A POOLE fraudster who was arrested with £1.3m in South Africa has written a book on his life in crime. 

Garrie Henwood, 55, was arrested in 1999 in South Africa when he was found with £1.3 million in cash.

Spending 12 months in a South African prison before returning to the UK, he was arrested by Northern Irish police on his arrival where he spent another six months in prison. 

Garrie, who is out of prison and says he is living a straight life, has written up his experience in a new crime thriller called Swiped which reveals how even the smallest scams can lead to a life of crime and years behind bars. 

Garrie said: "I had a heart attack 18 weeks ago and I was literally dying. I was not allowed to do anything for 12 weeks so I thought I would write about my past.

"This is what this kind of line of criminal work is like. If you want to dance in that world, there are consequences but on the other side of the coin, that world is amazing when it's going well.

"You dance with the devil, it always come back."

Garrie was put in jail in his youth for robbery and burglary in Poole and began his fraudulent behaviour after his release in Manchester. 

Relating his life to Leonardo DiCaprio in film Catch Me if You Can, it was sheer luck he was caught when his vehicle was hit by a police car going through a red light. 

He said: "I came back from South Africa at Heathrow expecting me to be coming into my mum's arms but she was tapped on the shoulder and told by the police, 'sorry he's not coming home'.

"I was put in IRA jail in Ireland and when I got back I partied for three days and went home and saw her."

Now a dad of three daughters and an entrepreneur living in Chelmsford, Garrie visits his mum in Parkstone twice a month. 

Described as a 'cathartic' book for his family, it will be be made available from mid-April. 

He said: "There's words in there that will break my daughter's hearts and words in there my mum would never know I told lies about."