the nickname ‘Lightning’.

After his first fight, Murray realised he has some real talent for the sport and dedicated his time to his training, focusing on striking and wrestling. He would be trained by Martin Bowers who described Murray as "a very nice boy" who "conducted himself well."

In an incredibly strange twist of fate, Martin Bowers and his two brothers, Tony and Paul, weren’t just boxing trainers, but they were also hardened criminals themselves who attempted a complex robbery of Gatwick Airport using disguises and Brink's trucks, but this plan never got beyond the idea stage and they were arrested before putting anything in motion.

2000 saw Murray launch headlong into professional MMA, with four bouts over the 12 months. The first was a victory over Mike Tomlinson, a bout in which Murray had quite severe hand injuries from a bar brawl he had been involved in the night before.

Over the next few years, Murray continued his impressive early record in MMA, winning most of his bouts and even training at the renowned Miletich Fighting Systems training camp in Iowa. He would rise high enough to fight the legendary Anderson Silva, who would defeat Murray by unanimous decision, certainly no shame in that loss.

The UFC is the ultimate goal for any MMA fighter, entering the Octagon and competing against some of the best fighters in the world. Murray would only fight once in the UFC, defeating Jorge Rivera via an armbar.

Murray was always a violent man and would often end up in street brawls, most famously he fought and supposedly knocked out UFC legend Tito Ortiz outside a night club in London.

In September 2005, Murray attended the birthday party of a British glamour model and reality TV star. After leaving the nightclub, Murray would once again find himself in a street fight, this time though he would end up stabbed, puncturing his lung and an artery. Life-saving operations and resuscitation were the only things keeping Murray alive.

The stabbing put paid to anymore professional fighting for Murray and instead, he turned his attention back to his life of crime and started plotting with long-term associate Paul Allen along with Jetmir Buçpapa, Roger Coutts, Emir Hysenaj, Stuart Royle and Lea Rusha.

The Securitas depot in Tonbridge, Kent, was one of the multiple sights used to distribute newly printed money. The gang had been studying the depot for months, with Emir Hysenaj even managing to get a job on the inside. Their plan was set, all they had to do was execute it.

In February 2006, the gang put their plan into action, kidnapping the depot manager, Colin Dixon, to understand more about the depot. They used Dixon as part of the robbery, forming them to open doors and gates for the gang, who were all armed to the teeth.

The gang attempted to remove all the notes from the depot, which accounted for £153,000,000, but they could only fit a third into their van, leaving with £52,996,760 in used and unused bank notes, the largest cash robbery in British history.

Over the course of the next few weeks and months, the police tracked down and caught most of the gang. It was Murray who accidentally sealed the gang’s fate after he left two burner phones with recordings of the criminal plot in a Ferrari he had crashed and then fled.

Murray and Paul Allen didn’t hang around to get caught in the UK, instead, they fled to Morocco, the homeland of Murray’s father and somewhere they thought would be a safe haven.

Murray and Allen were both eventually caught in Morocco and initially sentenced to 10 years in the Salé prison before returning to England to see out the rest of his time. In 2010 this was upped to 25 years and he remains there still.

Whilst not the only athlete to get caught up in crime, so few have made it such a part of their personality and lived their entire lives surrounded by it. Murray was an incredibly talented fight who could well have made a name for himself if he had been able to stay out of trouble, but as UFC head honcho Dana White said, “He's a scary son of a b****, and I don't mean fighter-wise".