Tough Nuts: Australia's Hardest Criminals

Chow Hayes - A Killer's Eyes (1x2)

: 29, 2010

Arguably Australia’s most feared gangster, Frederick ‘Chow’ Hayes was a convicted double murderer, sentenced to hang in 1952 for the brazen killing of standoverman and former boxer, Bobby Lee. Chow’s sentence was commuted to life in prison and he was released from jail in 1978. By this time, Chow was in the final decade of his life. At the time of his death, Chow had served almost 40 of his 74 years on the planet in jail. In his dotage, Chow became a celebrated crime figure – the subject of a biography by crime writer David Hickie and the subject of a chilling portrait by artist, Bill Leak that was short listed for the Archibald Prize in 1984. The portrait shows a wizened old man who still possessed the eyes of a killer. TOUGH NUTS charts the course of Chow’s life, from his formative years. Chow was the son of a WWI veteran; broken by his experience of the bloody conflict. Chow was nine years of age when he first set eyes on his father. His father was straight-jacketed in an asylum. Did this episode fuel Chow Hayes’ murderous rage, his complete lack of regard for humanity that saw him the most dreaded figure in Sydney’s underworld? Chow’s criminal career reads like a social history of the Sydney crime scene in the 20th Century – from the razor gangs of the 1930s, the post war booms in sly grogging, brothels and illegal gaming to the criminal networks founded on drugs.