Free Betrayal: Whitey Bulger and the FBI Agent Who Fought to Bring Him Down by Jon Land, Robert Fitzpatrick Page A

report to my secretary, outlining the criticism and points I needed to make about Bulger’s lack of cooperation and lack of performance, particularly in the drug area. I also knew that because of Bulger’s status as a Top Echelon informant, my assessment was going to ruffle more than a few feathers at headquarters. Heads might even roll, though not mine.
    My two-page report had Sarhatt’s complete attention, and when he finished reading, I braced myself. But his response caught me off guard.
    “Well,” he said. “What are we going to do?”
    “We keep it simple and just tell Washington that we are closing Bulger.”
    I don’t remember Larry responding at all to my statement, which I took as him affirming my plan. As Special Agent in Charge, Larry was the one dealing with FBIHQ and I wasn’t privy to any specific immediate outcome or resolution. There were other cases in progress in the Boston office that took me away from Bulger, who was far from my only pressing concern. At that time, we were doing undercover operations to expose organized crime penetration of the Boston stock market, as well as a corruption case against a Boston politician. Ironically, that politician, and a main target in the corruption case, was none other than Whitey Bulger’s brother Billy, president of the Masschusetts State Senate.
    A month later, during one of our annual FBI inspections, Connolly made overtures about bringing me to see Billy Bulger in his sumptuously reconditioned State House office. Connolly made a show of introducing me to “the power,” as he described it. I found it strange that Connolly, as an FBI special agent, even knew these people. He nonchalantly reminded me that he was a Southie boy, born and raised around the Bulger family, and that he was a good friend of theirs. He may have even told me his ice cream story again. As part of this annual inspection of investigative procedures from top to bottom, it was common practice to introduce the inspectors and brass to “important” people in Boston, whose input would likely be included in the assessment.
    Connolly’s story didn’t hold. I knew he was bringing me to see Billy Bulger as the guy who posed a threat to his brother and, perhaps, to him by connection. Or, maybe, I thought, Billy had requested the meeting so that he could get a look at his nemesis. If I’d had any questions about where Connolly’s loyalties lay before, I didn’t now. His taking me to Billy Bulger carried with it an implicit threat in the form of the political connections I’d be up against if I continued to press my case against Whitey. There was no doubt in my mind that Billy had already been briefed on the fact that I was the guy who wanted to close his brother as an informant, subjecting Whitey to arrest by O’Donovan’s State Police and Billy to endless public embarrassment. Sure, I was an Irishman, but I was also an outsider sent up from Washington with no clear picture of the lay of the land and no allegiance to Connolly’s ilk.
    Billy couldn’t have been warmer or more gregarious. His new office smelled of the leather furniture and freshly stained floor. He sat behind a gargantuan desk and his small stature made it look even bigger. He made it a point to tell his assistant he was in an important meeting and to hold all his calls. He said that looking at me, not Connolly. Again, body language was everything.
    He didn’t look like his brother, didn’t sound like his brother. But when I shook his hand I had the same feeling as when I’d first met Whitey. They were just different sides of the same coin and I caged the rest of the meeting in a framework that Billy, too, was a con man used to getting what he wanted and taking whatever action was necessary when he didn’t. He wasn’t accustomed to being told no either, and was even less accustomed to anyone standing up to him. Shaking hands was just part of his con.
    The specter of that arrogance never once rose in our carefully