Original subtitles

In 1978, Hollywood made a film about my life. It was called Midnight Express,

and it told the story of my imprisonment and escape from a prison in Istanbul.

The story itself was based upon the book I had written. At the time, I could

only say certain things for legal reasons. The movie itself changed even

book to a point where not all of it is valid and true to my story.

Now I have a chance to tell my story.

The first time I smoked marijuana, everything about my body said, ooh,

that's good, I like that.

To those who hadn't lived through the 60s, I pity you. It was just free love,

which was a wonderful concept, and I fully took advantage of it.

Patrick was one of my best friends in the 60s.

He was a writer and a dreamer, and we instantly hit it off. I mean, the two of

us saw the world in the same light.

He was the guy that we would send out to pick up girls. He was so smooth, women

just fell all over him.

We'd, like, put him on a leash, send him off to a crowd of women, and he'd

tackle two or three of them and bring them back to us.

Great guy to have.

I almost finished college when I had just enough and I needed to get out and

explore the world so I can experience life, so I can write about it.

I needed money, so for about two months I got a job at the Milwaukee County

Hospital.

One day while I was walking around, I walked past a room where somebody had a

broken leg.

Back then they had like rolls of tape and they dipped them in water.

And then rapid, rapid, rapid, rapid, and then the cast hardens.

And I thought, wow, that's easy. I could do that myself.

And somewhere or other, that stuck in my mind, which stayed there until my

friend who had been traveling, come back from Islam, who had brought several

little plaques of hash with him in his money belt.

Most of the grass in the United States was...

Not very good. This was terrific hash.

He told me that in Istanbul, they sell it on the streets and it's, you know,

very cheap. In those days, nobody searched you getting on an airplane. You

put a chicken under your arm and get on the plane. Nobody would know.

So that idea was in this part of my brain.

And having seen this cast was in the other side of my brain.

And they came together and I thought, you know what? I could do that.

Making the money wasn't my goal. I wanted the adventure of doing it, and I

wanted to pull it off.

So I decided to go to Istanbul and smuggle some hash back.

Literally, when I flew in, I was kind of looking at the different taxi drivers,

and I saw this kind of semi -young, hippie -looking taxi cab driver kid.

I said, I need to get to Sultanahmet, the hippie neighborhood, as it were. And

he said, hashish?

I said, yeah, I'd be interested in that. He said, oh, yeah, yeah, okay. Because

they know American foreigners, that's what they're interested in.

My cab driver took me back to his house.

I had tea with his wife. His kids are running around.

He rolled a joint of this really good hat.

Wow, this is really good stuff.

I said, you know, a kilo, two kilos. He said, two kilos, is that what you want?

I said, yeah, two kilos.

They charged me $150 for each kilo.

So I thought, hey, have I pulled this off or what? First night in Istanbul,

James Bond has scored.

I knew people could get arrested. I knew that sentences were severe in places,

but... It wasn't going to happen to me.

I knew I was way too smart and good -looking to ever get arrested, and I

believed that.

I didn't have to act at all in the walking because the cast itself creates

very motion you need to do, and it's heavy and it's awkward because you're

clumping and clumping and clumping.

Got to the customs, gave them my passport.

Luggage was checked.

Like everybody, they look in your bag, but not much.

So they passed me through.

The part I was nervous about was Kennedy. What's going to happen when I

back there?

I knew that if I got caught in New York with hash, I'd be going to jail.

It was fine until I had to make my way out to the door, and as I was walking, I

realized I'm leaving a trail because my cast was literally breaking apart.

All that clumping had loosened the cast up.

I was terrified somebody was going to see this and realize that there's

something wrong here, that this is not a real cast.

But nobody said a word.

So it just confirmed to me how clever I really was.

I sold little pieces of this hash to all my friends.

I would tape them underneath on my chest and I sold the hash like that.

This was by far and away the best product around.

Everybody wanted some of this stuff.

I made close to $5 ,000, which was an immense amount of money.

The money went quickly.

I decided to do it a second time because I was able to do it the first time.

October of 69, I went back.

Saw my cab driver friend.

Off we went and we essentially did the same thing a second time.

What I didn't want to do was put this in a leg cast this time because I just

barely pulled that off last time.

I'm real skinny. I could tape four pounds of hash, which is two kilos, four

pounds. I could tape it all around here and put on a bulky cable net sweater and

still look skinny.

It was easy for me.

Six months later, the money was gone again.

April 1970, my same guy. Hey!

All the same routine.

Two kilos for about $300.

I know I'm going to be able to sell this for thousands of dollars when I get

back to the United States.

