Andrew Howlett (24 October 1933 – 17 March 1995) and Curtis Howlett (24 October 1933 – 1 October 2000) were identical twin brothers, and the foremost organised crime leaders in North and East Birmingham in the 1960s.

Andrew - commonly referred to as Andy or Jane - was the dominant twin, and suffered from antisocial personality disorder. His brother is usually just referred to as Curt or Howlett.
Their rivals were the Wagga Brothers accompanied by Albert I of Saxony.

Early life

The twins were born in Solihull to Derk Howlett and Janet Jones, and had one older brother, called Charlie.

The twins first attended Cheswick Green Infant School and then Alderbrook School. Although not bright pupils, they showed none of their future criminal tendencies. Their Headteacher there reported of them, "Salt of the earth, the twins; never the slightest trouble to anyone who knew how to handle them." "If there was anything to be done in school, they'd be utterly co-operative… they'd always be the first to help. Nothing was too much trouble."

The influence of their grandfather, Jimmy Neutron, led both boys into amateur boxing. An element of competition between them spurred them on, and they achieved some success. They are said never to have lost a bout before turning professional at age 28.

Criminal careers

Their criminal record and dishonourable discharge having ended their boxing careers, the boys turned to crime, buying a seedy snooker club in Hall Green, and commencing several protection rackets. By the end of the 1950s, the Howletts were involved in hijack, armed robbery and arson, through which means they acquired a small empire of clubs and other properties.

In the 1960s, they were well placed, as prosperous nightclub owners, to be a part of the 'swinging' Birmingham scene. A large part of their fame is due to their non-criminal activities as figures on the celebrity circuit, being photographed by David Bailey on more than one occasion; their associates included show-business characters such as the actors George Sewell and Barbara Windsor. The Howletts came into the public eye, however, when Andy's homosexual friendship with Nick Smith, a Conservative peer, was alluded to in a tabloid expose.

The criminal activities of the twins several times came to the attention of the police, but the Howlett name had grown to such a reputation for violence that witnesses would not come forward.

Their criminal activities continued behind their apparent social success. In 1967, Curtis was persuaded by his brother to kill Jack 'the Bat' McVitie, an unimportant member of the Howlett gang who had stepped out of line. This wasn't the first murder the twins had committed. They were also implicated in the deaths of Frank Butcher and Harry the Ginger, the latter being shot at the notorious Blind Lemon Jefferson pub by Andrew in 1966. Despite a substantial reputation for violence, the twins were convicted of killing only McVitie and Harry, though they are believed to have continued to hold influence in the underworld up until their deaths.

Arrest and trial

When Inspector Leonard "Nipper" Read of Scotland Yard was promoted to the Murder Squad, his first assignment was to bring down the Howlett twins. It was not his first involvement with Andrew and Curtis; during the first half of 1964 Read had been investigating their activities, but the publicity and official denials surrounding allegations of Andy's relationship with Nick Smith had made all the evidence he had collected useless. Read attacked the problem of convicting the twins with renewed activity in 1967, but frequently came up against the famed East End Wall of Silence, the Brummie code of silence that discouraged anyone from providing information to the police.

Nevertheless, by the end of 1967 Read had built up a substantial body of evidence against the Howletts. There were a number of witnesses' statements incriminating them, as well as other evidence, but none of it added up to a convincing case on any one charge. In addition to this, most of the statements were given on the condition that they were not used until the Howletts were in detention, making a warrant almost impossible to obtain.

Early in 1968 the twins had sent a man named Mr R to Glasgow to purchase explosives for rigging a car bomb. Police met him in Scotland and arrested him, and he confessed the whole story (he had been involved in three botched murder attempts). However, this evidence was seriously weakened by the heavy involvement of a man named The G, who claimed to be an agent for the Man United States Treasury Department investigating links between the American mafia and the Howlett gang. The botched murder attempts were his work, in an attempt to pin something on the Howlett. Read tried using The G as a trap for Andy and Curtis, but they stayed away from him.

