Johnny Adair vies with his murdered hero Billy Wright for the title of Ulster's best-known loyalist hard man.
His swaggering figure, vicious anti-Catholic past and strident anti-authoritarian stance make him appear stereotypical. But he is more a curious jumble of opposites.
The uncompromising loyalist paramilitary is said to be massively egotistical and a confusion of outside influences ranging from his trademark reversed baseball cap to his Mickey Mouse tattoo, pierced nipples, shaved head and Tina Turner anthem Simply The Best. He revels in his "mad dog" nickname, and once referred to his young son as "mad pup".
He is heavily muscled despite being short, and he claims his impressive physique is due to a fitness regime he followed in prison and is not the result of steroid-taking which his opponents claim.
He is linked with about 20 sectarian murders of Catholics in the early 1990s, including the gun attack on Sean Graham's bookies on Belfast's Ormeau Road in which five were shot dead.
He was the first person to be convicted of the charge of directing terrorism - a crime many said was tailor-made to arrest him. He was sentenced to 15 years in 1995.
His mouth has landed him in serious trouble. Private boasts about paramilitary involvement to the former RUC were once secretly taped and he was arrested and jailed.
Freed under the terms of the Belfast Agreement in 1999, he was sensationally rearrested under orders of the then Northern secretary, Mr Peter Mandelson, who suspended his out-on-licence status.
He was re-released only to be returned again to prison by Mr Paul Murphy, again on suspicion of breaching the terms of his licence.
Murals in his Lower Shankill heartland depicting Billy Wright, Princess Diana and dead Catholics were said to have been completed on his orders.
The Maghaberry prison cell where he was held in virtual solitary confinement was decorated with a poster which read: "Kill 'em all. Let God sort 'em out".