Tom Cunliffe

I think it might be fair to say that for an active sailor to have lived out his allotted three-score years and ten without spending more than two days in jail isn’t bad going. This is my score at the time of writing and I continue in the lively hope that the total may rest there.

My inaugural custodial experience was a direct result of a misunderstanding with a South American bribe broker back in the 1970s. Arriving with my wife in a well-known port south of the Equator, I was approached by an official-looking character with no obvious function demanding a substantial sum of money. He had no receipt book and, when pressed, he explained in excellent English that our cash was to be distributed among various public servants, honest fellows all, who needed help with their domestic bills. To an