Askin and a police commissioner were among those who received thousands of dollars a week from Saffron, the crime figure's son has confirmed in a book on his father, to be released soon.

Saffron was also involved in loan sharking. One of his borrowers was Kerry Packer.

Despite Saffron's lifelong denial of involvement in criminal activity, in Gentle Satan Saffron's only son, Alan, 59, says his father controlled the vice trade, including illegal gambling and prostitution, in every state except Tasmania and the Northern Territory, and bribed a host of politicians and policemen to ensure he was protected.

At one stage, the American "Mob" tried to persuade Saffron to operate a casino in Las Vegas on its behalf, but his father declined, he said.

Mr Saffron details his father's "excellent business relationship and long-standing friendship" with Askin and the police commissioner of the day, Norm Allan, who died in 1977. Questions were asked about the size of Askin's estate, almost $2 million, when he died in 1981. Askin was knighted in 1972, while he was premier.

"There have been many accounts of my father's relationship with these two men but none realised the depth of his association and influence. Both were totally corrupt and my father's excellent business brain and complete integrity in his dealings with them allowed him to exploit their greed to its fullest," he writes.

Alan Saffron says he met Askin twice and saw him at his father's office at least twice. "Norm Allan was a more frequent visitor and he even came to our house in Vaucluse for Sunday lunch."

Mr Saffron details an all-expenses-paid trip to the US that his father organised for the police commissioner and his companion - "a very attractive, considerably younger, female".

In his early years as premier, Askin would meet Saffron at restaurants at arranged times and speak to him on the phone regularly. But as Saffron came to the attention of law enforcement agencies, intermediaries were used, Mr Saffron says in the book.

He says in the later years of Askin's premiership, his father became the "bagman" for Sydney's liquor and prostitution rackets, and most of the illegal gambling. "In return, my father was completely protected. "

During the late 1960s, when his illegal casinos were flourishing, Saffron was paying the premier and the police commissioner $5000 to $10,000 a week each.

The crime boss was making so much money from vice that he took to loan sharking, his son says. "This excess in cash led to another business: short-term loans at extremely high interest rates. He quickly became the 'go to' man if you needed cash, and subsequently made loans to some of Australia's most prominent businessmen, including Sir Peter Abeles, Sir Paul Strasser, Frank Theeman and Kerry Packer."

He writes: "Most of these people had convenient memory loss about their association with my father, or that they ever borrowed money from him."

Mr Saffron told the Herald yesterday he understood the loan to Packer might have been to cover gambling debts. In later years when his father was having a rough time with the media, he went to Packer for help. "His plea fell on deaf ears," Mr Saffron said.

Mr Saffron said his father had a "real weakness for sex" and while he was married to his wife, Doreen, he had "three mistresses at a time and still liked to have girls on the side". His father also insisted on having sex with the prostitutes employed in his establishments.

Mr Saffron said he was "extremely disappointed that there were notable absences at his father's funeral, including several prominent former politicians and police who had been the recipient of his father's generosity. "I wish I could tell you who they are," he said, but lawyers for his publisher, Penguin, had asked him to remove a number of names from the book.

One person who did attend Saffron's funeral in 2006 was the controversial West Australian businessman Warren Anderson. Mr Saffron said Mr Anderson had been a wonderful friend to his father and had helped him with "real estate ideas".

"He really trusted Warren. He thought he was a really good man," Mr Saffron said.

As to his father's battles in his dying years to restore his reputation by suing anyone who referred to him as Mr Sin, Mr Saffron said he had wasted thousands of dollars. He said he told his father: "Don't try to clean it up. Everybody knows you did it."

"He was a sinful man," his son said, "but he was not Mr Sin." That person, he said, was a doctor whom he would not name.