May 13, 2025 • 11 mins
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Ron Isherwood has lived wild life of gangs, prison and drug addiction. He has sinced turned his back on crime and drugs, using his freedom to help others escape drug addiction and avoid the life that he once lived.
Rewind back to Season 10 to hear the full story.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Apporte production.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
I've got arrested for that too.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
So I'm sitting at Pendridge at seventeen years and three months.
I'ld charged with five attempted murders, use a fire of
prevent love mansion, the break enders and steel as a
seventeen year old kid. And I'm sitting in jail thinking, wow,
this is this is it. I'm never going to get
out of jail home. I will never ever get out
(00:37):
of jail. And I was a pretty little boy, blonde hair,
blue eyes, you know, But I think, you know, what
what did Dad say when you found out this? Oh
he was wrapped because I'm when I say wrapped, I'm
his son. He thinks his footsteps have a shooters the
shooting of the coppers good on your sort of type
of thing. And and plus the word went into the
(00:58):
prison as his Ishwood's kid. You look after him, and
you know, and I had old guy. I sent a
message and sent a chocolate hi, which was unheard of
those days, and sending me a stand which across from
the kitchen, which is unheard of. You know, all the boards,
as in the boards are going like who's this guy?
He's getting all these messages and food and everything set
and the prison officers are coming across in here and
(01:19):
you're a stand which you know, like that's from Charlie
as c division.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
I thank you. You know. So to me, jar wasn't scary.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, wouldn't it be?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
It was. You know, people think Charle's full of tigers
and lions. It's not. It's not.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
It's not for a lot today it's a lot worse
because the drugs destroyed it. But and so what happened
for me, Neil was while I was in jail, the
government in there. You remember I'm seven stone seven. I
was a boxer. I was seven stone seven, so that's
not very big. I don't know that is in kilos.
It was tiny. And they put me on a drug
(01:54):
called like Actual, which is a psyche drug to control me.
That was the beginning of my addiction.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
So I'd never never take took a drug in my life.
The reason for that because they said I was violent.
And you know, don't get me wrong. If there's some
sort of pedophile and theyre going to come and say, hey, son,
came Iria, you know, I'd probably hurt them. Yeah, you know,
and I think anyone in their right mind would hurt them,
and so they put me on like actual to control
(02:25):
me and to stop me from being a menace.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
So I was pested. I was a pest. I'm seventy
year old kid. I'm trying to show the world that
I'm a tough guy. My father. How long?
Speaker 1 (02:35):
How long into your in society did they do that
to you? So how long?
Speaker 3 (02:40):
Within six months they had me on like actual. Within
six months they put me on lie actual and I
went through the system. I wasn't in there for I
got found not guilty of the attempted murders the waterside workers,
painters and doctors had. It was very similar to the
days of Sydney when there were certain people in the
Sydney that were highly connected that had magistrates under the
(03:03):
under their wing. Say, by the time I went to court,
I got found not guilty of this. They lost the
evidence to that the gods that pointed me out the
line out said no, that's not the guy, they said,
And then the prosecution is, why did you say that
was the guy? Because the policeman told me said it
was that guy, And the magistrates look going to cross
and go like this is this is just a joke,
(03:24):
and I just missed the charges. But I still got
thirty six months to serve as a juvenile. But I
got out of jail, and what happened was I become
a drug addict. I didn't know that there's no as
information about drug addiction. So nineteen seventy four, I started
injecting heroin and the whole world changed. The gangsters didn't
want to know about me because you're a junkie, your liability.
(03:51):
We'd moved to Sydney.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Did you hide it first or did you not.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Know I hit it at first?
Speaker 3 (03:56):
It's quite sad in retrospect, I got cause you lose
so much weight on heroin, you know, And all of
a sudden, you know, I was just super fick because
I was always super fit eye and you know, and
I love fighting. I like fighting. I actually like boxing.
