Gangster 'Broken Tooth' Wan Kuok-koi wants quiet post-prison life
'Broken Tooth' will leave Macau prison today, and hopes to leave behind his notorious past
It's a tall order, but on his release from Coloane's maximum-security prison today, Macau's most notorious gangster wants one thing - to be forgotten.
"Broken Tooth" Wan Kuok-koi was jailed for a string of gangland offences in a casino-linked crime wave that gripped Macau in the run-up to its handover in 1999. The 14K triad boss has been held in a specially built high-security jail since 1998. Today he walks free.
Pedro Leal, one of the lawyers representing Wan, said that after nearly 14 years in prison, all Wan desires now is that everyone forgets about him altogether.
"The only thing he wants is for people to forget him. In recent weeks he's been on the cover of many magazines and they've all talked about his past. All he wants is to be left in peace. He's going to lead a quiet life from now on."
Leal also said that Wan, 57, received no special privileges while in jail and was treated like any other prisoner.
Wan was convicted of a string of offences in November 1999 and imprisoned in a tiny, windowless cell at the high-security jail on Coloane Island. The block was purpose-built to hold Wan and his henchmen and is a kilometre from the main facility.
If Leal is to be believed, Wan's release will finally close the chapter on one of Macau's most infamous and bloody eras. When Macau's Judiciary Police director Antonio Marques Baptista watched his car explode as he went jogging with his dog on Macau's Guia Hill on May 1, 1998, he was seeing Wan's reign of terror go up in flames as well.