You know this guy Benji Ditchman (I’m told by one of my advisers that I should tell you that is my name for Steve Flemmi) almost seems believable at times which is amazing. I have to slap myself off the side of the head to keep from believing some of the things he says. I’m reminded of the time I was a young defense counsel. I knew the attorney representing Larry Baione, aka Larry Zannino. He’s been mentioned several times here as the captain in Gerry Angiulo’s Boston Mafia. Larry was caught cold with some stolen jewelry, like it was in the pockets of his pants. There was also other solid evidence beyond that to incriminate him.
He denied he knew the jewelry was there. He said he would take a lie detector test which he did. He passed. There was no trace of any deception. It just demonstrated that there are some people so hardened and without feelings, like these major criminals, that they can say anything without showing any emotion or it having any effect on them.
Listening closely to Benji it seems there are two parts to his testimony: one part which he remembers or made up in his mind to justify his actions; another part which he probably was asked about by the prosecution team, figured out what they wanted and answered accordingly. You can see it in the questioning and answering. Sometimes it takes Wyshak ten questions to get to the point he wants, another time Benji is right on the mark and can expound on it as if it happened yesterday.
I mentioned how this guy Pat Nee has been coming up off and on as being involved somehow or other in many of the murders. Again this afternoon we heard that he helped with the disposition of Debby Davis’s body. I’m puzzled why no one has ever prosecuted him for all these crimes.
Part of the afternoon testimony involved the paying off of the cops. Benji said Connolly got almost a ¼ million from Whitey and him. He named several other FBI agents he allegedly paid off. Were they giving him information? No. Why was he paying them. Connolly suggested that he do it. How easily it is to destroy a person’s reputation.
And that really is the theme of Benji that we heard throughout the day, he really wasn’t responsible for anything. Most of the murders he had just stepped out the door or was bending over to tie his loafers or was in the middle of a blink when the murder happened. Those he actually were involved in he was forced to do by others.
He was there when Castucci was invited to the apartment Murderman had in Somerville 50 yards down the street from their headquarters at Marshall Motors. When Castucci got there he stepped out and the next thing he knew Murderman Martorano killed him.
They extorted 60,000 from a guy named Ted Berenson. He didn’t want to do it because he was a friend of Murderman but Whitey said he had to do it so he did. What did Murderman do when he told him they extorted his friend. Nothing except to split the money with them.
He saved the best tale for just before the jury left for the day. This was the about Debbie Davis. He said he loved her but wasn’t in love with her. I have no idea what it means so don’t ask. Anyway he gave her lots of gifts including nice jewelry and new cars and then complained that by her using these things she was calling attention to herself and them. Then one day he has to go out at night to meet Whitey during the time Whitey is complaining he’s not spending enough time with the business. It just so happens to be Debbie’s birthday. He has to go because there’s a meeting with John Connolly. (We’re supposed to forget that he testified earlier Whitey met a lot with Connolly by himself.) He tells Whitey it’s Debbie’s birthday but Whitey insists. So he tells Debbie he’s sorry but he has to meet with FBI Agent Connolly
When Whitey finds out he’s outed Connolly, he insists Debbie must be murdered. She knows too much. This is the same Whitey who told the FBI SAC that he didn’t care if the state police or newspapers said he was an informant, no one would believe it. Now Benji would have us believe because Debbie knew of their relationship she had to die. Spare me.
Of course, he then acts as if he is surprise when he brings her into his mother’s house pursuant to a plan to murder her and Whitey grabs her by the throat and strangles her as he drags her into the basement and he does nothing. After that he goes and “cleans up.” What is he cleaning up?
Strange things: he said he hadn’t talked to Paul Rico the FBI agent in charge of security at World Jai Alai since 1974 but he has no problem calling him up on the telephone eight years later to see if he was in on the murder of the owner of World Jai Alai, (you know like a former FBI agent’s going to tell a top OC guy on the phone who he hasn’t seen in eight years count me in on that murder); he said he didn’t know Richard Schneiderhan until Martorano told him about him in 1978 but Schneiderhan has testified that he and Benji are life long friends; and, his tone of voice is the same when he talks about the murder of the young woman, the payoffs of FBI agents, or his flight to avoid prosecution.
Like Larry Baione, he has no emotions or feelings. He’s reciting a twisted version of history so that he can live with himself and please the prosecutors. Brennan will be cross-examining him either Monday or Tuesday since he’s still spinning his lies on direct exam.
