A petty criminal who was caught on camera loudly protesting being arrested after eating “delicious Chinese food” has tragically died.
A television news crew filmed Jack Karlson shouting at police outside a Brisbane restaurant in 1991 and when footage of his outburst was uploaded to YouTube in 2009 it went viral.
The faded vision showed a mustachioed Karlson delivering a series of Shakespearean-sounding lines as he was reluctantly ushered away from his lunch table.
“Gentlemen, this is a manifesto for democracy!” he shouted into the camera. “Get your hands off my penis!”
—What’s the charge? Eating a meal? A hearty Chinese meal? Oh, that’s a nice headlock, sir. Ah, yes, I see you know judo well.
Karlson’s arrest was a case of mistaken identity, but the minute-long clip has since become the subject of countless memes and even its own line of merchandise.
His death came just weeks after his family announced that he was suffering from prostate cancer.
Karlson’s story was told in the book Carnage: A Succulent Chinese Meal, Mr Rent-a-Kill and the Australian Manson Murders by journalist Mark Dapin.
Jack Karlson confronts police outside a Brisbane restaurant on October 11, 1991, in one of the most viewed arrest videos of all time. His arrest on suspicion of credit card fraud was a case of mistaken identity, but his real-life story is far more extraordinary.
The former stage and television actor and occasional painter will also appear in an upcoming documentary titled The Man Who Ate A Succulent Chinese Meal.
To publicise that film, Karlson recently met with one of the officers who arrested him at the China Sea restaurant in Fortitude Valley all those years ago.
Seven Network reporter Chris Reason had rushed to the restaurant that day after receiving a tip that one of Queensland’s most wanted men had used a stolen credit card to pay for his meal.
Karlson was not the suspect police had originally thought, but his arrest was so colorful that it was widely seen on television and took on a life of its own.
One of the arresting officers, Stoll Watt, appeared on ABC News Breakfast alongside Karlson in June when the men were asked what they remembered about their encounter.
“There are many different versions of the events,” Watt told host Michael Rowland.
“There are a lot of mysteries and misperceptions about the whole thing. But the most important thing is that Jack should have won an Oscar and he’s a good friend.”
Rowland asked Karlson if one of his most famous lines from the video, “Get your hands off my dick!”, referred to something that actually happened or was made up on the spot.
“I probably made it up,” Karlson said. “I don’t remember.”
Sunrise also aired a segment about the upcoming documentary in which host Monique Wright read a piece from Reason about Karlson’s video.
“I’ve been doing this job for more than three decades,” Reason wrote.
‘Mandela covered up, Bosnia, Ukraine, 9/11, all they want to talk to me about is the fucking Democracy Manifesto!’
Despite being wrongfully arrested in 1991, Karlson, who is in his eighties, has a long history of being on the wrong side of the law.
He is known to have had links to some of Australia’s most notorious criminals between the 1970s and 1990s, including Sydney gangster Neddy Smith and Melbourne mobster Mark “Chopper” Read.
Over the decades he was held in prisons in Brisbane (Boggo Road), Sydney (Parramatta, Long Bay) and Melbourne (Pentridge), and escaped from custody three times.
In the 1970s, he appeared as an extra in the classic Australian television dramas Homicide, Division 4 and Matlock Police, and in 2020 he starred in a music video for punk rock band The Chats.