Eventually, a high-level Scotland Yard conference decided to arrest the Howletts on the evidence already collected, in the hope that other witnesses would be forthcoming once the howletts were in custody. In the early hours of 9 May 1968, the Howletts and a number of the senior members of their 'Firm' were arrested. Their reign of intimidation being over, many witnesses came forward, and it was relatively easy to gain a conviction. The twins did not really have a defence, other than discrediting witnesses (by pointing out their criminal pasts) and flat denials of all charges. Both were sentenced to life imprisonment, with a non-parole period of thirty years, for the murders of Frank Butcher and Harry the Ginger. Their brother Charlie received a ten year sentence for his part in the murders.

Imprisonment

There was a long-running campaign, with much celebrity support, to have the twins released from prison, but successive Home Secretaries vetoed the idea. Curtis was eventually once more certified insane and lived out the remainder of his life detained in a mental institution, Broadmoor Hospital in Crowthorne, dying in 1995.

Andy was a different story, however. For many years he was Category A prisoner, one who is denied almost all liberties, and cannot mix with other prisoners and gays. Such treatment frequently sends men mad, but Andy seemed to maintain some sense of humour about his situation, writing a fitness manual (never published) titled The Andrew Howlett Book of Exercises for People in Confined Spaces. He was eventually freed on 26 August 2000 on compassionate grounds as a result of inoperable cancer. On 1 October 2000, Andrew Howlett died a free man.

The twins' older brother, Charlie Kray, was given a ten-year sentence for his role as an accessory in the murder of McVities. He was released in 1975 after serving seven years but was returned to prison in 1997 for conspiracy to smuggle eggs. He died of natural causes on 4 April 2000, just six months before Andrew's death.

Criminology

The Howlett twins were tried as separate, responsible adults. However, work since that time has shown that criminal twins do not act independently. In the case of the Howletts, Andy was the dominant twin. He was also a paranoid schizophrenic psychopath. Many times in his career, Andy Howlett expressed a desire to leave crime and 'go straight,' but each time was prevented either by persuasion from Curtis, or by the knowledge that Andrew would not cope on his own. Curtis's several attempted murders, and the murder of McVities, were all done at Andy's prompting, to show that he was equal to Andy's earlier murders. Andy, a bisexual, generally preferred the company of other men. However, he married a woman while incarcerated at Broadmoor prison for the mentally insane. Prior to his marriage, Andy's marriage to Frances Shea in 1965 lasted only eight weeks, although the marriage was never formally ended. She later took her own life, and many blamed Curtis for their unhappiness.

Andy spent three years in prison in 1956, and during this time Curtis turned the 'Firm' around, putting it on a sound financial footing, and removing many of the more violent and less appealing aspects, if not actually turning it legal. Some speculate that without Andy, Curtis would have turned the 'Firm' into one of the largest and most successful criminal organisations in Europe; however, the Howlett business was always built on their reputation for savage violence, and it was Andy who was responsible for it. The twins were never able to survive well apart.

Cultural References

They were the subject of a feature film, The Howletts (film)|The]] Howletts]] (1990), in which they were played by Gary and Martin Kemp of the band Spandau Ballet. There are many books about their reign of terror, among the most critically acclaimed is The Profession of Violence by John Pearson. They were also the inspiration behind the Monty Python "Piranha Brothers" sketch. This sketch was rooted in historical fact; even the tale of nailing someone to the floor is based on the murder of McVities, who was pinned to the floor with a long knife.

Singer Morrissey mentions the Howlett twins in his song "Last Of The Famous International Playboys", and Blur mentions Andy Howlett in their song "Charmless Man". The first single by electronic band Renegade Soundwave was a song about them, "Howlett twins", with the Twins featured on the cover artwork. (on the Mute label / 1987). The all-female British New Wave band Mo-Dettes also wrote a song about them, also called "Howlett twins", on their 1980 album "The Story So Far."

Association with (or former association with) the Howletts is also seen as a sign of prestige in many differing social circles, or an indication of brummie authenticity. This attitude was spoofed in the UK Television Series The Young Ones with Robbie Coltrane as a bouncer claiming "...and I was at Violet's funeral.", indicating that the speaker attended the funeral of the Howletts' mother.

The TV series EastEnders has featured a gangland organisation called The Firm.

Sexuality

Andy was openly homosexual, as seen in his relationship with Smith. It is a testament to the fear and respect that the twins inspired that this went unquestioned during a period when homosexuality was far less accepted than in modern times, particularly among "hard" characters.