Pubdate: Tue, 08 Jan 2013
Source: Boston Globe (MA)
Copyright: 2013 Globe Newspaper Company
Contact: http://services.bostonglobe.com/news/opeds/letter.aspx?id=6340
Website: http://bostonglobe.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/52
Author: Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

CONVICTED MARIJUANA DEALER LOSES US APPEAL

A federal appeals court has refused to overturn the decades-old
conviction of a marijuana dealer who argued that FBI agents lied
during pretrial hearings in his case to protect longtime -informant
James "Whitey" Bulger.

The US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit concluded Monday that
even if the FBI withheld information about Bulger's role in the 1983
arrest of Michael F. Murray, the case did not warrant a new trial or
sentence -because there was overwhelming evidence that Murray was guilty.

"In rejecting this petition, we in no way excuse or condone the FBI's
illicit involvement with Whitey Bulger," the court wrote. "But the
connection to Murray's 1984 conviction, for a crime he did commit, is
too attenuated to support his petition."

Murray, now 61, and six other men were arrested in April 1983 -after
FBI and US Drug Enforcement Administration agents seized 15 tons of
marijuana from a South Boston warehouse, a garage, and vehicles.

At the time, an FBI agent testified that agents had been targeting the
drug ring operated by Murray's brother, Joseph, for nearly a year
after receiving tips from several unidentified informants. But the
agent said he accidentally stumbled upon the location of the warehouse
where the drugs were stored while conducting surveillance.

Murray's bid to get the evidence against him tossed out during the
1980s on the grounds that the search warrant was flawed was
unsuccessful and he spent 18 months in prison for conspiracy to
possess with intent to distribute marijuana.

In 2006, when Bulger was a fugitive and the government was fending off
lawsuits based on his corrupt relationship with the FBI, it was
revealed that Bulger tipped the FBI to Joseph Murray's ring in 1983
because he was angry that the Charlestown drug smuggler was import-ing
drugs into South Boston without giving him a cut of the profits.

After the raid at the South Boston warehouse, Bulger -began extorting
monthly payments from Joseph Murray, and the pair were also involved
in an ill-fated plot to ship weapons to the outlawed Irish Republican
Army, according to court testimony. Joseph Murray was shot to death by
his wife in 1992.

Michael Murray's lawyers, Rosemary Curran Scapicchio and Dennis M.
Toomey, filed a petition in 2007 to overturn his old conviction,
arguing that Bulger told the FBI about the location of the South
Boston warehouse and they lied to protect their informant. The lawyers
appealed after a judge rejected the claim.

"Evidence that the FBI was actively doing Bulger's bidding, and that
Bulger set into motion the entire investigation into the Joe Murray
Crew, would have materially altered the verdict because none of the
agents' testimony could be credited," -Michael Murray's lawyers told
the Appeals Court.

Even though Michael -Murray has served his sentence for the 1983 case,
it came back to haunt him in 1994 when he was convicted of a second
drug offense: smuggling 10,000 pounds of marijuana from -Texas to
Massachusetts. As a -repeat offender, Murray was sentenced to 30 years
in prison. He is currently being held at the Federal Correctional
Institution at Allenwood, Penn., and is slated to be released in 2020.

"The unique nature of the evidence that was hidden from Murray for
decades has resulted in a conviction that is fundamentally unjust,"
wrote the lawyers, urging the Appeals Court to overturn the judge's
ruling denying Murray's request to have his old conviction overturned
and to impose a lower sentence for his subsequent drug conviction.

Federal prosecutors argued in a brief filed in the Appeals Court that
Murray failed to prove that agents lied to protect Bulger and said
that the most damning evidence against -Murray was that he was seen
driving a van containing bales of marijuana.

Bulger, 83, fled Boston shortly before his 1995 federal racketeering
indictment after being warned by his former FBI handler, John J.
Connolly Jr., that his arrest was imminent. Bulger was captured in
Santa Monica, Calif., in June 2011 and is slated to stand trial in
June on charges in 19 slayings. 
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