Has The Defense Been Beaten Down By The Federals?

I bailed out early today right after Martorano finished his testimony. There was one witness still scheduled to testify who was a Boston police officer in the cold case division. He was just being used to put in pictures of the murder scenes so I saw little reason to remain. Plus, it was more than that. I have a sense today that the fight went out of Bulger’s defense team.

Maybe it’s me and they have some sort of strategy but I don’t see it. Today’s session was not to my liking for a lot of reasons. Not least is Wyshak’s ability to take over the courtroom with his talking objections which seem to get sustained by the judge in her frequent rulings on Brennan questions after a Wyshak objection: “sustained as to form of question,” and Brennan coming back and asking which is in effect the same question and it being allowed. But the interruption gives Martorano more time to consider it and come up with an answer.

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Martorano Leaves The Stand – Was He Bloodied Up Enough?

Suddenly it ended – about 10:45 the cross-examination ceased. Wyshak then spent the last ten minutes rehabilitating Martorano. It was over too soon. It seemed there was much that was not touched upon. I’m surprised.

It started off well. Brennan slams Martorano who when asked him if he was worried that Stevie Flemmi could implicate him in the murder in Oklahoma starting to talk about having done it because his partners Whitey and Stevie wanted him to do this. Brennan said I asked you about Oklahoma have you been told to add Whitey in to all your answers to my questions. He said no but Martorano seemed to have been cut up short. We haven’t heard Whitey’s name thrown in as an extra much since whereas yesterday it was all Whitey all the time.

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New Novel – The Man Who Murdered Too Much

I’m reading a book. The villain has told us he’s been forgiven for his murders. By whom is uncertain, but that’s what he tells us. This confuses me. On the other hand he says he is justified in doing what he has done. He had a good reason to kill all of these people. But on the other side he is looking for forgiveness.

The villain tells us after every murder he felt bad. He really felt bad after he killed the two African-American teenagers, one a girl, who were sitting in a car with a guy Smith he set out to kill. He tells us he thought they were three guys in a car waiting to kill him and they had hoods on because it was a snowy night as if it were snowing inside the car. The autopsy showed they had no hoods. OK he says, they were silhouettes so he couldn’t see who they are. When he got into the back seat of the car he just shot three purple shadows in the snow.

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The Incredible Allegations Against Former FBI Agent Paul Rico

We trust our prosecutors not to have grown up in bags but some of them have. We hope that when they have to use gangster witnesses they have the wherewithal to recognize when they are being scammed. When gangsters are looking for a deal they’ll give you what you want to hear. Just because it follows along with the theory of the case doesn’t mean it is true.

You can’t grow up in the protected suburbs, go to sheltered schools, and spend your life in what JJ Sullivan used to say “book learning” and get a law degree and then a lawyer job and think you know what is happening in the world of the street. Here’s an example of that. I had a conversation with a prosecutor who I’ll call Ryan. Ryan had lived a pretty sheltered life living in academia and achieving honors and it would turn out throughout Ryan’s life there was never any private sector employment. Ryan however did quite well in the law trying and winning murder cases, becoming a judge and so on.

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Hank Brennan Takes It to Martorano

No more Mr Wiseguy – no more skirting around the edges – we’re starting to see the real John Martorano for what he is a person who described himself on 60 minutes as a vigilante being force to admit there was little vigilantism in him but sheer mindless murder.

Brennan started in on him and kept his voice calm, a quality I first noticed in him when he stood up to the Magistrate the first time I attended these hearing, and insistently bored away at Martorano making sure he got the answers he wanted. No more avoidance, Brennan nailed him down. No Florida lawyer who defended Connolly who said he was intimidated by Martorano, Brennan is standing tall and firing away at him.

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Martorano Spins A Huge Lie – Trying To Implicate FBI Agent Paul Rico

Martorano seemed to be a little reticent in his testimony this morning. His seemed somewhat uncomfortable but as he got to the story of the Wheeler and Callahan murders he seemed to have perked up a bit. He takes a sip of water every once in a while and uses the water carafe to refill his glass. I’m surprised at how steady his hand is in pouring the water and drinking the glass. Nothing seems to bother this guy. Even looking at the autopsy pictures he identifies them as if he was looking at a picture of the swan boats.

The last questions this morning revolved around how he felt after killing his buddy Callahan. He said he felt very bad. He risked his life for him. That was the second time he talked about risking his life for Callahan. What he meant is when he went to kill Wheeler in Oklahoma he felt he was somehow risking his life. I didn’t quite follow that but then again this is a gangster testifying

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Richard Schneiderhan – Paid For Years Of Ill Service

John Martorano in his testimony mentioned the name of Richard Schneiderhan. He is a retired state trooper who is on pension from Massachusetts. In a sense he was never worked for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts since he was on the payroll of gangsters.

Martorano told a story that makes little sense about how he became his source of information for him – that was at a time when he was being debriefed and he never thought he’d be called on it – and having done it he’s stuck with it. It’s a lie but it isn’t perjury.

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Dirty Dickie O’Brien – The Criminal With The White Hat And Black Soul

We’ve heard a little it about the testimony of Martorano. How his heart was so broken after learning Whitey and Stevie were rats that he immediately became one himself or how Whitey undermined his brother Billy by telling everyone John Connolly was going to take money because Billy wanted him to see that Whitey doesn’t get into trouble.

The federals are anxious to get Billy’s name into the trial so they come up with the ever-changing story about Billy Bulger. Here we are supposed to believe that Whitey is telling other gangsters things about his brother that will put Billy in the jackpot, or at least in the headlines of the newspapers. My gut, and from everything I’ve seen, Whitey did everything in his power to isolate himself from his brother by not letting him know about his lifestyle and also by not suggesting that somehow Billy was looking out for him. Whitey was the big brother – they usually don’t tell that they need their little brother’s help, at least in my experience.

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Does The Right Of A Free Press Destroy The Right To A Fair Trial

Today, as I mentioned, before the start of the day Howie Carr called to J.W. Carney who was sitting at counsel table, he beckoned him to come to him which Carney did, and they engaged in some conversation for no more than fifteen or thirty seconds. Howie turned away with a big smile.

The reason I mention this again is to indicate that Carney was aware Carr was in the courtroom and was in the position to listen to his partner in the book business, John Martorano testify.

Originally Carr was sequestered from listening to the testimony of witnesses which order Judge Casper lifted as regards him. The idea behind sequestering is that you don’t want one witness, who I’ll call Howie, to know what the other witness, let’s call him John, with whom he has a close relationship like a partnership, to be able to tailor his testimony to agree with the first witness. So if John testifies a car in question was red, you don’t want Howie to know he said that. So when you ask Howie about the car’s color he won’t say red just because he heard John say it.

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Falling Asleep Listening To Murderman Talk About Murders

The most exciting thing about the day was seeing John Martorano come in. I wanted to see how he looked and how he would dress so I went to the courtroom where the trial was being held. You may recall I told how the last time he had a bishop’s belly; when I first saw him walk by me to the witness stand I could only think that the belly grew; he is as I tweeted as round as he is tall. But, he’s not all that tall, only about 5’5″ or so.

But this roly poly murderer to give him credit dressed to the nines — with a nice cut suit that wrapped neatly around his wide girth under which he wore a blue shirt and had a blue silk handkerchief peeking out of the small breast pocket. I had to pay particular attention to his shoes. They were black loafers with tassels, like these but black.

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