Rating: 
Summary: Can i have more please?
Review: This is a study in how informants are made and maintained... Here is an example of how one man, probably linked to this case without his knowledge, was approached..The man worked for a government contractor and shortly after weird things began happening. He suddenly lost a good civilian job,began getting routine IRS audits, had phone and email problems, and was approached by a number of women who befriended the man, rejected overtures for dates, then reported back the man was gay--falsely. Friends speculated NSA,the CIA or FBI was involved because all of these have a role in this Bulger case. Then the man became unemployable and had evidence of continuous bank record monitoring. When new 'friends' appeared and the man began noting checks on money being used to help them, those bank records suddenly became tampered with and the records unavailable, as if referring to a classified employee.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Story but a Tad Slow
Review: This is an intriguing tale of corruption and total failure by law enforcement to monitor its informant activities. The story goes into great detail regarding the FBI's truly unholy alliance with Boston's under world crime figures and at times this detail seemingly slows the story down. All in all this is a great story that will leave you scratching your wondering how the heck could such a collapse of the justice system occur?
Rating:
Summary: Incredibly Current and Continuously Engaging
Review: This is by far one of the best books I have ever read. Lehr and o'Neill relate the amazing story of the twisted connection between the Bulger family, the community of Boston and "Southie", and the Boston office of the FBI. I could not put this book down. After reading a few chapters I was desparate for news on the Bulger case, and the story continues to unfold to this day. Whitey Bulger is still at large and on the FBI's Top Ten Most Wanted list, FBI agent John Connolly was recently sentenced for his crimes, and Billy Bulger was, until this past August, President of the University of Massachusetts system. Connections between Billy and Whitey are still being drawn by government agencies and prosecutors and refuted by Billy and the FBI. Read this book and you will be swept with a new hobby: keeping yourself aware of new developments in the Bulger case. You don't have to be a Bostonian to appreciate this story. And it's all true!
Rating:
Summary: Can i have more please?
Review: Written by two veteran Boston reporters, "Black Mass" is a story of crime and corruption that turns into a gripping tale of good intentions gone awry. Taking place on the mean streets of South Boston, a mere twenty miles or so from where I've lived my whole life, this book tells of a violent intersection of cultures: the tribal culture of Irish America, the often-closed culture of the Federal Bureau of investigation, and the violent culture of organized crime. And unfortunately, it's all true. At bottom, "Black Mass" presents a haze of divided allegiances and moral ambiguity, that may well shake your faith in our government-appointed protectors. Looming large over the whole story is the imposing figure of James J. Bulger Jr., or "Whitey Buljah" as he is more commonly known around these parts. Long before the Bloods and Crips were household names, Bulger emerged from a culture where street gangs were omnipresent and career options for adults were mostly restricted to the Armed services, politics, factory and police work, or crime. Unfortunately, Whitey Bulger never quite outgrew the gang culture of his youth, and he proved exceedingly skilled at the crime profession. As intelligent as he was soulless, Bulger graduated from street enforcer to bank robber (with a stint in Alactraz along the way) to organized crime kingpin with his hand in all things illegal as the head of the vicious Winter Hill Gang. Along for the ride was the aptly nicknamed Stevie "The Rifleman" Flemmi, a barbaric killer whose Mafia connections made him a perfect stoolie in the Boston FBI's war against the Mafia. It was in 1975 against the backdrop of the FBI's battle with La Cosa Nostra that FBI agent John Connolly, who emerged from the same projects as Bulger, crafted a plan to bring Whitey and Flemmi into the Bureau's fold as informants. It sounded like a sweet deal for all those concerned: Bulger and Flemmi got to take out the Winter Hill Gang's competition, and the FBI got a well-placed ally in its effort to bring down Boston's ruling Angiulo family. Unfortunately, it didn't quite work out that way. The FBI did manage to bring down the Angiulos, due largely to its now-legendary wiretapping operation at Gennaro Angiulo's headquarters, but Bulger and Flemmi remained connected to the FBI long after they had outlived their usefulness. In fact, as this book makes clear, the two gangsters greatly enlarged their stature in Boston's underworld during the 1980's, and they did it with the full knowledge and even collaboration of the FBI. As O'Neill and Lehr explain, the shared South Boston origins of Bulger and Connolly, which seemed like such an asset back in 1975 when Connolly was recruiting Whitey, ultimately became a liability. Coming from a tight-knit, tribal culture like Southie, Connolly couldn't exactly be counted on to maintain his objectivity in dealing with Bulger, whom he even came to refer to as a "good bad guy." An even deeper problem, though, was John Connolly himself: a smooth-talking lady's man who liked the high life a bit too much, Connolly eventually became virtually indistinguishable from his prized informants. Hanging out with Bulger and Flemmi and accepting their gifts, Connolly didn't just look the other way while Bulger, Flemmi & Co. enlarged their empire and the bodies piled up; he was an active assistant in their operation. Although they were frequently pursued by the Massachusetts State Police, local detectives, and even the DEA, the two gangsters were virtually untouchable. Perhaps even worse, O'Neill and Lehr make it clear that the FBI's mishandling of its two prized informants went beyond John Connolly's corruption to encompass a massive institutional failure. With Connolly corrupted and a series of supervisors compromised, the Bureau's guidelines for oversight of informants became essentially null and void. Falsified reports that exaggerated Bulger and Flemmi's usefulness while understating their criminal activities became the norm, and even those in other law enforcement agencies who suspected something amiss had their efforts blocked. One painful lesson to be drawn from this book is that the law is only as strong as those who enforce it. When those charged with stopping crime drift to the other side, where do we turn then?
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