I really enjoy to me, it's a sport, it's a
it's an art. And and I like getting if you
if you enjoy this because you're good at it, you know, No,
(04:17):
it's just ship Golfred loves playing golf, you know what
I mean. So I really enjoyed boxing and I enjoyed fighting,
and I got really skinny, and I remember the guys
up here a bell Maine at the water side, they
put on a turn they's to call it a barrel
where they put on a party and they'd all donate
money because I thought I had stomach cancer because I
lost so much weight, and they said, what's wrong with
(04:38):
and I said, I've got stomach cancer. So these guys
went and put on this this doing you know, got
you know, maybe fifteen ORed bucks. There's a lot of
money in the early seventies, and give it to me
to donate to me to help me get me through,
and I watch some more smack, you know, so you know,
it's quite sad. And then when they found out I
was just basically I was banned from the underworld, from
(05:00):
the from the gangster side of the underworld. But as
you know, in the seventies, especially in the late seventies,
the drug the drug world had taken over the underworld.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
And the guys that kicked me out of the drug
out of the underworld seen me.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
Driving a new Judet Felcon, you know, the good looking
girl the apartment in town. It's like, what's going on
with him? You know, And it's like I'm selling heroin
I was a heroin Addicts'. Of course what you do
is you you buy heroines, so you know, and in
the seventies you bought heroin for five hundred dollars a
(05:34):
half an hource and that's on that's in Australia. Overseas,
you paid triplets for it, you know, you paid pennies
for it over there. And it all came all the
heroines came out of Asia. It didn't come out of
anywhere else. Those days came out of Malaysia. And you
come out of places that you know, it was the
only brown rocket wasn't white, and it was just a
(05:55):
different world. But you come to someone's house and there'd
be some brown rocks sitting there, and there'd be some
white powder sitting there. There's some hashit on the table.
No one was robbing each other, and it was a
different you know, you turn up, you put some hats
on the table, some Buddhist nicks and you's make a
few joints. You'd listen to a bit of music and
it was quite a The rollin stage was singing about
brown sugar, Area Clapton singing about cocaine. You know, everyone's
(06:16):
blue reads singing about heroin. You're put spiking to my vein.
Things aren't quite the same. It was normal, was trending.
There's no more drugs squad theres nocesses and drugs buy
those days that's were called customers agents. They hear from Piermont.
They'd come and raid your house and half the time
they wouldn't even pincher. They'd throw the dope down the
toilet and you to piss off, you know, because it
(06:36):
wasn't nasty.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
It wasn't It wasn't the where it became, you know.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
But I went in and out of prison all just
I was never pinched for dope. They loaded me up once,
the cops loaded me up in the seventies, and this
is where I found out Melbourne was different from Sydney.
All the coppers up here are on the take. In
Melbourne they weren't like that. The copp has just got you.
(07:01):
In Bassua, they'd have to bash you in your confession
if you didn't confess. Your record of interview wasn't allowed
in court. So there's no such thing as verbal. So
if you just stack staunch half the time, you'd never
get found guilty down there because there was no verbal
and so I got arrested up here and the cops
verbaled me, and then the lawyers came to me and said, oh,
(07:25):
you know, just plead guilty and we'll get you a fine.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
You know, it was the only drug comnion I ever had.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
And then they said you got to give the cops
five hundred and I was like, oh, you know, so
I gave them five hundred. Well, the next week the
cops were back on the door in a different squad.
We don't want money. And that's when I realized that
you can't pay them. You can't pay them because once
you pay them, they own you. And I just really
lost myself into drug addiction, into the drug world, into King's.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Cross because they ended up up the cross And did
you sell it?
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Were you selling more or were you taking more?
Speaker 3 (07:59):
I was taking more. I was always my own best customer. Yeah,
I was always my own best customer.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Like how much we talk how much of an addiction was, Well.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
You're talking about pure heroin now, not street heroin.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
I'd open a ten grand bag, the stuff that we'd
get out of Panang becoming ten grand bags.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
They weren't.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
And there's like a big sausage. It's made like a
big sausage ten grams and I'd opened a ten grand
bag and thirty hours later, so it's one and a
half days. Was gone, ah pure, And I used to
think the dope's gone off. Something wrong with the dope.
And the guy got out of jail. He come to
visit me, and he's dead now, the good guy, and
he had a mate with him. He said, can you
(08:37):
give I made a shot? You know, he just got
out of the nick and you know, I'm I'm not
a really friendly person.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
I fuck, you know.
Speaker 3 (08:44):
Anyway, there's a little bit of brown staying on the spoon.
I squared to be back in there, misseduff for him
and he odeed and I thought it must be a week.
