Birthday freedom for Train Robber

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But Biggs, who is being treated in hospital for pneumonia, is not expected to be fit enough to celebrate his birthday.

Relatives said he was "extremely weak" and unable to swallow or speak, and he is scheduled to undergo minor surgery in the next few days with doctors waiting to see whether he will recover enough to be moved to a nursing home.

Biggs, who spent 30 years on the run after being part of a gang which stole £2.6 million from a train in 1963, is being treated at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital in Norwich after being moved from nearby Norwich Prison last week.

His prison sentence ended when paperwork was completed at around 2pm on Friday after Justice Secretary Jack Straw decided he should be freed.

Biggs's son Michael said Mr Straw had made a "common sense" decision which was in the interest of the taxpayer.

Michael Biggs said his father had paid for his crimes. And he said Biggs would spend his final days away from the public gaze.

"As a family, we are absolutely thrilled," said Michael Biggs. "My father is now a free man."

He added: "Ronnie Biggs is about to close this last chapter. He will now be retreating fully from public life. This is not going to turn into a media circus."

But the grandson of the driver beaten over the head during the robbery said Biggs should "rot in jail". Stephen Mills, 46, whose grandfather Jack Mills was struck with an iron bar and never worked again, told the Daily Telegraph: "I wish Ronnie Biggs was dead, he should have been left to rot in jail. Biggs is a terrible man and he should have served his last days in jail."