Rating: 
Summary: An untold chapter
Review: I know a person who grew up in state child care who may have a father involved in this case without their knowledge, perhaps even Bulger or Flemmi during their alleged pornography days.In a predominantly Catholic area. Did Flemmi or Bulger have children as a result of these activities? How strong were their ties to the pornography business? Were Bulger and Flemmi tied in any way to the Boston Strangler killings which remains controversial?Around the time Bulger disappeared, everything hit the fan for this person. Loved ones around them were threatened and as they went to the FBI and Justice Department and State Police they were ignored. Before Bulger disappeared this person was approached by alleged Defense Investigative Service and FBI personnel at a business seminar. This was also prior to the release of Jonathan Harr's book, "A Civil Action" and when it was released Bulger disappeared as this person became a target of harassment in sync with escalating media accounts of the case. The person was connected as a state child to a reputed gangster in the area with alleged ties to John Connolly as a foster child without their knowledge. The person was very young and the particulars were arranged by combined private and public human services representatives.When this case opened up these same connections to the former child started acting bizarre, as if anxious that the whole thing was unravelling. It has been speculated that perhaps this person is a child of Whitey's without their knowledge and that state and federal authorities all had a role in the upbringing of the child and perhaps the child was bounced around and neglected and/or physically and emotionally abused in proportion to Bulger's cooperation. None of the media has raised the prospect that a confluence of state and federal representatives effectively managed the Bulger case.This book does highlight how information was frequently passed between DEA and the FBI in informal channels and why should we believe it was limited to only these 2 agencies? The state police and DEA are detailed as investigating Bulger here while Connolly had ties to the DEA and FBI. All one has to do is look in any major yellow pages and you wil find all sorts of escort services complete with corporate account capability to know that society and the government does not find these things objectionable. Bulger and Flemmi may have simply been regional coordinators for these services. What we do not know is how many services or gratutities were actually provided to government and/or political officials and whether their continued generosity or lack of it is what contributed to their prosperity or demise. Bulger and Flemmi may have been involved in providing services for many agencies and the FBI might be bearing the brunt of the heat. In this book nor anywhere else has anyone tried to interview former military associates of Bulger and Flemmi or investigated possibly military involvement in their activities, especially where McIntyre was concerned.Will Congress make inquiries of the Defense Investigative Service which overseas industrial security and background checks with the secret service (see James Bamford's 'The Puzzle Palace') or the DIA?
Rating: 
Summary: Good job, more info needed
Review: If you are unfamiliar with the case you will learn a lot from this book. From the experience of someone i know, a lot is being ignored or concealed in this case. Whitey's flight occurred around the time 'A Civil Action' was released by Jonathan Harr, about water pollution and a cancer epidemic in a city in Middlesex County,Massachusetts. The earliest signs of the epidemic occurred in the 1960s around the time Steve Flemmi was recruited by H Paul Rico. The water pollution controversy involved at some point the communities of Burlington, Winchester,Stoneham,Reading in addition to Woburn. Many thousands of people were potentially exposed to contaminated water. Middlesex County was a hub for space and military contracts, and Boston was a hub for military contracts as well. The Mclean-Mclaughlin wars began in the 1960s and according to Willie Fopiano the dividing line was Somerville and Charlestown.In 1963 John F. Kennedy was involved with NASA with Middlesex County (Woburn)a primary site.As the space budget had JFK's approval, miltary bases were cutting back.2 groups emerged:1)NASA for Woburn, and 2)Save our Shipyard(Boston Navy Yard).The Boston Navy Yard employed 3,000 and at least 10% of those lived in Middlesex County.The number of new jobs in Massachusetts to be created by the NASA site was roughly equal to or less the number of jobs at Boston Navy Yard but of different skillsets. A small group of workmen(according to local newspaper) transferred from Boston Navy Yard to Portsmouth Navy Yard. Not long after the USS Thresher (first fast attack nuclear sub)sank off Portsmouth,NH killing 129 sailors.A military officer testified before Congress that 20% of the backpressure relief valves had been installed backwards. So in 1963 the Thresher sank,JFK was shot and not long after the NASA site in Massachusetts collapsed, leaving millions of dollars in potential revenues and thousands of jobs abandoned. Given the military and space efforts in the area and cold war concerns with Vietnam raging, high national security in Massachusetts is a given. The Mclean-Mclaughlin wars began around the time of the events of 1963. Within Middlesex County reside or resided many of the characters noted in this case:Ring,Morris,Rico,Connolly,Limone,Mawn. In the area of the Boston Navy Yard: Flemmi, Bulger. In the collapse of the NASA deal,the chair of the Save our Shipyard committee, Cark Roessler, headed up the local Woburn Redevelopment Authority. Instead of NASA, Woburn and surrounding communities had industrial parks developed and local property taxes became among the lowest in the state. The wells in Woburn were not officially shut down until May,1979 and the controversy from the late 1950s until 1979 perpetuated.If they had been shutdown earlier, could this have been seen as a threat to either the NASA site or the industrial parks? Could the events in Massachusetts be summed up in Fletcher Knebel's book, 'Seven Days in May'?