I guess I was a drug smuggler. Sure, I was smuggling drugs. That's what I was.

was a drug smuggler.

Between the time of my third trip and my fourth trip, the PLO hijacked

airplanes, flew them into the desert.

where they blew up these jets.

That was the beginning of this whole new era.

That was the beginning of all the airport security that now is just part

parcel of life.

In October of 70, when I went back to Istanbul for my fourth trip, I knew that

security and airport security certainly is going to be heightened, but my

supreme confidence just overrode my intelligence.

I had my routine down. I knew the cab driver.

This would be another easy score.

I went out to the airport, watched people going through customs.

Nobody was getting body searched. Nobody was getting frisked. I'm thinking, no

problem.

Went through customs. They looked at my passport.

Got a lot of stamps in it now.

They then had all of the passengers get on a bus.

I wasn't quite sure why, because this hadn't happened previous.

There was some woman talking to me about her son and traveling here. I was just

listening and smiling and thinking, I can't wait to get back to the States.

And they drove the buses out to where the airplane was.

And again, I was thinking it was a little strange, but I didn't quite

until I looked.

Out the window of the bus, the airplane had a cordon of soldiers

in front of the boarding ramp.

And they were, I guess, searching people.

This can't be happening.

I'm looking at it, but I'm still saying this can't be happening. Not to me.

I knew that a month prior, planes had been blown up.

And I guess this was the result. Now they're going to search us.

I didn't know what to do. I acted like I dropped my passport. I was sort of on

the floor thinking, what am I going to do?

Well, I would have hidden under the seat and stayed there.

The lady said, what do you do? I said, I've lost my passport.

Oh, I can see this. She said, oh, it's in your pocket. Look.

I said, you know, thanks.

I wanted to run.

I couldn't get back to the airport for the terminal.

I couldn't take all the shit off. I got it all taped to my body.

The only way to go was, there's the airplane. If I can just get on that

There was a line of men, and I'm watching this process.

When this guy finishes, this man goes and gets on the plane.

So all I could do was try and kind of bluff my way through.

Like, let me just slide by them.

Almost be invisible. Just slide by.

I got past the first guy.

As I approached the second guy, I had my shoulder bag, and in it was my Frisbee,

and I took my Frisbee out of my bag, and I... Just kind of move past him as if

I'm putting stuff back in the bag.

I had my foot in the air. I've told this story and people said, wow, you're

being a little dramatic.

Not at all. I mean, I literally, I had my foot. I was about to step on the

plane.

This guy looked at me and I said the other guy had searched me.

Now this hand got a little tighter on my shoulder.

I'm trying to stay calm, but I was freaked.

He hit these hard plaques into my arms.

He kept going.

And then he hit these hard plaques around my waist.

And he kept going.

Wow. I guess he didn't really feel it.

I'm the least religious of the people, but at that point, I'm like, please,

Jesus, get me out of this. I will never do this crap again. Please.

But then, He came back up.

And when he came back up, then he hit him.

Now, my heart is really beating, and this guy's looking right at me.

I could see in his mind, oh, my God, bomb. Again, he's looking for bombs.

looking for a terrorist. And in his mind, he's got a terrorist.

Took out his gun, stuck it in my waist, screaming, bomba, bomba, bomba. And all

the soldiers put their rifles down, and people started scurrying around, and I'm

just frozen there.

My whole life was hanging right in that moment.

The reality of what was going to happen next was beyond me.

He realized, that's Esra, that's Hash.

Esra.

Esra, Esra, Turkish word for Hash. He said, you know, Hash, it's Hash.

And like, everybody was, oh God, it's just Hash. Everybody was so relieved.

Except me, of course.

It was the changing point in my life.

Everything in my life was pre and post that moment at the airport.

Everything changed.

And it's literally shaped my life from that moment till now.

They took me out to Samajalar prison.

I had no idea what was going to happen to me.

None.

I have no idea how long I'm going to be here.

I don't know when I'm going to get out of here, if ever.

What I wanted to do was just curl up in a little ball somewhere and cry because

I was so tired and I was so emotionally drained that I wanted someone to take

care of me.

He put me in the cell and it was a bare bunk and it didn't have blankets and

things on it and it's cold like steel and stone.

There's no heat.

I said something to him about, you know, is there a blanket or something? He

said, no, sleep, go to sleep, go to sleep and clangs the door shut.

I could see him fumbling around with a key, but he didn't really lock the door.

Off he went.

I heard somebody say... The guy in the next cell was

saying something to me, and I wasn't sure what, but my door was open.

It's very hard to see. It's night. It's dark.

This guy had a stick, and he said, blankets, couple of cells down.

