{"id":62600,"date":"2011-12-28T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-12-28T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/former-fbi-agent-tells-of-corruption-in-going-after-whitey-bulger-at-uri-forensic-seminar\/"},"modified":"2011-12-28T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-12-28T00:00:00","slug":"former-fbi-agent-tells-of-corruption-in-going-after-whitey-bulger-at-uri-forensic-seminar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2011\/12\/former-fbi-agent-tells-of-corruption-in-going-after-whitey-bulger-at-uri-forensic-seminar\/","title":{"rendered":"Former FBI agent tells of corruption in going after \u2018Whitey\u2019 Bulger at 溏心vlog免费B站 forensic seminar"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tDetails scary, unsettling meeting with mobster<\/p>\n


\n\tKINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 December 28, 2011 \u2013 When Federal Bureau of Investigation agent Robert Fitzpatrick went to the bureau\u2019s Boston office in 1980, he wasted no time setting up a meeting with bureau informant James \u201cWhitey\u201d Bulger.<\/p>\n


\nDespite being told by fellow FBI agents that \u201cBulger was a great guy\u201d and that \u201cyou\u2019ll love him,\u201d Fitzpatrick had heard too many stories about FBI corruption in dealing with Bulger and the mobster\u2019s alleged links to numerous murders.<\/p>\n


\nAs he recently told an audience of students, faculty and community members at the 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s Forensic Science Seminar, he was ordered to clean up the Boston operation and he decided to dig into its relationship with Bulger.<\/p>\n


\n\tAfter 16 years on the run, Bulger was arrested in California in June 2011 and charged with 19 murders. Fitzpatrick captivated the audience with his tales of deceit, murder and the dangers of going after one of Boston\u2019s most protected mobsters.<\/p>\n


\n \tFitzpatrick retired from the FBI after a long and distinguished career that also included investigations into the Ku Klux Klan bombings in Mississippi, the Martin Luther King Jr. assassination and the ABSCAM bribery case that led to the arrest of several congressmen. Fitzpatrick detailed his Boston odyssey in a book co-authored with Jon Land, Betrayal, Whitey Bulger and the FBI Agent Who Fought to Bring Him Down.<\/p>\n


\n\tFitzpatrick\u2019s reward for his excellent work was a promotion to assistant special agent in charge of the Boston office.<\/p>\n


\n\tWhen he arrived in Boston, Fitzpatrick sat down with Massachusetts State Police Lt. Col. John R. O\u2019Donovan, whom the agent had met while running a class at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va. During the class, O\u2019Donovan told him the Boston FBI office was corrupt. Fitzpatrick admitted he was leery of talking with him a second time.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI was afraid of what he might tell me,\u201d said Fitzpatrick. \u201cHe said the FBI office was not only doing nothing, but it was protecting Bulger.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tAfter going through numerous files on Bulger, including those from the Massachusetts State Police, Boston Police and the federal Drug Enforcement Agency, Fitzpatrick \u201clearned there were a whole bunch of bad things going on. My guys were telling me that the Mass. State Police were just jealous that we had such a good informant. I found out Bulger was being protected at all levels of the FBI. I had to find out whether we should keep protecting him.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tSo with another agent, Fitzpatrick drove out to Bulger\u2019s home. On the drive, the other agent told him \u201cBulger is a great guy.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWhen he (Bulger) answers the door, I put my paw out, but he doesn\u2019t shake it,\u201d Fitzpatrick said. \u201cI go into the condo and everything is dark, but he is wearing sunglasses.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tFitzpatrick, a trained profiler, said he became more uncomfortable because he couldn\u2019t see Bulger\u2019s eyes. \u201cPart of profiling is looking at the guy and tuning into him.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tWhile FBI agents are trained to treat informants as \u201carms-length friends,\u201d Fitzpatrick quickly came to the conclusion that Bulger was neither a friend nor a good guy.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cIn the kitchen, he starts telling me what a tough guy he is, and that he was a (prison) enforcer in Alcatraz and Leavenworth,\u201d said Fitzpatrick. \u201cThat\u2019s great, but what are you doing for me (the FBI)?\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tBulger bristled at the question and then Fitzpatrick noticed another FBI agent in a dark portion of the room. \u201cHe\u2019s not supposed to be there,\u201d Fitzpatrick said. \u201cThe agent says, \u2018Hi Bob,\u2019 and then I see a smirk on Bulger\u2019s face.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cThe first thing that comes to my mind is that this is a setup, and I decide to leave,\u201d Fitzpatrick said.<\/p>\n


\n\tWalking back to the car to meet the agent waiting for him, Fitzpatrick made a decision. \u201cI am going to close this guy down. I don\u2019t like him. I don\u2019t trust him.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tBut just as he entered the car, the other agent said, \u201cIsn\u2019t he (Bulger) great?\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tSeething, Fitzpatrick told the agent that he was going to shut Bulger down as an informant. The other agent told him he couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n


\n\tFrom that first visit with Bulger, Fitzpatrick spent six years battling the Irish crime syndicate allegedly headed by Bulger and he also arrested a Mafia crime boss. But as he confronted dirty FBI agents, a culture that fought against embarrassing the FBI and the murder of mob informants, Fitzpatrick saw the end of his bureau career coming. He never did succeed in closing down Whitey Bulger.<\/p>\n


\n\tHowever, 10 years after his quest began, The Boston Globe began an investigative series on FBI corruption and Bulger\u2019s alleged role in the deaths of numerous informants. Fitzpatrick said \u201ceven then the bureau did not close him (Bulger).\u201d <\/p>\n


\n\tAfter leaving the FBI, Fitzpatrick became a private investigator, and ironically is now a senior expert for the bureau on the Bulger case, as well as profiling, abnormal criminal psychology, terrorism, hostage negotiation, cartel drug trafficking and organized crime.<\/p>\n


\n\tVictoria Antonelli, an intern in the 溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Communications & Marketing and a junior journalism major, contributed to this story.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Details scary, unsettling meeting with mobster KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 December 28, 2011 \u2013 When Federal Bureau of Investigation agent Robert Fitzpatrick went to the bureau\u2019s Boston office in 1980, he wasted no time setting up a meeting with bureau informant James \u201cWhitey\u201d Bulger. Despite being told by fellow FBI agents that \u201cBulger was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62600\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}