An appellate court in Boston has rejected James "Whitey" Bulger's request for a new trial. The forer mobster was convicted of participating in 11 murders during 1970's and 80's,
On Friday, the 1st US Circuit Court of Appeals denied the argument of Bulger's right to a fair trial when a judge blocked him from attesting about his claim that he received immunity for the crimes he committed. The Boston Herald reported the purported immunity was made by Assistant US Attorney Jeremiah O' Sullivan, a federal prosecutor who died in 2009.
The court of appeals concluded that "Bulger received a fair trial and none of the complained-of-conduct on the government or the court's part warrant reversal of his conviction". Yahoo News reported that the ruling isn't the end for the former mobster, who was once named as one of the country's most wanted fugitives. Bulger has the right to appeal the ruling of the panel by asking for a hearing before the full court of six justices. Hank Brennan, the lawyer representing Bulger, did not comment on the matter.
In 2013, Bulger disputed the government's argument that he was a longtime FBI informant who gave the agency information on his gang's main rival, the New England Mafia. According to Daily Mail, he said Attorney O' Sullivan had given him immunity during the 80's in return for protection of the lawyer's life from the gangsters he prosecuted. However, the court found that O' Sullivan did not have the power to award such immunity.
James "Whitey" Bulger, 86, moved away from Boston in 1994 after receiving a tip from an FBI agent that he was about to be indicted. He was a fugitive for more than a decade and was finally captured with his longtime girlfriend in 2001 in Santa Monica, California.
At the time of his reign as a crime head in Boston, Bulger carried out dozens of murders that included the strangulation of his sidekick's own stepdaughter, Deborah Hussey.