I don't know, but I want a blanket.

I wrapped this blanket up around me and soon sort of drifted off a little bit.

And the next thing I know, he tried to

grab my blanket.

Next thing you know, he's pulling, I'm pulling, he's pulling.

I'm not real big, but I'm real fast and nasty.

Somebody's going to mess with me. I'm going to mess with them first.

Next thing I know, I've hit this guy and bang, he goes running off.

The next thing I know, the doors are opening and guards are coming in.

Grab me, start dragging me out.

Took me down to the basement.

Hamid was there.

Hamid was the badass.

He's like a bear. He's a big guy.

He was the saddest.

It felt like fire each time he hit me.

I'm trying to get away from this thing, and then he's whapping me and hitting

me. My hands got whacked pretty much because I was trying to stop it like

I thought they were just killing me.

I had a chance to write a letter home to my parents.

I didn't know what to say, and I didn't know what to tell them.

All I knew was... I have to tell my mother

that I'm arrested.

Sorry.

And I know the pain that's going to cause her.

And that was the beginning of, I think that's when I

first knew what sorrow was.

You know, I've gone through a whole life. My life was so easy until then.

But knowing the pain that I'm about to...

Cause my folks that really brought it home to me of what I've done

But you know my dad when I needed him as angry as he was and as

disappointed as he might have been He showed up within a week or so

It was wonderful to see him

and it was devastating to see him at the same time To see me locked up like

this. It had to be breaking his heart

He said, he said, your mother wanted to come, but...

He

said, your mother

wanted to come, but I didn't think it was a good idea, and it wasn't. I mean,

I'm so glad she didn't come.

It would have killed her to see me in there.

I finally received a four -year and two -month prison sentence.

And that, to me, seemed a lifetime away.

I was 23 when I was arrested.

Four years in prison? That's, you know, that's a sixth of your life.

But there is a question of escape.

All people talk about in jail is escape.

Various ways to do it, places to go, how to do it.

People had maps and everybody had stories.

And there was the train line that went through Greece and took you over the

border and you could jump off. And that was like, you take the Midnight Express,

meaning you take the escape train.

You know, you talk about it, but there is a huge abyss of pain and fear between

talking about it and trying it.

That's really all I thought about for years.

The very bottom of the social hierarchy was us, the hash smokers.

Rapists, killers, murderers, they're all above us.

The very bottom was the drug smugglers, and particularly the foreign and the

hippies.

Violence happened a lot. It's long periods of boredom broken up by moments

sheer terror.

Seeing the same people, the same faces, the same stories, literally the same

clothes, the same colors, you get so bored.

And then something would happen.

Somebody would get stabbed. It would be this violent confrontation.

I'd been in jail for like a year and a half now.

I was desperate to escape from prison.

One of the things I'd learned about was a Bakikoi mental hospital.

Under the Turkish law, if you get classified criminally insane, they keep

this hospital. But I'd heard from all the prison scuttlebutt that it's a much

easier place to escape from.

That wasn't the hard part. The hard part was once you got out of it, what do you

do then? You need someone on the outside.

And that's where my friend Patrick was going to be part and parcel of this

escape plan.

He came and visited me in the prison.

We remained stalwart friends throughout.

There was nobody listening, so it was pretty easy to talk about the situation.

From what everyone says, it's really easy to escape from. Patrick would be on

the outside with papers, false passport, and a car.

I would escape out of Bakikoy. He'd pick me up, and we'd drive off to the

border, and I'd escape.

All I have to do.

Get in. Just convince them I'm crazy.

How hard can that be?

None of my friends would have even had a doubt that I could convince them that I

was crazy.

Why should I talk to you? Because I'm here to help you. No, you're not. You're

not here to help me. You're trying to get inside my head, but I'm not going to

let you. I put on a show. I mean...

I didn't hold back. Just tell me what he's writing.

Say, what are you writing? What are you scribbling down there? Don't write any

notes about me. You should talk to me.

No, I want to talk to him.

He's the one with the pen.

Whatever came out. No, it won't sit down just because you want it to.

I'm not going to sit down.

I got to go to Bakikoi for a period of observation.

If prison was bad, Bakikoy was the bottom of the birdcage.

I'd never seen anything like it. Everybody in Bakikoy was there because

were criminally insane, meaning they had done something hideous.

She got it.

She got it.

She got it.

She got it. She got it. She got it. She got it.

One weird emaciated guy was constantly coming up and talking to me.

He said, I couldn't get rid of this guy. Every time I turned around, he had

these big bug eyes. He was staring at me. He looked like a semi -spider.

There was an ex -judge.

And he was talking like he was in court.

