Britain’s most notorious prisoner will reportedly tie the knot for a third time after proposing to his actress girlfriend.
Charles Bronson, who has been behind bars since 1974, had reportedly planned to pop the question on Valentine’s Day, but brought it forward after a personal visit from former Coronation Street actress Paula Williamson this week.
According to The Mirror, Bronson went down on bended knee and asked for Williamson’s hand in marriage at HMP Wakefield on Monday.
It will be the third marriage for the 64-year-old. Bronson divorced his wife of five years Irene, in 1977. He then married Fatema Saira Rehman in 2001. The marriage lasted four years.
During his second marriage he converted to Islam.
Speaking ahead of the news, Williamson told the newspaper: “We are so in love. I know he has a public image of being a violent prisoner, but in reality he is so different.
“There are obviously difficulties with him being in prison, but we feel so strongly about each other we’re determined to make it work.”
Bronson was jailed for seven years in 1974 for armed robbery but has been locked up for much of the time since then following a string of violent incidents including assault, hostage-taking and damage.
His supporters insist he is a changed man, having undergone therapy behind bars.
Bronson, whose real name is Michael Gordon Peterson, was jailed for life in 1999 for taking a prison art teacher hostage for two days.
A judge ordered him to serve a minimum of four years but he has been regularly been refused parole and was kept in an isolation cell at HMP Wakefield known at the Hannibal cage.
Williamson appeared in Coronation Street three times between 2008 and 2012 as a nurse and has also performed in Hollyoaks and Emmerdale.
The couple have been together for five months.
Prison inmates can apply to get married or have civil partnerships via a request form to the governor, who will decide if the ceremony should happen in prison or at a register office nearby.