Deconstructing the legend of a “noble” cold-blooded murderer.
The 50-year murderous reign of infamous Boston gangster James “Whitey” Bulger ended on an oily parking-garage floor in Santa Monica in 2010. In Hunting Whitey: The Inside Story of the Capture & Killing of America’s Most Wanted Crime Boss, Boston journalists Casey Sherman and Dave Wedge take readers through the FBI’s pursuit of Bulger during his 16 years on the run, his arrest, the two-month trial (and conviction) that followed, and the final “Misery Mountain” deadly prison drama that would end his life in 2018 when he was 89.
Sherman and Wedge’s goal in writing the book was “to deconstruct the mythology surrounding James ‘Whitey’ Bulger and to apply greater focus on the men and women who banded together over a span of decades to bring this monster to justice.”
The authors researched over 70 letters written by Bulger in prison and interviewed dozens of people who had intimate knowledge of the case, including Bulger’s family members and law enforcement. The interviews also include conversations with Bulger’s brother, Billy; the convict accused of murdering Bulger in prison, Freddie Geas; and former FBI director Andrew McCabe
Read the rest of my review at Washington Independent Review of Books.