I mean, the man was totally out of his mind.

It really was maddening. Everywhere around you is insanity.

The bad

part

is you're in Bakako. The good part is...

It's probably easier to escape from there.

The walls were old and pitted. You literally could climb over the top.

So I was waiting now for the right timing.

Patrick was off raising money. He had to get false papers.

And so he got himself involved with people who could do that.

I got a telegram one day from my dad.

Patrick was found dead in his hotel room with a bayonet through his chest.

He got himself involved with people from the underground getting false papers

that somehow knew he had money.

If I hadn't gotten in jail, if I hadn't done what I've done, Patrick would still

be alive.

It was probably the lowest point of prison for me.

My parents are suffering because of me.

Now my friend is dead because of me.

It cracked me.

But what it also did was it turned that escape switch off.

I got sent back to the Samajalar prison.

I realized I still had whatever it was, another...

year and a half, two years, and... I just, I sort of

settled into the fact that, okay, I guess I need to spend the rest of the

here.

I certainly can't have anybody else die because of me. Enough people have

suffered because of me.

I need to do this time.

And then the American Council showed up one day, 54 days before I was scheduled

to go free. I was crossing off the calendar, and I thought, oh, he's here

You know, they've screwed up. I'm going to get out early.

As soon as I saw his face, I knew something really bad had happened.

I was afraid. I was waiting to hear tragic news about somebody, family.

That's when he said the High Court in Ankara... The High Court in Ankara wants

to change the verdict.

They want you for smuggling, not possession.

At first, I couldn't quite fathom it. I'm going free.

They're very clear about what they want.

He said they're going to send you to life.

The only discretion he had was he could lower life to 30 years.

But life, 30 years, it's all the same.

I can't spend the rest of my life in prison.

And that's what essentially was happening.

The switch went back on.

I needed to get very honed and totally focused on escaping.

For me, for Patrick, for my family.

One way or the other, whether I escape or whether I get killed trying, I'm

getting out of here.

Going to the island was incredible news for me. I didn't know how specifically I

was going to get off the island, but I knew one way or the other, this is

than the Istanbul prison.

It's 17 miles off the coast.

The sea is considered to be the wall around the island.

You could move around, you could be out in nature.

It was heaven compared to the prison.

But you're still locked in.

Murali is a work island where boats come from the mainland and bring all this

produce, and we work in a canning factory canning the produce.

The boats come into the harbor, and they all have these little dinghies tied

behind them.

Then they have to leave at night because it's a prison island.

But one day, a storm was brewing, and I could see the storm and these clouds,

and the waves were starting to whip up.

And I realized the boats were anchoring. They were going to spend the night in

the harbor because it was getting too rough at sea.

And they've all got these little boats tied behind them.

Bingo! I knew this is the night.

The plan was to be out past the bed check, swim out, cut the rope on one of

dinghies, and to row the dinghy to the mainland.

I really had to screw my courage up.

As much as I wanted to go, I was scared to death of what was going to happen.

This was really leaping off the edge into the abyss here.

I'm out past the bed check at night, and if I'm caught, the worst.

The scariest part was crawling down across the rocks because I'm exposed out

here.

It was like a stone pier that went out into the water, and they had guards with

guns.

If they see me, I'm dead.

I got to the edge of the water and went in, and suddenly it's getting a little

deeper, and I'm breast -stroking my way, trying to be quiet, trying

not to cough, trying not to get a muggy of water in my mouth.

I didn't want them hearing me coughing.

and kind of collapse in the bottom of this dinghy.

I had a knife from the canning factory. I had that in my back pocket.

And I was sawing the rope that connected it to the boat like this when I heard a

noise. Up above my head, a hatch slapped open.

I mean, it was right above me.

My heart stopped, and I froze there.

Because I'm so open. I'm so vulnerable. If this guy sees me, I'm cooked. I'm

done.

This fisherman did this big hocking noise and... ...hocked this

big loogie out into the ocean.

I heard the hatch slam shut again. I waited a half a beat.

There was nobody there and I cut the damn rope.

And as soon as I cut the rope...

the dinghy started to drift away.

What I needed to do was get into the open sea, past the last of the boats,

was so concentrating on rowing and not missing a stroke, I almost wasn't aware.

I looked up and realized that I'm on path to the end of the island.

Wow!

I'm past the last of the boat. I'm free.

For the first time in like five years.

I'm beyond the bounds. There's nobody telling me what to do. It was an

incredible feeling.

The problem became that once I got beyond the island, I really was kind of

disoriented.

It was 17 miles to the mainland.

I'm screwed. I'm going to get swept way out to sea.

I was frightened, and I was cold, and I was vulnerable.

