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WASHINGTON – Long before the infamous Boston gangster James "Whitey" Bulger was killed in a federal prison In West Virginia, lawmakers, lawyers and even prison guards had sounded the alarm about the dangerous conditions in the area. However, there is no public indication that federal penitentiary officials have taken steps to address security concerns, even though the murder of Bulger marks the third at the scene of the incident in the past six months.
An independent government commission discovered that the Hazelton US penitentiary, located near the border between the state and Maryland at Bruceton Mills, was overcrowded for years. Prisoners have repeatedly expressed concerns about their safety in the high security prison, which houses 1,270 detainees. A report released in 2016 by the District Correctional Services Council of the District of Columbia indicates that prisoners have warned officials: "Inmates can lose their lives quickly here."
According to press reports, the penitentiary received a sinister nickname among the detainees: "Misery Mountain".
USP Hazelton in Bruceton Mills, West Virginia.
CBS News
In April, Ian Thorne, aged 48, was killed during an altercation with a fellow inmate. In September, Demario Porter was also killed in another fight with a fellow inmate.
Forensic records, surveillance reports and newspaper articles detail numerous violent incidents in recent years. In 2016, an inmate was charged with murder after prosecutors declared that he had strangled another prisoner to death during a fight. In February 2015, an inmate stabbed another prisoner with a homemade weapon during a fight, according to court documents. Another detainee was sentenced to an extended sentence in May for assaulting a fellow prisoner and possessing a deadly weapon.
"There are a multitude of federal prisons that do not have such a rate of homicide," said Cameron Lindsay, a former federal prison guard who now works as a prison security consultant.
The Federal Prison Office has not responded to requests for comments on safety issues at the Hazelton USP.
Last week, five congressional members wrote to Attorney General Jeff Sessions about what they called a "continuing dangerous understaff" in federal prisons in West Virginia and Pennsylvania and said they were alarmed by the reports. died at the USP Hazelton.
Justice Department spokesman Wyn Hornbuckle said the GM was "aware of the concerns expressed in the letter" and that he would respond to members of Congress.
Eleanor Holmes Norton, a delegate from the District of Columbia in the House of Commons, asked the Inspector General of the Department of Justice to initiate an investigation into the conditions of detention at USP Hazelton, citing the deaths of Thorne and Porter. Holmes Norton said she had also heard about the "brutal treatment" of inmates in the prison and feared that the incidents "would be indicative of bigger and more persistent problems in the institution."
In a statement on Tuesday, Norton said Bulger's death "highlights the news of a culture of violence in Hazelton."
Norton's office stated that she had not received a response to her previous letter and that John Lavinsky, spokeswoman for the Inspector General, had declined to comment.
Bulger, 89, who had enjoyed a corrupt relationship with the FBI before turning 16 as one of the most wanted men in America, was found unresponsive on Tuesday morning, just hours after his arrival at USP Hazelton. He was pronounced dead soon after. Authorities did not disclose the cause of death, but prosecutors said the investigation was ongoing for homicide. Sources told CBS News that he had apparently been beaten to death and the Boston Globe reported that Bulger's eyes had been almost flat.
A successful mafia man, Fotios "Freddy" Geas, who would hate the "rats", and at least one other inmate would have been involved in the murder of Bulger, said a former investigator on the case on Wednesday. The long-time investigator was not allowed to discuss the issue and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Fotios "Freddy" Geas in an archive photo of 2009. Geas and at least one other inmate are believed to have murdered the former head of crime in Boston, James "Whitey" Bulger, who was killed behind bars on October 30, 2018 in a federal prison in West Virginia.
Don Treeger / The Republican via AP
Geas, 51, and his brother were sentenced to life imprisonment in 2011 for their role in several violent crimes, including the 2003 assassination of Adolfo "Big Al" Bruno, a genovese head of the family. murdered in a Springfield, Massachusetts, parking lot.
The case largely depends on the testimony of several gangsters who became government informants, reports MassLive. The two brothers reportedly refused to cooperate as co-conspirators who would have been sentenced to lighter sentences.
Private detective Ted McDonough, who knew Geas, told the Boston Globe, "Freddy hates guys who abuse women, Whitey is a rat who kills women, it's probably that simple," McDonough told the newspaper. , who had first reported that Geas was suspected.
Bulger was leading a largely Irish crowd that was arranging lender scrapings, gambling and drugs. He was also an FBI informant who had spoken of the New England mob, the main rival of his gang, at a time when the destruction of the mafia was a top priority for the FBI. Bulger became a fugitive and escaped the authorities for nearly two decades before being captured in 2011. He was sentenced in 2013 as part of an extensive charge of racketeering – including for 11 counts of – was sentenced to spend the rest of his life behind bars.
We do not know why he was transferred.
"What I do not understand, that's why the Federal Bureau of Prisons would be transferring a very large publicity detainee, who is a known snitch, to the general population of a high-security prison.You must be smarter than that, "Lindsay, the former keeper, said.
James "Whitey" Bulger, photographed after his arrest in 2011