Rating:
Summary: Can you tell me more?
Review: In the 1960s, a boy ('X') was shuffled around in multiple states, threatened with his possible murder by a man alleged to be the driver for one of the gangsters listed in this case.In the 1970s the boy was befriended by a caseworker from Jamaica Plain attached to a subcontractor for Massachusetts who arranged a social security number for the boy while bouncing the child around foster homes who repeatedly threatened and intimidated the boy over a period of years in the late 1970s. Whitey signed up in the mid-1970s.
In the 1980s, 'X'now a teen, lived in Middlesex county while another person going by the same name and same town popped up and began having his mail diverted to this new man's address. Over the next 10 years, this man appeared to follow the teen as he became a man, calling his workplaces and leaving his name, moving to the same towns, and even attending the same church wherever this boy went. Once 'X' was nearly arrested for being AWOL, as this man was in the army and had used his address.
In the 1990s 'X' had a local newspaper article detailing his search for his unknown father.Not long after the editors and reporting staff changed and claimed no knowledge of their predecessors. After that, the man lost his job, began getting getting threatening calls and to be followed by men in suitsas well as plainclothes. on at least one occasion one of the plainclothes men was referred to as "Mr. Ring". An older man moved into the apartment complex beside 'X' and across from a unit where a woman claiming to do " acccounting for the government" lived.This man had Tennessee license plates,carried a revolver and claimed to work construction. Weeks later the man was seen driving a phone company truck and moved out immediately afterwards.But not before being seen laying cables from his apartment to the one across the hall.Barry Mawn, formerly of a Tennessee FBI office,was newly assigned Boston SAC. 'X',attending Northeastern University,suddenly began having problems with some instructors who appeared to have an unknown hostility to 'X'.Northeastern is where Agent Morris and R.Robert Popeo had affiliation. In addition to having many.many problems with his phones,'X' began courting malice from a group of 10(10 is the number of alleged secret witnesses against Whitey)who used threats and intimidation and coercion to keep the man constantly in fear and blamed him for "what is going on.." in the Bulger case. Since all of this,the man has been destroyed completely financially and careerwise and questions have been raised if FBI personnel have been monitoring the man and interfering with employment and communications as well as assuring financial destruction(like a state trooper was by Bulger).The man went to the Justice Department to seek help and was blown off by the Justice Management division while taps and traces by local police were ineffective against the hostile calls.
Additionally, the man repeatedly got daily blank phone messages from a phone linked to MBNA offices in Florida, where Paul Rico lived and which corporation Louis Freeh later became a senior Vice President of.
Since ,Trooper Foley, the champion in this case, has retired, the Government Reform hearings are closed, and there seems to be no one who can hold the FBI accountable.
Rating:
Summary: Appendix B
Review: In the 1970s, Whitey signed on to the Top Echelon program. In the late 1970s a boy who was being overseen by former government officials,"Patsy" was assigned a female social worker by the name of Debbie Richards, a name mentioned in this book. Patsy was bounced around in state child care while William Bulger was in the Senate. In 1982 Patsy was befriended by "Tim",a man claiming to be a former "mental health counselor" undergoing a career change while at technical school. Just prior to meeting "Tim", another man appeared in Woburn,Mass ,where Patsy lived, going by the same name at a different address. "Patsy II" began creating problems for Patsy I, notably going AWOL in the army and much more while sending authorities after Patsy I.In 1992 Patsy was introduced by mutual friend to "John Doe" and a new friendship was formed. In 1995 Whitey fled after a local newspaper article in the Boston area did a story on Patsy' search for his unknown father and family roots.About the same time, "Tim" and "John Doe" began acting strange...
