FEBRUARY 12, 2023
By Harry Mottram: When notorious criminal Kenneth Noye (pictured) stabbed motorist Stephen Cameron to death in a road rage incident he went on the run. And the one person he knew he could count on was Bath resident and handler of stolen gold bullion John ‘Gold Finger’ Palmer.
In May 1996 Noye had been driving his Range Rover along the M25 when as he left the motorway an incident developed between him and Stephen Cameron, 21, who was driving a van. In a typical road range situation the two drivers got out of their vehicles and confronted each other. While passing motorists might have suspected it was a case of the odd punch and insult the reality was Noye pulled out a knife and stabbed Cameron in the chest. He calmly walked back to his car and drove off leaving Cameron’s girlfriend Danielle Cable, 17, to call 999 as her boyfriend died of the wound.
Noye, 48, was on licence from prison for his part in handling stolen gold from the Brink’s-Mat gold bullion robbery and when he heard Cameron had died he knew he’d be back in the clink for good. He rang round his old criminal mates – his car was crushed – his clothes burnt and an alibi was sorted. His next move was to Bath to Palmer’s house in Lansdown where the duo planned Noye’s disappearance. Dodgy coppers and customs staff were contacted to turn a blind eye when the following day from a field near Bath Noye was spirited across the English Channel to France in Palmer’s AS355 Twin Squirrel helicopter. After a night in Palmer’s chateau near Calne Noye took a train to a private airport near Paris and there a private jet took him into exile in Spain.
The story of John Palmer and Kenneth Noye and their part in the wider Brink’s-Mat gold bullion theft is told in the BBC drama The Gold on Sunday 12th, 2023, while a new book on Noye’s flight and eventual arrest and imprisonment is told in A Million Ways To Stay On The Run: The Uncut Story Of The International Manhunt For Public Enemy No.1 Kenny Noye, by Donal MacIntyre and Karl Howman, is published by Mirror Books.