Boston crime kingpin Bulger jailed for life
Influence extended into the FBI; once considered untouchable
Boston crime kingpin James (Whitey) Bulger — whose murderous reign terrorized the city for almost 40 years — will spend the rest of his life in prison.
Bulger, 84, was sentenced Thursday, his face frozen as his grim fate was handed down.
The last big-city Irish crime boss in America, Bulger’s hold over Boston was so complete that his evil influence stretched deep into the FBI and even state politics. Many in Boston considered him untouchable.
A jury convicted Bulger in August in a broad racketeering indictment that included murder, extortion, money-laundering and weapons charges. The jury convicted Bulger in 11 of the 19 killings he was charged with participating in, but acquitted him of seven and could not reach a conclusion on an eighth.
He said nothing in his defence, slamming the prosecution as a sham.
Judge Denise Casper heard testimony Wednesday from a dozen relatives among the 19 slaying victims. They described the octogenarian gangster as “a terrorist,” “a punk” — and even “Satan.” Prosecutors called him a sociopath.
Before sentencing him to two consecutive life sentences, Casper eviscerated Bulger, calling his multitude of crimes “almost unfathomable” and the human suffering he inflicted “agonizing to hear” and “painful to watch.”
Reading off the list of the 11 victims Bulger was convicted of killing, Casper said, “Each of these lives came to an unceremonious end at your hands or at the hands of others at your direction.”
The old killer stood stoically, his hands folded in front of him. His expression was blank.
Tommy Donahue — whose father, Michael Donahue, was one of Bulger’s victims — told the Boston Herald he was relieved seeing the mobster for the last time.
“It took 31 years, six months, two days to finally get a conviction of somebody for my father. That old bastard is going to be in prison. He’s going to die in prison,” Donahue told the Herald. “It’s a good feeling. It’s bittersweet, but it’s a damn good feeling. The next time I hear anything about him, hopefully he’s dead.”
Donahue added he didn’t want Bulger to be executed.
“I say stick him in a cell, shut the door and let him rot,” he said.
The Whitey Bulger myth extended beyond Boston and New England. He was the inspiration for Jack Nicholson’s demented mob chief in the 2006 Martin Scorsese thriller, The Departed.
But while prosecutors painted Bulger as a homicidal maniac, residents in his working-class South Boston neighbourhood saw the killer in more romantic terms. To them, Bulger kept hard drugs out of the neighbourhood and gave out Thanksgiving turkeys to families in need.
One of the linchpins to Bulger’s long ride in organized crime were corrupt Boston FBI agents who protected him from the cops — and other gangsters. When Bulger disappeared in 1994, it was revealed that he acted as an FBI stool pigeon, ratting out other criminals.
Former Boston FBI agent John Connolly Jr. — Bulger’s handler when he was an informant — was sentenced to 10 years in prison after being convicted of tipping him off ahead of an indictment.
After receiving the heads-up, Bulger fled Boston with his longtime girlfriend and remained a fugitive for more than 16 years until he was captured in Santa Monica, Calif., in 2011.