"Tim" began acting inexplicably hostile while "John Doe" began acting hostile and accusatory. Later,John Doe claimed to be taking notes and possibly tape recording staged conversations, in which Patsy was steered into making statements which could be taken out of context as if building a case for later use. Tim began doing the same.Tim hailed from the area where an FBI office existed in Merrimack Valley in Massachusetts. This whole situation appeared as if a boy tied to one of the principals in the Bulger case was systematically assigned monitors to keep tabs on him during the period Bulger and Flemmi operated and when Bulger fled and the situation unravelled, the boy,now a man,became a target of revulsion and blackballing. The boy might have had ties to Bulger's victims,adversaries, government agents, etc.
Even the Dept. of Justice, which Patsy corresponded with concerning the harassment, claimed no knowledge of the correspondence, citing its classified records section.
Rating:
Summary: The Incredible Journey
Review: In this case we see how a covert operation can be carried out and its participants dispensed with when the job is done. The government is shredding Flemmi's family apart, turning relatives against one another. It seems plausible a number of players now prevalent in the Bulger case are in fact long term plants held in abeyance until the time is right, such as with Martorano and Weeks. An acquaintance who has been totally destroyed since Bulger fled in 1995 has been approached by individuals claiming family ties to the upper tiers of local and national FBI managementwhile having been misled by the Justice Management Division of the Department of Justice. These approaches usually involve intimidation or extortion with the deliverers claiming FBI affiliation in the Merrimack Valley region of northern Massachusetts which includes a regional FBI office outside of the Boston office. Has the Defense Investigative Service and FBI teamed up to squeeze a child of Bulger or a close friend of Bulger's to keep Bulger away? Are Whitey Bulger and Flemmi's names being smeared to bringclosure to their roles in a covert operation?
Rating:
Summary: Mobius Strip
Review: Not long after Whitey Bulger signed on (1975), i know of a person who was raised in state child care and whose circumstances changed significantly in Massachusetts. One day while at work after high school, the person was told " see you in room 320" by a coworker whom this person never saw again. About a year later, some of the person's mail stopped coming at their apartment. A short time later, some military police came to arrest the individual claiming they were AWOL from the military. This person was not in the military. As the person found out, across town was another person with the exact same name. When calling organizations from which the person ("John Doe#1") had not gotten mail, those organizations had the second man's("John Doe #2") address. So John Doe #2 was using this person's address for military service and knew enough about the person to contact organizations that person did business with and have their mail forwarded to the second address. 5 yrs later, when William Weld is said to have headed the Justice Dept criminal investigation division (Mueller-FBI and Judge Mark Wolf as subordinates) and Mike Dukakis was governor.,John Doe#1 was working at a local company and received an incoming customer call for another coworker. In taking a message, it was John Doe #2 who said they lived a few towns over. Another 10 yrs passed and John Doe #1 attended a major Massachusetts church at the insistence of a longtime churchgoer there. As John #1 attended the church, this 'friend' checked up on them frequently to see which services they attended, as if tallying. About a year passed and one day they saw their name in the church newsletter as being in the hospital. When John #1 called the church, John #2 had joined at approximately the same time. John #1 called the hospital and John #2 was in room 320, the same room number given by a mysterious coworker 20 years earlier! What does this have to do with the Bulger case? As part of the Bulger-Flemmi arrangement, was this person setup as a patsy and was their reputation destroyed over a span of 20 years by this John Doe #2? John Doe #2 operated in the same county region as major players in this case. Hypothetically, if one of the major players in this case had a child, how would such a child be treated and would the child prepared as leverage should the fragile relationships in this case falter? Or could Bulger, an air force veteran, have been authorized by Lt Gen Lew Allen (Air Force), Director of NSA or Flemmi authorized by Marshall Carter? Or Were either affiliated with the Treasury Departments or Secret Service?
