Notorious bank robber, B.C. writer wins book award for work of non-fiction

VICTORIA – One of the country’s most notorious bank robbers has won a $5,000 prize for his latest work of non-fiction.

During the 1970s and 1980s, Stephen Reid was a member of the Stopwatch Gang, which hauled in millions and used timepieces while robbing about 100 banks in Canada and the United States.

Reid is currently serving an 18-year sentence at the William Head Institution on southern Vancouver Island for a separate 1999 bank robbery and shootout with police in Victoria.

Reid has won the 2013 City of Victoria Butler Book Prize for his work, “A Crowbar in the Buddhist Garden:Writing from Prison.”

In the book, the novelist grapples with the nature of addiction and the pain associated with separation from family and friends.

This past March, the Parole Board of Canada granted Reid day parole, allowing him to attend a substance-abuse program.