Coming out of the courthouse it was about 100 degrees and very high humidity; a fitting environment for having spent four hours listening to an agent of Beelzebub.
Hope carney brings up the fact Debbie Davis had met a new man in Mexico before she was killed and the pilgrimage benji and Charlie took to Mexico to kill this guy. Also how he sexually abused Debbie hussey for 13 years before she told her mother while she was in the midst of withdrawing from heroin about this. On top of the black “johns” she would take back to Milton (I’m sure judge Casper will be thrilled to hear that) I was not there so I do not know what happened, but it’s a helluva screenplay wyshak weeks and flemmi’ve concocted to make jimmy look like the second coming of satan in which flemmi is. He did a helluva job claiming “it affects him everyday”. Carney needs to bury his credibility, flemmi perjured multiple times yesterday “Jim wasn’t at Morris'” “he wasn’t?” “Oh yuh, Jim bulgah Was there Freddy, forgot my lines!” Doesn’t take a rocket scientist with X-ray vision to see through that horse shit.
Flemmi said they removed Debra Davis’ clothing prior to burying her because…..to hinder identification possibilities….something like that he said – how ridiculous, if anything ‘removing’ her clothing would have created a second source of I.d. Separate from the location of the body itself. I would say Flemmi removed her clothing because he had sex with or raped her just prior to killing her.
Matt-absoluteiy riveting. Also,WC and Patty, great points and insights. Does the Feds case begin to unravel with the cross of The Rifleman (Lucas Cain in the TV series)? If the body count on Whitey is diminished and put back on the actual culprits(Flemmi,Weeks, Martorano,Nee),if their credibility is therefore ruined with the jury and Whitey’s informant status brought into question , does the jury find the hungnjury findings needed by Bulger on the murders(Not Guilty will get him retried in state courts on those same murders).
Except, C&B have not effectively crossed Weeks or Martorano in this regard and just getting Stevie jammed up in his lies and deceptions won’t be enough. But if James takes the stand,which no defense attorney would ever allow, and gives a clear believable version of the events, coupled with unexpected testimony from listed and still to be announced witnesses, this could become more than interesting.
Chaco:
The evidence to me forbids any sympathy for Whitey – I can’t see any juror (unless in the tank) wanting to do anything for him.
A not guilty on all counts just sends him to California to face the gun charges or to Florida and Oklahoma to face the murder charges.
C&B have a strategy to let the murders go uncontested. That’s one reason I think Whitey testifies. You aptly describe it when you say it will be more than interesting. As far as C&B giving Whitey advise, I have to think he is leading the show.
Wasn’t this easily led, reluctant patsy already a killer before he met Whitey? My memory is fuzzy but I’m pretty sure he was killing people along with his scumbag brother & Joe Barboza’s crowd (2 more serial killer FBI informants) before Whitey got out of prison.
Jeff Hansen: yes. There was the Fitzgerald bombing, the Poulos shooting in Vegas, Wimpy Bennett, Bernie McClaughlin, others (?) in the Somerville-Charlestown Irish gang war. Matt can fill us in on others I’ve missed.
A couple of observations about Flemmi’s testimony:
1. He is the most rigigdly scripted witness I’ve ever seen. Wyshak has spent several hundred hours with Flemmi during prior civil and criminal trials and civil and criminal depositions. It shows: they work well together.
2. Flemmi appears credible when he describes certain events. His comfort level appears to come more from his confidence he knows the relevant portion of his script more than the fact he is truthfully describing real events he witnessed.
3. Flemmi’s total inability to accept blame for his wrongs is rivaled only by that of John Morris.
4. My favorite Flemmiism: “Jim forced me to let him kill Debbie Davis. That wasn’t fair because his girlfriends Cathy and Theresa both knew he was in informant and he didn’t kill them. He only killed the girl I loved but wasn’t in love with!”
Huh? Really?! The guy who drove Theresa back across the country to drop her off would kill a girl simply because she knew he was an informant?! Flemmi seems to be the only guy around with three murdered girlfriends.
5. Flemmi spent three hours today proudly reminiscing about all the murder and mayhem he committed from 1955 to 1975. Then, he spent the last hour saying he wasn’t a killer and was forced into extortions and murders by Bulger or Martorano.
6. When Brennan stands up to cross Flemmi, I predict you will see Flemmi struck by an extreme case of sudden onset amnesia. Even worse, Flemmi loves to ramble on big irrelevant narratives and he answer questions with questions so often that you’d think he was the the lawyer and defense attorney was the witness. Another Flemmi tactic is to pretend he can’t hear the defense attorney when he hears prosecutors just fine.
