The dead body of a potential witness, who had hoped to
testify about how mob boss James "Whitey" Bulger forced him at
gunpoint to sell a liquor store, was found in a suburb of Boston, authorities
said on Thursday.
Stephen Rakes, who once sued the FBI for failing to protect
him from one of Bulger's extortion schemes, was found on Wednesday afternoon in
Lincoln, Massachusetts, about 16 miles (26 km) northwest of Boston, according
to the Middlesex Country district attorney's office.
There were no obvious signs of trauma, and the medical
examiner is conducting an autopsy to determine the cause of death, the district
attorney's office said. No wallet was found on Rakes' body, an attorney for
Rakes' ex-wife told reporters.
While authorities investigated his death, prosecutors at the
courthouse in Boston called on their major witness, longtime Bulger lieutenant
Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi, to testify about the murders he says
he and Bulger carried out.
Rakes, 59, was among the many extortion victims of Bulger's
feared "Winter Hill" gang who were due to take the witness stand in
the mob boss's trial. Authorities charge Bulger with committing or ordering 19
murders in the 1970s and 1980s.
Rakes, nicknamed "Stippo," once owned Stippo's
Liquor Mart in South Boston, which prosecutors charge Bulger's gang took over
in a 1984 shakedown. He was on the government's list of witnesses but had not
yet taken the stand.
His ex-wife, Julie Dammers Rakes, learned of his death on
Thursday morning and reacted with "surprise and shock," said her
attorney, Anthony Cardinale.
Cardinale told reporters at Boston's waterfront courthouse
that he did not believe Rakes' death was linked to the trial.
"I seriously doubt that this has anything to do with
any part of the case," he said.
Bulger's gang bought the store for about $65,000 cash,
forcing Rakes to take that sum at gunpoint in his home in front of his
toddlers, prosecutors charge. They said the gang used the store as a front to
launder money from illegal activities.
Like the gangsters, Rakes grew up in working class south
Boston. After years of complaining about Bulger and his associates, Rakes had
attended the trial almost every day and hoped to testify against the mob boss.
In 2002 Rakes sued the US government for failing to protect
him from Bulger's gang, which operated with impunity in Boston due to Bulger's
relationship with the FBI. A federal judge dismissed the suit.
Bulger, 83, faces the possibility of life in prison if
convicted of charges related to the 19 murders including racketeering,
extortion and drug dealing.
He has pleaded not guilty to all charges, though his lawyer
admitted that Bulger was a drug dealer, extortionist and loan shark,
essentially an "organized criminal."
Steve Davis, a friend of Rakes and a brother of one of
Bulger's alleged murder victims, said Rakes did not feel at any time during the
trial that his life was in danger. "He was comforted knowing Bulger was
already behind bars," he told reporters outside the courtroom.
News of Rakes' death came the day prosecutors called one of
the government's top witnesses, Flemmi, who is serving a life sentence for his
role in many of the murders of which Bulger is accused.
As Flemmi was brought in to testify, he and Bulger saw each
other for the first time since the week before Christmas in 1994. He told the
court he had met with Bulger almost daily for two decades starting in 1974, and
that their relationship was "strictly criminal".
Flemmi, who testified only briefly before court wrapped up
for the day, said he and Bulger had met with a corrupt FBI agent "hundreds
of times" to trade information.
Bulger has adamantly denied being an FBI informant,
insisting that he paid then-agent John Connolly for tips but offered none of
his own. Connolly is serving a 40-year prison sentence on racketeering and
murder convictions.
The trial brings back a dark period for Boston's FBI office,
when Bulger and Flemmi were listed as informants but also were given tips by
corrupt agents who helped them escape capture and root out "rats"
within their ranks.
Bulger fled in 1994 after a tip from a corrupt FBI agent
that arrest was imminent. He was finally captured in Santa Monica, California,
in 2011 after 16 years on the lam.
His story inspired the 2006 Academy Award-winning film The
Departed, in which Jack Nicholson played a character loosely based on Bulger.
The government is close to finishing its case and earlier
this week advised US district judge Denise Casper that it could wrap up by
Tuesday.
No comments:
Post a Comment