The obsession with the details of Bulger’s arrest is understandable. But the bigger picture is this: there has been a carefully constructed narrative, one of damage control for the FBI and Justice Department, which is now at risk. It was a narrative that held that Whitey Bulger was protected by a rogue FBI agent, John Connolly, and a rogue FBI supervisor, John Morris, both of whom had been dealt with: Connolly was given a life sentence and sent off to prison, and Morris was given immunity and sent off to disgrace.
But there are other FBI agents and supervisors who have been accused in open court by Bulger’s cohorts, Stevie Flemmi and Kevin Weeks, of accepting cash and gifts from Bulger, or looking the other way when they had a chance to lock him up. Those allegations supposedly needed corroboration before the Justice Department was prepared to seek more charges against FBI agents. Bulger might be that corroboration.
The FBI’s reputation was always under a cloud as long as Bulger was on the lam. And so his arrest in Santa Monica — so much for all those sightings in London, Italy, and other exotic locales — was a good day for the FBI. But it remains to be seen whether this turns out to be a good year for the FBI.
Honest cops who built cases against Bulger only to see them ruined or made more arduous by a duplicitous FBI say the FBI cannot control where the investigation goes now.
“The real issue here is now that Bulger is in custody, who gets access to him,’’ said Tom Foley, the retired State Police commander who led the investigation that resulted in the 1995 racketeering indictment against Bulger.