You know, it must be really weak personal can you
do on that little bit? But my times had become
so high because I was using so much dope. You know,
even though I didn't even realize it, I become heroin.
(09:04):
You built a very big tolans very quickly. That's why
it's such a horrible drug. Not as bad as ice,
but you know, such a horrible drug. Heroin is a
physical drug. You know, you get stoned, you fell asleep,
you set fire to your pillow. You set feel like
fight to your mattress. Where the new drugs these days
they set fight to your brain. They cooked their brain humans.
I'm fried. You know you never heard that term in
(09:25):
the open days. We just all fell asleep, just fell asleep,
you know we did. We just fell asleep, mate, you know,
I fell asleep. And then in nine in eighty one,
I was I just got out of jail, and I've
met a good guy in there. His name was warrelyan
frenchie Roger Rogerson killed him. Well, French and I mates.
We trained together. We trained, and I was telling French
(09:46):
about drug deal and you know how much money because
French was you for stick up some stick up some
guy and there's no money stick ups and there's ore
the money.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
You know.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
We trained every single day and we're super fit, and
you know we're mates. And there's the worst part about
drug addiction. And I got out of jail. The French
you'd been out about five months. You started working for
Needy Smith, started selling gift for Eddie and so I
get the French.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
He hears I'm out.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
He comes and sees me, mate, give you half an
hounce and give you a start, you know, thanks brother,
you know. And he turned up, you know, six days later,
I'm short. I've used most of it. He's like, what happened?
I said, mate, it just gives another half and I'll
get you know, the week later, I'm short. And he said, mate,
who the fuck are you? Where's my mate? Where's Ronnie?
(10:33):
Where's my mate from jail? You know, the bloat that
was Staunches loyal? Where's he gone?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
And he did.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
He said to me, there's a funny joke. We said, joke,
but he said, We said, I Don'm gonna have to
put one in your leg or something. So I can't
just keep letting you rob me, he said. He said,
everyone's going to rob me. But that's what a dish
had done to me. I could no longer be reliable, consistent,
you know, I couldn't. I couldn't do anything, maneyf for
come time to get a shot or save your life.
(11:02):
You're dead because the drugs just took over thing. That's
why I hated them so much. That's why I hate
them today. I hate what drugs can do to good people.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
H
Apporte production.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
I've got arrested for that too.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
So I'm sitting at Pendridge at seventeen years and three months.
I'ld charged with five attempted murders, use a fire of
prevent love mansion, the break enders and steel as a
seventeen year old kid. And I'm sitting in jail thinking, wow,
this is this is it. I'm never going to get
out of jail home. I will never ever get out
(00:37):
of jail. And I was a pretty little boy, blonde hair,
blue eyes, you know, But I think, you know, what
what did Dad say when you found out this? Oh
he was wrapped because I'm when I say wrapped, I'm
his son. He thinks his footsteps have a shooters the
shooting of the coppers good on your sort of type
of thing. And and plus the word went into the
(00:58):
prison as his Ishwood's kid. You look after him, and
you know, and I had old guy. I sent a
message and sent a chocolate hi, which was unheard of
those days, and sending me a stand which across from
the kitchen, which is unheard of. You know, all the boards,
as in the boards are going like who's this guy?
He's getting all these messages and food and everything set
and the prison officers are coming across in here and
(01:19):
you're a stand which you know, like that's from Charlie
as c division.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
I thank you. You know. So to me, jar wasn't scary.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, wouldn't it be?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
It was. You know, people think Charle's full of tigers
and lions. It's not. It's not.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
It's not for a lot today it's a lot worse
because the drugs destroyed it. But and so what happened
for me, Neil was while I was in jail, the
government in there. You remember I'm seven stone seven. I
was a boxer. I was seven stone seven, so that's
not very big. I don't know that is in kilos.
It was tiny. And they put me on a drug
(01:54):
called like Actual, which is a psyche drug to control me.
That was the beginning of my addiction.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
So I'd never never take took a drug in my life.
The reason for that because they said I was violent.
And you know, don't get me wrong. If there's some
sort of pedophile and theyre going to come and say, hey, son,
came Iria, you know, I'd probably hurt them. Yeah, you know,
and I think anyone in their right mind would hurt them,
and so they put me on like actual to control
(02:25):
me and to stop me from being a menace.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
So I was pested. I was a pest. I'm seventy
year old kid. I'm trying to show the world that
I'm a tough guy. My father. How long?
