Posted on 09/07/2001 5:19:55 PM PDT by ninonitti
A House committee vowing to unravel ``one of the greatest failures of federal law enforcement'' in American history issued a sweeping subpoena yesterday for decades worth of FBI memos that might explain why the Bulger gang was not prosecuted until 1995.
``We need these documents to find out what happened in Boston,'' said James Wilson, chief legal counsel for the House Government Reform Committee.
But the Department of Justice has already refused to hand over the ``deliberative documents'' under a new blanket policy against sharing with Congress internal paperwork related to any criminal investigation.
Attorney General John Ashcroft is slated to go before the committee Thursday to defend the policy begun by the Bush administration.
Massachusetts Congressman William Delahunt (D-Quincy), who has been asked by reform committee Chairman Dan Burton (R-Indiana) to assist with the probe, said citizens deserve to know how federal agents decided to forge notorious alliances with hit men and gangsters.
``Now it can be told,'' Delahunt said yesterday. ``We need to know why these decisions were made and how they were made.''
Members plan to hold a round of hearings later this month on allegations that FBI agents and the Massachusetts U.S. Attorney's Office helped Boston hit man Joseph Barboza avoid the death penalty in California in 1971.
Yesterday, the committee disclosed that its sources say Theodore Sharliss, a Lynn ex-con and former pal of Barboza's who helped set up his assassination in San Francisco in 1976, was himself an FBI informant.
Sixteen years later, Sharliss implicated hit man J.R. Russo as the triggerman who shot Barboza, 43, who died in a hail of bullets after having lunch with Sharliss.
Goverment deliberations about Sharliss, who entered the witness protection program, ``may also shed light on whether the federal goverment was aware that Barboza was to be killed prior to the murder taking place, and whether they were aware that their own informant was plotting to set Barboza up,'' the committee said in a statement.
In a detailed list of reasons for hunting down documents related to federal informants and the New England Mafia, the committee raises a litany of questions covering four decades of Hub federal law enforcement.
On James ``Whitey'' Bulger, who is under indictment for 19 murders, the committee asks, ``Notwithstanding extensive evidence readily available to federal law enforcement authorities, why was Bulger not prosecuted for his many crimes prior to 1995?''
The committee asks the same question of Stephen ``The Rifleman'' Flemmi, who faces trial next year on 10 counts of murder, but the committee statement credits him with ``perhaps well over 20'' murders.
On indicted ex-FBI agent and Bulger handler John Connolly, the committee wants to know if Justice Department officials considered indicting him before 1999.
On former FBI supervisor John Morris who admitted taking money from the Bulger gang, ``Did the Justice Department consider indicting him and, if so, why did it refrain from indicting him?''
On Barboza, the committee wants to know why the government helped defend the hit man in Santa Rosa where he killed a man while in the witness protection program, and why the FBI supported his false testimony in Boston in the 1965 Edward ``Teddy'' Deegan murder case that sent four innocent men to prison.
On hit man Jimmy ``The Bear'' Flemmi, the committee recounts previously released FBI memos showing the government knew he had killed several men, including Deegan, but did not prosecute him.
``Why was Flemmi not prosecuted, and why did the FBI allow Joseph Salvati to spend 30 years in prison for a crime that was committed by two - and possibly three - of their informants?'' the committee asks.
On former FBI agent H. Paul Rico, who handled Barboza, the committee wonders if DOJ ever considered action against Rico when a Rhode Island judge ruled he suborned perjury in another murder case.
On former New England Godfather Raymond Patriarca, the committee questions whether officials in DOJ knew about an illegal bug placed in Mafia headquarters in the early 1960s.
On Mob boss Frank Salemme, the committee wants to know why Salemme was prosecuted for the 1968 bombing of Hub attorney John Fitzgerald's car but his partner Stephen Flemmi was not.
Delahunt must be a fan of Ed Wood's horrible "Plan 9 From Outer Space". I wonder if he cross-dresses like Mr. Wood?
Ah, the old Janet Reno tactic. Great. A wonderful way to continue institutional coverups and Bush/Ashcroft appear to be "equal opportunity" holders back of information.
Just great.
I was wracking my brain to try to remember the name of the guy they kept in jail for 30 years. I hadn't noticed that paragraph. Joseph Salvati, that's right! What was the name of the FBI guy who was sarcastic when he was asked about the case in hearings?
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