James “Whitey” Bulger, once the most-wanted gangster in America, protected by the premier law enforcement agency in America, was convicted of racketeering in Boston yesterday and will spend the rest of his life in prison.
A jury sitting in federal court in Boston found Bulger guilty of 11 of the 19 murders he was charged with. Most of the murders he was acquitted of happened in the 1970s and the jury found the evidence too weak.
But the jury found Bulger guilty of nearly all the racketeering counts, which included murder as an act of racketeering and the violent extortions of bookmakers and drug dealers.
Bulger showed no emotion as the verdict was read, and with each passing moment the enormity of the verdict against him sank in. He had denied killing two women whose murders were among the 19 with which he was charged. But the jury found him guilty of murdering Deborah Hussey, the stepdaughter of his partner in crime, Steve Flemmi. The jury issued no finding in the murder of Flemmi's girlfriend, Debra Davis, which was short of finding him not guilty.
'Good bad guy'
Bulger's attempt to rescue his "good bad guy" image, by copping to most of the charges but denying he killed the women, was in shambles with the jury's finding, though he may find a grain of solace in the "no finding" in the Davis murder.
Bulger’s brother, Jack, watched from the front row. His other brother, Bill, the former president of the Massachusetts senate and the University of Massachusetts did not attend.
Judge Denise Casper set sentencing for November 13th, but it is almost moot. Bulger, who turns 84 next month, is certain to die in prison.
The eight-man, four-woman jury returned its verdict after five days of deliberation that saw them sift through a mountain of evidence.
“Thank God,” said Pat Donahue, whose husband, Michael, was murdered by Bulger in 1982 after he unwittingly gave a ride home to a potential witness against Bulger. “This has been a long time coming, but it’s a relief that it’s over.”
Donahue’s sons Michael jnr, Shawn and Tommy, who had grown up without their father, hugged each other as their mother spoke.
Bulger’s conviction followed a two-month trial marked by a parade of admitted killers and drug dealers who pointed their finger at a man with whom they had worked or paid off.
Corrupt FBI agents
His defence rested on asking the jury not to believe his former criminal associates who got immunity or reduced prison terms in exchange for testifying against him. Bulger's lawyers pointed to the corrupt FBI agents and cynical justice department that tolerated Bulger's crimes for decades, asking jurors to acquit him as a rebuke to the government.
But the jury apparently did not want to release one of the most prolific killers in Boston’s history just to send a message about FBI corruption.
Bulger was one of the most infamous American criminals of the 20th century, having served time on Alcatraz before he emerged in the 1960s and became untouchable a decade later when the FBI recruited him as an informant in their war against the Mafia.
Evidence showed he exploited that relationship for all it was worth. And the FBI did more than look the other way when Bulger engaged in murder, often helping identify potential witnesses against him so that he could kill them.
Bulger's FBI handler, John Connolly, the son of Galway immigrants, is serving a 40-year prison sentence for helping Bulger and his gang murder Boston businessman John Callahan in 1982. Connolly was a protege of Bulger's brother, William, key in the Massachusetts senate and University of Massachusetts
Underscoring the incestuous nature of Boston, and its intersections of politics and crime, Whitey Bulger’s trial unfolded in a courthouse named for the late congressman Joe Moakley, who grew up in the same south Boston neighbourhood as the Bulgers and was a family friend.
Bill Bulger and other family loyalists were among those who insisted that Whitey Bulger was not nearly as bad as his detractors made out. They portrayed him as a benevolent gangster, almost a Robin Hood character, and claimed he kept drugs out of Southie, as the neighbourhood is known.
But a series of drug dealers took the witness stand to describe how Whitey Bulger shook them down at gunpoint, demanding they pay him for the privilege of selling drugs in and around south Boston.
There was considerable evidence showing Bulger set up his own drug dealing operation, run by a career criminal named Billy Shea. Shea testified that, at the height of the cocaine distribution ring, he was paying Bulger $10,000 a week.
Rather than deny the charges, Bulger’s lead counsel, Jay Carney, admitted in his opening and closing statements that his client made millions of dollars from the drug trade.
Many legal observers suggested Carney’s strategy was to admit to most of the 32-count racketeering indictment, hoping it would lend more credibility to Bulger’s adamant insistence he did not kill two women whose murders are among the 19 he was charged with.
Bulger’s defence focused on denying that he killed Debra Davis and Deborah Hussey, the girlfriend and stepdaughter, respectively, of his partner in crime, Steve Flemmi, as well as denying something for which he didn’t face charges: being an informant for the FBI.
Carney elicited some guffaws when, during his opening statement, he insisted that Bulger could not be an informer because he was Irish. Carney argued that being an informer was the worst thing in the Irish consciousness. Bulger denied he was an informant, insisting that the 700-plus pages of informant files attributed to him were falsified by his FBI handler, Connolly.
The jury apparently believed most of the testimony against him provided by criminals, but they rejected testimony from John Martorano, an admitted killer of 20, who put Bulger in the middle of a group of murders of rival gangsters in the early 1970s.
However, the jury did convict Bulger of murders that Martorano implicated him in the 1970s and 1980s, the key difference being there was corroborative evidence provided by others.
Bugler case factfile
Whitey Bulger: arrested in 2011 after being on run for 16 years. The mobster, who terrorised south Boston in the 1970s and 1980s, ran the city's notorious Winter Hill Gang. The authorities found him in 2011 in Santa Monica, California, with an arsenal of weapons and $822,000 in cash secreted in the walls of his retirement bungalow.
Verdict: Bulger (83) found guilty of 31 out of 32 criminal charges against him.
Racketeering offences: comprised 38 criminal acts which included 19 murders, extortion, drug dealing and money laundering.
Case proven: in only 11 of the 19 murders he was accused of carrying out or ordering in his days as head of the Winter Hill Gang. Seven murders were not proven and there was no finding on one.
Length of trial: more than two months. The eight-man, four-woman jury arrived at their decisions on fifth day of deliberations
Sentence: set by Judge Denise Casper for November 13th. Bulger is certain to die in prison. – (Reuters/New York Times)