Rating: 
Summary: Leaves a lot out
Review: O'Neill & Lehr have a history with the Bulger brothers as does Jeremiah O'Sullivan. O'Neill & Lehr interviewed William Bulger about misconstrued dealings with 75 State Street. Whitey had an advocate in former Speaker of the House John McCormack, who believed Whitey could do quite well if given half a chance. Whitey also worked for a short time as a custodian at the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. William Bulger is heavily connected, having ties to Jackie Birmingham, Thomas Birmingham's father, Senator John Kerry who has indirect ties to the extended Kennedy clan and many other notables. In his book William Bulger details how thorough FBI scrutiny can be and it is likely the FBI has extensively monitored the entire family. What might have happened in this case is that drastic measures were taken to mediate the escalating violence of the Mclean-Mclaughlin wars which claimed many more lives than what Bulger and Flemmi have been accused of taking. It is unlikely that action against Connolly, Flemmi and Bulger will effect any long term solution, as the system their organization perpetuated has strong buy in at the highest levels of government. Going after these 3 is like a company firing an executive to quench the public thirst for vengeance, but the organization itself perpetuates with new players. There are many many more individuals such as Flemmi and Bulger in the area and which have not gotten anywhere near the heat these guys have. They have been listed in local newspapers.And there has been a much stronger link between organized crime and law enforcement than one might suspect. Organized crime may actually help law enforcement by breaking down geographical regions into empires of control and holding those organized crime groups accountable, thus minimizing random crime.
Rating:
Summary: Into the shredder
Review: Speaking as a recent Boston transplant amd a fan of O.C. stories this book is awesome. Boston, for those who are unfamiliar, really is a "little" big city....For me its hard to imagine that the politics and crime that is closely linked in this book could happen as recently as it did. As a story it is a compeling read. This book may not be as action filled as other Mafia books, however, as a atory of real life corruption and journalistic detail it can hardly be surpassed.
Rating:
Summary: Rock and a hard place
Review: There are many troubling issues in this case.Bulger fled after it was leaked to the Boston Globe that Bulger is an informant- who leaked it? Has the Justice Dept/FBI made arrangements for replacements in its Top Echelon program to perpetuate the lucrative arrangement with Bulger,Flemmi and Mercurio? Were Flemmi,Bulger and Mercurio targeted as kids to become informants through long term monitoring and manipulation? Was Bulger made by the government? In his brother's book, William Bulger describes Whitey as quite intelligent but coming from a tough neighborhood and who frequently received harsh beatings by the Boston Police.It is said that when agencies such as the CIA recruit, they will cultivate a recruit and orchestrate events such that the recruit will have no choice but to relent and work for it. Some tactics employed are said to be: spreading rumors that cast doubt on the character of the target such that employment opportunities are few,if any..also, harassment of the friends and family members of the target or buying off family and friends to no longer have contact with the target thus controlling the relationships that person has. How did Flemmi 'recruit' Bulger? What does the handling of informants by the federal government say to all current and future informants? What is the government saying to its own agents in the manner it is treating the Boston FBI agents? Billy Breen in his book describes how after a time an informant can identify with the people under investigation, and even become one of them.But Breen also describes how the power of the govt will use informants in dangerous operations but then use things like IRS audits and the like to harass or control them.This case is so difficult to sort and to tell who is being truthful or not. Were Flemmi and Bulger called in to help thwart the bloodshed ongoing in the Mclean-Mclaughlin wars? How many people did Bulger and Flemmi help? How many crimes were prevented by the cooperation of Flemmi and Bulger? How many agents in the government were helped by Bulger and Flemmi? What were the members of rival gangs into? Did Flemmi and Bulger try to get out but were forced to stay in? Were Flemmi and Bulger drafted into it while military personnel? Related title: While the Music Lasts-- William Bulger, Speaker of the House- Tip O'Neill w/William Novak, The Godson-Willie Fopiano,Wiseguy- William Joseph Breen
Rating:
Summary: A must read!
Review: This is a fantastic book. I knew nothing of the true story, so I found every twist and turn very entertaining. It is well written and doesn't get too bogged down in gritty detail. I read about 2-3 books a month and this ranks near the top of ones I've read in 2003. The story is very interesting, but the strength is in it's characters. Whitey, Flemmi, Connolly, etc. all have their moments. I found myself many times thinking to myself, I cannot believe this. But it's true, scary in fact. It has all the elements of a great movie, and I'm surprised that it hasn't been adapted already. It has Scorsese all over it. The authors give you a good taste of life in South Boston and of course expose a criminal decade or two that was aided by the FBI. This isn't conspiracy theory stuff, btw. Agents in the FBI protected their star informants, giving them tips, covering up information, that allowed them to stay on the street and supposedly bust others. Highly recommended.
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