This just keeps getting better and more juicy with every detail that comes out. If a movie is not made about this whole deal, I would be very surprised. You watch, Nick will have a book deal to counter Simon’s book. Simon’s book which will more than likely thrash Thatcher and company, will probably motivate Thatcher to write a book to tell his side of the story. It will be the battle of the books–a ‘written word bloodbath’! Frederick Forsyth, eat your heart out. lol –Matt
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Dog of war Simon Mann paid £400k in wonga to buy his way out of jail, claims coup plotter
By Barbara Jones In Pretoria22nd November 2009
It was an extraordinary scene. British mercenary Simon Mann was deep in conversation with his chief prosecutor, the Attorney General of Equatorial Guinea, the man who had brought him to justice for plotting to overthrow the West African country’s government.
They sat close together, discussing large sums of money and poring over paperwork.
Then, like the celebrity prisoner he had become, Mann reached over and borrowed the Attorney-General’s mobile phone to call his home in England.
For the next 50 minutes, Mann berated his wife Amanda for failing to produce the funds he needed to buy his way out of prison.
What was holding up the bank transfer, he demanded to know. When would the money reach West Africa? Did she realise how urgent this was?
Looking on in astonishment were four of his fellow prisoners. Unlike him, they were shackled by chains on their wrists and feet and wore uniforms of grey and white stripes.
Also unlike him, they had no vast reserves of money to call up in order to buy freedom.
They had been summoned to one of their occasional meetings with the Attorney-General in a ground-floor room at Black Beach prison and had come face-to-face with Mann for the first time since they were all arrested in March 2004.
For Nick du Toit, Mann’s chief co-conspirator, it was a traumatic moment.
‘He seemed so relaxed, almost unaware of us,’ he said. ‘Then he wanted to shake my hand and was only slightly embarrassed that I was shuffling over to him in chains. He asked how I was and I said I was fine. It was unreal.’
Now back home in Pretoria, du Toit has given The Mail on Sunday the first authentic account of the moment of their release on November 3.
He also revealed details of the special treatment afforded to Mann during his time in Black Beach – which included hotel food and an exercise treadmill.
Mann, 57, was released after 14 months of his 34-year sentence, boasting to du Toit that it cost him nearly half-a-million pounds.
Two weeks ago, Mann flew home to his country estate in Hampshire in a private jet. He briefed a PR agent on his plans to write a book about his adventures and announced his intention to incriminate those he claimed were fellow plotters who failed to come to his rescue in jail.