Ronnie Biggs in 1963. Photo: PA/PA Wire

Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs, who won worldwide notoriety after escaping and living the high life in Rio de Janeiro, has died, sources said.

Biggs, who was 84, and was being cared for at the Carlton Court Care Home in East Barnet, North London, died early yesterday.

He had become increasingly frail in recent years after suffering several strokes.

He was last seen in public at the funeral of fellow Great Train Robber Bruce Reynolds in March.

Speaking earlier this year Biggs said he was proud to have been part of the gang behind the robbery.

On August 8, 1963, the robbers, masterminded by Reynolds, stopped the Glasgow-Euston overnight mail train and carried out the biggest robbery of its time.

Biggs escaped from prison in 1965 and spent 36 years on the run before finally being arrested and jailed in 2001. He was released from prison on compassionate grounds in 2009 due to ill health and subsequently said he had few regrets about the crime that made him a household name.

Biggs, who could not speak due to his strokes and communicated through a spelling board, said: “If you want to ask me if I have any regrets about being one of the train robbers, my answer is no.

“I will go further: I am proud to have been one of them. I am equally happy to be described as the ‘tea boy’ or ‘the brain’.

“I was there that August night and that is what counts. I am one of the few witnesses – living or dead – to what was ‘the crime of the century’.”

He did admit to some regrets.

“It is regrettable, as I have said many times, that the train driver was injured,” he said.

The train driver Jack Mills, who was coshed, reportedly by Biggs, never fully recovered from the ordeal and died a few years later.

Biggs went on: “And he was not the only victim. The people who paid the heaviest price for the Great Train Robbery are the families. The families of everyone involved in the Great Train Robbery, and from both sides of the track.

“All have paid a price for our collective involvement in the robbery. A very heavy price, in the case of my family. For that, I do have my regrets.”

Some Biggs quotes while on the run

• One report said that since my time on the run I’ve had 2,500 girlfriends. I mean you got to realise, I’ve been on the run for more than 30 years; I have got to have had more than that.

• It has been rumoured that I was the brains of the robbery, but that was totally incorrect. I’ve been described as the tea boy, which is also incorrect.

• There’s a difference between criminals and crooks. Crooks steal. Criminals blow some guy’s brains out. I’m a crook.

• I don’t have any intentions to return to England. I would go back if I could return as a free person. I don’t want to return to prison.

• I am no longer a criminal. I gave up that practice years ago.