Speaker 1 (02:35):
How long into your in society did they do that
to you? So how long?
Speaker 3 (02:40):
Within six months they had me on like actual. Within
six months they put me on lie actual and I
went through the system. I wasn't in there for I
got found not guilty of the attempted murders the waterside workers,
painters and doctors had. It was very similar to the
days of Sydney when there were certain people in the
Sydney that were highly connected that had magistrates under the
(03:03):
under their wing. Say, by the time I went to court,
I got found not guilty of this. They lost the
evidence to that the gods that pointed me out the
line out said no, that's not the guy, they said,
And then the prosecution is, why did you say that
was the guy? Because the policeman told me said it
was that guy, And the magistrates look going to cross
and go like this is this is just a joke,
(03:24):
and I just missed the charges. But I still got
thirty six months to serve as a juvenile. But I
got out of jail, and what happened was I become
a drug addict. I didn't know that there's no as
information about drug addiction. So nineteen seventy four, I started
injecting heroin and the whole world changed. The gangsters didn't
want to know about me because you're a junkie, your liability.
(03:51):
We'd moved to Sydney.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Did you hide it first or did you not.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Know I hit it at first?
Speaker 3 (03:56):
It's quite sad in retrospect, I got cause you lose
so much weight on heroin, you know, And all of
a sudden, you know, I was just super fick because
I was always super fit eye and you know, and
I love fighting. I like fighting. I actually like boxing.
I really enjoy to me, it's a sport, it's a
it's an art. And and I like getting if you
if you enjoy this because you're good at it, you know, No,
(04:17):
it's just ship Golfred loves playing golf, you know what
I mean. So I really enjoyed boxing and I enjoyed fighting,
and I got really skinny, and I remember the guys
up here a bell Maine at the water side, they
put on a turn they's to call it a barrel
where they put on a party and they'd all donate
money because I thought I had stomach cancer because I
lost so much weight, and they said, what's wrong with
(04:38):
and I said, I've got stomach cancer. So these guys
went and put on this this doing you know, got
you know, maybe fifteen ORed bucks. There's a lot of
money in the early seventies, and give it to me
to donate to me to help me get me through,
and I watch some more smack, you know, so you know,
it's quite sad. And then when they found out I
was just basically I was banned from the underworld, from
(05:00):
the from the gangster side of the underworld. But as
you know, in the seventies, especially in the late seventies,
the drug the drug world had taken over the underworld.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
And the guys that kicked me out of the drug
out of the underworld seen me.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
Driving a new Judet Felcon, you know, the good looking
girl the apartment in town. It's like, what's going on
with him? You know, And it's like I'm selling heroin
I was a heroin Addicts'. Of course what you do
is you you buy heroines, so you know, and in
the seventies you bought heroin for five hundred dollars a
(05:34):
half an hource and that's on that's in Australia. Overseas,
you paid triplets for it, you know, you paid pennies
for it over there. And it all came all the
heroines came out of Asia. It didn't come out of
anywhere else. Those days came out of Malaysia. And you
come out of places that you know, it was the
only brown rocket wasn't white, and it was just a
(05:55):
different world. But you come to someone's house and there'd
be some brown rocks sitting there, and there'd be some
white powder sitting there. There's some hashit on the table.
No one was robbing each other, and it was a
different you know, you turn up, you put some hats
on the table, some Buddhist nicks and you's make a
few joints. You'd listen to a bit of music and
it was quite a The rollin stage was singing about
brown sugar, Area Clapton singing about cocaine. You know, everyone's
(06:16):
blue reads singing about heroin. You're put spiking to my vein.
Things aren't quite the same. It was normal, was trending.
There's no more drugs squad theres nocesses and drugs buy
those days that's were called customers agents. They hear from Piermont.
They'd come and raid your house and half the time
they wouldn't even pincher. They'd throw the dope down the
toilet and you to piss off, you know, because it
(06:36):
wasn't nasty.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
It wasn't It wasn't the where it became, you know.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
But I went in and out of prison all just
I was never pinched for dope. They loaded me up once,
the cops loaded me up in the seventies, and this
is where I found out Melbourne was different from Sydney.