What I realized was, if I die, I'm free.

If I escape, I'm free. If I die, I'm free.

And that was a very liberating feeling.

One way or the other, I'm out of prison.

That feeling alone suffused me.

All my muscles and all my body was just livened by the feeling that I'm out. And

I did it.

I'd have rowed forever.

I'd have rowed a hundred miles.

I'm going to row until I die or until I hit the damn beach.

I was chanting to myself, if they catch me, they'll beat me. If I make it, I'm

free. I'd catch me, you know, that kind of stuff. Whatever kept me going, I went

rowing and rowing, and I rowed and rowed, catch me, I'm free.

Catch me, I'm free.

Catch me, I'm free.

Catch me, I'm free.

Catch me, I'm free. Catch me, I'm free.

I lifted up a little bit and the boat scraped.

It was sand.

And then the wave lifted up a little bit again and I was there. It was the sand.

I was like on the beach.

It truly was the finest morning of my whole life.

Ecstatic at being out here in the morning with the sun coming up

and...

And the sky over me.

But I know that now there's going to be a bed check. And somewhere they're going

to start counting. And they'll realize, where is William?

I'm still in the middle of Turkey.

The clock is ticking. They're looking for me. And if they find me now, I'm

The plan was to get to the Greek border. There's a river that separates Greece

and Turkey, and I know if I swim across the river, on the other side is Greece.

The Greeks and the Turks have been enemies for thousands of years, mortal

enemies. There was no way the Greeks were going to send me back to Turkey

I killed someone.

I saw Turkish border guards patrolling this open section.

I know somewhere just up ahead is real freedom, which is what Greece was for

When the sun set, I started making my way out across this rocky field.

It kind of dropped down into this irrigation ditch.

I started to come up over the top of the ditch, and I heard footsteps.

I couldn't quite make out where it was, but it was getting closer.

It was two Turkish border guards walking along the top of the ridge that I was

about to be going over, and I froze.

I was curled up on the bottom thinking stone, inanimate object.

And I'm getting freaked now.

It's like that was really close.

At one point, I heard dogs, and that freaked me out.

For some reason, I took off my shoes and socks, these old beat -up sneakers and

socks, thinking if they're following my scent, these dogs would come, and they'd

smell these sneakers, and it would blow their noses out, and they wouldn't be

able to follow me anymore.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. It was a terrible idea because now I'm

barefoot, and I could feel my feet getting chopped up, and there were twigs

rocks.

As I moved through these trees, I could hear.

I could hear water. I could hear the river.

Somewhere up ahead, I was desperate, desperate to get to

that river.

I came through trees, and there was the water in front of me.

And I was like, that's it.

I was so close, nothing was going to stop me.

My fear now was, I know there are Turkish soldiers here, I know there have

Greek soldiers over there, and whether it's a Greek bullet or a Turkish bullet,

either way, I'm dead.

All I wanted to do was make my way across, and the river washed me down.

I swam and swam and swam until I hit some mud, and I came and I was on this

muddy riverbank.

But the reality was, I'm still not really sure that I'm free. I'm still not

really sure this is Greece.

What I didn't want to do is run up to the first person and say, hey, here I

and have him turn out to be a Turkish soldier.

I was so spaced out from being up and running and moving for so many days.

I was having these visual hallucinations, these audio

trust my senses.

My mind was like inflamed.

At one point, I came up upon what was like a dusty road.

Didn't even see it, but passed what was like a wooden kiosk.

What it was, was a sentry booth.

And as I passed it, suddenly this bayonet came down.

He was more freaked out than I was.

He said something to me.

And I realized I didn't understand him.

And he said something else.

And I realized I don't understand him. I speak good Turkish. He's not talking

Turkish. It must be Greek.

It was like, yes.

I collapsed on the ground with my arms in the air. More soldiers came up and

running, and I'm on the ground laughing like a loon.

I knew at that point I made it.

I landed at JFK.

There was my dad, his hair all silver, and, uh...

He was ecstatic to see me as I was to see him.

There's a photo of me and my dad sitting there and I was like hanging on to him.

Once again, I'm a little boy and my father's taking care of me.

Still feel guilty about it? Oh, terribly guilty.

Terribly guilty.

You know, my dad's been dead three years now and I still feel guilty.

Once I got out everything changed that I was a happy guy and I was on top of the

world and You know I've got a book and I've got a movie and I made money and

I met my wife and I had a wonderful life and all that good stuff But

deep down I I still feel Somehow I had

to make make it up to him what I put

Put him through Looking

back now I can talk about it being experience

in life, and I learned so much and I did But the cost of my family