UK Panel Denies Parole for Notorious Robber Bronson

MOSCOW, March 30 (Sputnik) - The UK Parole Board said on Thursday it had denied the recent bid at freedom from 70-year-old Charles Bronson, a notorious British robber who has spent most of his life behind bars, since his release would pose a significant risk to the public.

"Decision: No direction for release on parole licence and no recommendation for transfer to an open prison," the UK Parole Board said in a summary, following a series of oral hearings on the case.

Bronson, who changed his surname to Salvador in 2014, was jailed at the age of 22 for an armed robbery he committed in 1974 and has spent most of the last 48 years in custody. He is being held at high-security Woodhill prison in Milton Keynes, north of London.

The panel concluded that he "genuinely wants to progress and that he is motivated to work towards his release" but his history of "persistent rule breaking" suggested that he might not have the skills to manage his violent tendencies outside of prison.

"He lives his life rigidly by his own rules and code of conduct and is quick to judge others by his own standards … It is unclear whether the strong external controls of custody are mainly responsible [for his progress] or whether his attitudes have genuinely changed," it said.

Bronson has served much of his jail time in solitary confinement, a British TV channel reports. He has a record of violent offenses committed while in custody, raging from attacks on staff and inmates to 11 hostage-takings in nine different sieges. He insists he is now reformed after finding solace in art.