All the coppers up here are on the take. In
Melbourne they weren't like that. The copp has just got you.
(07:01):
In Bassua, they'd have to bash you in your confession
if you didn't confess. Your record of interview wasn't allowed
in court. So there's no such thing as verbal. So
if you just stack staunch half the time, you'd never
get found guilty down there because there was no verbal
and so I got arrested up here and the cops
verbaled me, and then the lawyers came to me and said, oh,
(07:25):
you know, just plead guilty and we'll get you a fine.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
You know, it was the only drug comnion I ever had.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
And then they said you got to give the cops
five hundred and I was like, oh, you know, so
I gave them five hundred. Well, the next week the
cops were back on the door in a different squad.
We don't want money. And that's when I realized that
you can't pay them. You can't pay them because once
you pay them, they own you. And I just really
lost myself into drug addiction, into the drug world, into King's.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Cross because they ended up up the cross And did
you sell it?
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Were you selling more or were you taking more?
Speaker 3 (07:59):
I was taking more. I was always my own best customer. Yeah,
I was always my own best customer.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Like how much we talk how much of an addiction was, Well.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
You're talking about pure heroin now, not street heroin.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
I'd open a ten grand bag, the stuff that we'd
get out of Panang becoming ten grand bags.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
They weren't.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
And there's like a big sausage. It's made like a
big sausage ten grams and I'd opened a ten grand
bag and thirty hours later, so it's one and a
half days. Was gone, ah pure, And I used to
think the dope's gone off. Something wrong with the dope.
And the guy got out of jail. He come to
visit me, and he's dead now, the good guy, and
he had a mate with him. He said, can you
(08:37):
give I made a shot? You know, he just got
out of the nick and you know, I'm I'm not
a really friendly person.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
I fuck, you know.
Speaker 3 (08:44):
Anyway, there's a little bit of brown staying on the spoon.
I squared to be back in there, misseduff for him
and he odeed and I thought it must be a week.
You know, it must be really weak personal can you
do on that little bit? But my times had become
so high because I was using so much dope. You know,
even though I didn't even realize it, I become heroin.
(09:04):
You built a very big tolans very quickly. That's why
it's such a horrible drug. Not as bad as ice,
but you know, such a horrible drug. Heroin is a
physical drug. You know, you get stoned, you fell asleep,
you set fire to your pillow. You set feel like
fight to your mattress. Where the new drugs these days
they set fight to your brain. They cooked their brain humans.
I'm fried. You know you never heard that term in
(09:25):
the open days. We just all fell asleep, just fell asleep,
you know we did. We just fell asleep, mate, you know,
I fell asleep. And then in nine in eighty one,
I was I just got out of jail, and I've
met a good guy in there. His name was warrelyan
frenchie Roger Rogerson killed him. Well, French and I mates.
We trained together. We trained, and I was telling French
(09:46):
about drug deal and you know how much money because
French was you for stick up some stick up some
guy and there's no money stick ups and there's ore
the money.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
You know.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
We trained every single day and we're super fit, and
you know we're mates. And there's the worst part about
drug addiction. And I got out of jail. The French
you'd been out about five months. You started working for
Needy Smith, started selling gift for Eddie and so I
get the French.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
He hears I'm out.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
He comes and sees me, mate, give you half an
hounce and give you a start, you know, thanks brother,
you know. And he turned up, you know, six days later,
I'm short. I've used most of it. He's like, what happened?
I said, mate, it just gives another half and I'll
get you know, the week later, I'm short. And he said, mate,
who the fuck are you? Where's my mate? Where's Ronnie?
(10:33):
Where's my mate from jail? You know, the bloat that
was Staunches loyal? Where's he gone?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
And he did.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
He said to me, there's a funny joke. We said, joke,
but he said, We said, I Don'm gonna have to
put one in your leg or something. So I can't
just keep letting you rob me, he said. He said,
everyone's going to rob me. But that's what a dish
had done to me. I could no longer be reliable, consistent,
you know, I couldn't. I couldn't do anything, maneyf for
come time to get a shot or save your life.
(11:02):
You're dead because the drugs just took over thing. That's
why I hated them so much. That's why I hate
them today. I hate what drugs can do to good people.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
H
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