Key government witness in racketeering trial against purported gang leader exposes long life of criminal acts and betrayal
BOSTON –Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi says he loved his girlfriend, Debra Davis. But because she knew too much about his criminal gang's ties to the FBI, he stood by and watched as James "Whitey" Bulger strangled her in 1981.
"That was the plan," Flemmi said in his second day of testimony at Bulger's 32-count racketeering trial. As usual, it was Bulger's plan, and his associates agreed to help carry it out.
Flemmi left jurors with the wrenching image of Bulger grabbing Davis "by the throat" and killing her in a South Boston basement as a wild week in the trial came to a close and prosecutors prepared to rest their case.
For nearly four hours on the witness stand, Flemmi described routine practices from his 40-year criminal career, including two decades as Bulger's right hand man. Killing enemies for revenge or to eliminate threats was standard procedure, as was maintaining a give-and-take relationship with authorities. Flemmi testified Thursday that Bulger had also been a long-time FBI informant.
"It's always good to have sources" in law enforcement, Flemmi said. Without them, "you couldn't possibly survive, as open as we were and with all the notoriety we had."
Flemmi pleaded guilty to 10 killings, extortion, drug distribution and other charges. He is serving a life sentence and avoided the death penalty by agreeing to testify against Bulger.
On the stand, the 79-year-old Flemmi looked like a seasoned football coach with glasses, brown t-shirt and his trademark dark green windbreaker jacket. He appeared rested,alert with no visible signs of the violent life he's lived.
His tone was matter-of-fact, even as he recalled his deep involvement in a 1960s gang war that left some 60 individuals dead. He flatly told, for instance, how former gang warrior James O'Toole had reached out to Flemmi's gang in an attempt to make peace. O'Toole had once tried to kill Flemmi's brother, Vincent, and Flemmi wasn't about to forget it.
"He wanted to be forgiven," Flemmi said of O'Toole. "I told [John Martorano] to kill him."
Flemmi's testimony came on the heels of revelations that a potential government witness, Stephen "Stippo" Rakes, turned up dead this week on a roadside some 30 miles from his Quincy home. His body showed no signs of trauma, but state police are investigating and final autopsy results from the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner are expected to take several weeks.
Unlike Rakes, who wasn't certain to testify, Flemmi has several crucial roles to play before the government rests its case next week, according to legal experts who're following the trial.
For starters, he's corroborating and expanding on testimony from Martorano, an admitted killer who addressed jurors in June. In the 1975 murder of bar owner Eddie Connors, for instance, Martorano said Flemmi and Bulger had carried guns to a phone booth where Connors had arranged to take a call. When they came back to the car, Bulger said, "he's gone."
Flemmi fleshed out what happened at the booth. He said he and Bulger put multiple bullets in Connors, who'd been bragging about his role in a prior murder by Bulger's Winter Hill gang and called unwanted attention to Bulger's Winter Hill gang and its criminal activity. In the Connors hit, Bulger emptied both a pistol and a double-barreled shotgun, Flemmi said.
Flemmi is also positioned like no one else to tie together for jurors everything they've heard over six weeks about murder, extortion, money laundering and firearms violations. He can leave them with vivid accounts to take into deliberations, according to Margaret McLean, a former Massachusetts assistant district attorney and now a law professor at Boston College.
"They've saved their strongest witness for last," McLean said. "This guy is their finale… He has the knowledge of an expert … He knows people, he knows dates. That makes him believable."
Flemmi's testimony contradicted points Bulger's attorneys have been keen to make in the trial, now in its 25th day. They insist he was never an FBI informant; Flemmi says they both were. Bulger's attorneys have also said that Flemmi killed Davis.
But Flemmi testified that he agreed to have her killed because he'd "inadvertently" told her about meetings with corrupt FBI agent John Connolly, and Bulger wanted her dead. Flemmi didn't kill her himself, he said, because "I couldn't do it."
Davis' murder "affected me," Flemmi said, "and it's going to affect me 'til the day I die."
Experts say it was no coincidence that details of Davis' death came 10 minutes before court wrapped for the week.
The government wants to send the jury home for the weekend with a visual in their minds," McLean said. "That [focus on Davis] was timed. That was orchestrated because that's one of the keys: Bulger is insisting he never killed Debra Davis."
The defense is expected to start soliciting testimony from 30 witnesses as soon as next week. It's uncertain whether Bulger will testify. The trial is expected to last into late August.
Contributing: Gary Strauss in McLean, Va.; the Associated Press
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