Thriller on 'two Armenian criminals' published in London

PanARMENIAN.Net - A great-grandfather from Hampstead Garden Suburb, London, is celebrating after becoming one of the country’s oldest debut authors, aged 92.

Anthony Tobias spent ten years writing Finders Keepers Killers, basing the story on his own experience of meeting a murderer. Set in 1993, the thriller tells of “two Armenian criminals who were recruited by the Russian State Security Commission and sent to London to block the sale of arms from a crooked British official to the breakaway state of Chechnya. The pair, stopping at nothing, assassinated the new Chechen ambassador and were subsequently arrested.”

Before retiring aged 75, Anthony used to work as an administrator at a legal practice in the West End and it was whilst accompanying a solicitor, he met one of the villains in his tale.

Anthony said: “One of the murderers was taken to Wandsworth Prison. He immediately appealed to us saying he would be killed there for what he did, so we had him moved to a high security wing in Belmarsh Prison.”

Anthony visited the man “a number of times and kept close contact, supplying him with books and Armenian papers," until one day he received a call saying he had been found dead in his cell.

Anthony said: “The circumstances were bizarre. An inquest found he hanged himself and committed suicide but I don’t believe it – I think he was killed for what he did.”

After hearing reports about conflict in Chechnya on television Anthony said it “rekindled” his interest and motivated him to write his account.

Anthony has lived in the borough for 35 years and has been writing plays, novels and short stories “every conscious hour” for around 65 years, Times-Series reported.