Broughill forced his victims to stare down the barrel of a gun but he has been described by police as a "polite crook"

They said he went quietly when caught red-handed.

After an early beginning in crime, Broughill carried out a string of hold-ups in the late 1970s.

He became known as the "Beanie Bandit" as he always wore one while robbing at gun-point.

His crime spree came to an end when, proving himself to be no rocket scientist, he was seen speeding in his own car from a bank he had just robbed.

Detectives traced his number plate and were waiting for him when he arrived home.

After serving a jail sentence Broughill was walked from prison in 1986 and within weeks took up where he left off.

Now older, but still armed, he earned the new nickname "The Grandpa Harry Bandit" because his gun was similar in size to the fictitious character Dirty Harry.

After carrying out stick-ups on banks and building societies, and netting over $50,000 in the process, he was arrested in February 1987 at age sixty-two.

Detectives found a sawn-off .38 revolver and a .22 calibre sawn-off semi-automatic rifle in his Traralgon flat.

Looking forward to returning to jail, Broughill pleaded guilty and was sentenced to sixteen years with a twelve year minimum.

Two weeks later he was recaptured, and he explained the reason for going AWOL to police.

"I went to an early opener hotel (The Waterside in King St), had a few too many and missed the train."

He pleaded guilty to escaping from lawful custody and was punished with a further month's jail.

After he was released on parole, Broughill again fell foul of the police.

The squaddies tagged the crims towards Swan Hill, 300 km's north-west of Melbourne, then to a speck on the map called Galah where Broughill and another crim named Nat Fratino burgled a silo office.

In January 1999 Broughill was charged with burglary and theft of a motor vehicle and bailed on several conditions.

But he ever got the chance to have his matter resolved.

On February 10, 1999, police investigating the Moorabbin shootings of Sergeant Gary Silk and Constable Rodney Miller made a bid to track down Lee Torney, a convicted killer, who detectives considered a strong suspect.

He and Fratino were in the business of pinching cars to order.

Later that month, Broughill was found dead in a quarry in Wodonga, about 300 km north-east of Melbourne.

While there were no apparent wounds to his body, his testicles were missing.

Had they been removed by tortoises that lived in the flooded quarry, or were they removed by a more sinister party before his death.

Broughill mixed with some cut-throat characters during the later part of his career; men, according to police sources, who could have murdered for fear of an old man "squealing".

The questions surrounding his death remain unanswered, with an inquest into the cause of his death ending inconclusively.