P
Regarding # 4 – lol. Yes, Flemmi’s expression of …we’ll call it bewilderment….. at his account of Bulger wanting to kill D. Davis while Stanley and Greig had met Connoly too is the exact reason that it makes more sense that Flemmi very likely simply killed her in a fit of rage, perhaps livid at the idea that not only did Davis want to keave him but that he sent Davis and her mother on vacation to Mexico….wasn’t the guy davis started dating Mexican, from Mexico, perhaps she met him on Flemmi!s all expense paid vacation. I’m familiar with Davis and Hussey’s murders, however, who is the third murdered girlfriend you reference?
Jan: isn’t it also the case that Flemmi tried to hunt down the Mexican guy she was seeing but couldn’t find him?
Jon – cripes, I don’t know.
No se nada
Patty:
1. You can see them reading from the script. Wyshak gets all confused if the right line doesn’t come back to him. Flemmis’ ability to memorize his lines has deteriorated.
2. Could be that many of the lines he has rehearsed so often he just has to hear the programmed word uttered by Wyshak and he spins a story.
3. I thought that. Compare him to Murderman who took responsibility even though he had some inane reason.
4. Benji didn’t make it clear that was the reason – he never said he told her Connolly was being paid off or was giving them information, he just told her that he was going to meet with him. He had to come up with something to pin it on Whitey – remember he was Whitey’s underling and forced to do whatever Whitey’ overbearing personality told him to do.
5. Ah, your paying attention, not supposed to do that.
6. I expect he’ll have his memory lapses, his hearing problems, and his looks over to Wyshak to see how he’s doing. Wyshak will be constantly interrupting – I hope they don’t pull the delaying recess or time to go home tricks to limit Brennan’s cross, but nothing will surprise me.
Flemmi says he loved her but wasn’t in love with her, effectively minimizing his feelings for her in order to minimize anyone considering the possibility that he murdered her in a rageful fit of passion vs. the ‘business decision’ he said he reluctantly went along with. Seems Flemmi might be contradicting himself as he previously stated that such decisions were usually made after a group consensus rather than just the duo of himself and Bulger that he describes here.
Jan:
Flemmi lives in an alternate universe of his own making – he now presents himself as some mindless wimp doing whatever others tell him to do – the problem with the whole case is he has taken the prosecution into that universe with him. You made excellent points.
Didn’t the mindless follower variant coincide with his deal? Perhaps the prosecution gleefully pranced hand in hand with Flemmi through the quid pro quo daisies of his alternate universe?
In the realm of Crimes of passion, I would say Flemmi occupies his own alternate universe even within that realm. None of these are good guys, however, something about Flemmi is exceptionally unnerving.
Matt,, great analysis. Flemmi held fast to his story that Connolly was a good cop and Morris was the corrupt agent and source of Federal leaks, from his arrest by the FEDs in 1995 through his testimony before Judge Wolfe (1998-99?) through 2003 (past John Connolly’s 2002 Federal Trial, at which the FEDs never called Flemmi as a witness; how could they, Flemmi was still saying apparently that Connolly was a good cop?). Then upon the eve of his own trial, inevitable conviction and likely execution after spending a few years in a federal or Oklahoma/Florida Hell Hole) Flemmi suddently, sua sponte, had a revelation: John Connolly also was a bad cop who was taking money from Flemmi. It took until 2006-2008 for Flemmi to “remember” how much: $20,000 a year for about 12 years; and Flemmi also remembered the exact words John Connolly used in 1982; Flemmi said Connolly said, “If Callahan testifies we’ll all be in trouble” and also Connolly said these very words in 1982 as Flemmi first recalled and told them to the FEDs in 2006: “Callahan will fold under pressure.” or whatever words Flemmi swore were the exact words Connolly used in 1982. We all remember with crystal clear clarity in 2013, those little snippets of conversation we had with acquaintances in 1988. How could anyone forget what someone told him in 1988? We all remember the “exact words”. I remember being at the Miracle in Miami in 1983-4 with BC football fans, the Ryan Brothers, my brother Sammy, my cousins, friends from Southie/Dorchester including John Connolly and a dozen other cops/soldiers/security types, ordinary Joes, from Southie/Dorchester—300 of us flew down on a Chartered flight from Boston—and you know what about that most exciting of weekends? I can’t remember one word, one sentence anyone said.
Nicely stated William.