Brutal_ The Untold Story of My Life Inside Whitey Bulger's Irish Mob - Kevin Weeks [131]
I was also brought back to Boston for Schneiderhan’s and Michael Flemmi’s trials; sometimes I was driven up and other times I was flown there. Schneiderhan was convicted in March 2003 of trying to warn Billy Bulger that his phone was tapped. Six months later, he was sentenced to eighteen months in federal prison for obstruction of justice. Michael Flemmi had been arrested in 2000 and charged with obstruction of justice and perjury, possession of unregistered weapons, and transfer and possession of machine guns, for helping to move the arsenal of weapons from the shed in his parents’ backyard. In September 2002, he was sentenced to ten years in prison. Finally, in October 2003, Stevie, then sixty-nine, cooperated with authorities and pled out to ten murders in exchange for a recommended sentence of life in prison to avoid the death penalty for two of the murders, one in Florida and the other in Oklahoma. If Stevie rendered substantial assistance about his own criminal activity and others in a timely fashion, his brother Michael could possibly receive a reduction in sentence.
One of Stevie’s sons, Billy Hussey, changed his name to William St. Croix. I think that was a grandparent’s name. He testified against his own uncle, Michael Flemmi and, when faced with the possibility of charges against himself, was prepared to testify against his own father. When Stevie pled out, his son did not have to testify against him.
Most of the time, however, the same people I had been with before, the prosecutors, U.S. Attorneys, agents, and members of the Department of Justice Task Force, came to Allenwood to talk to me. I continued to meet with all of them until Stevie pled out guilty to the ten murders.
During one of the flights that I took between Boston and Pennsylvania, the federal marshals brought me to the airport handcuffed and shackled. Of course, the chains limit your movements. You can’t scratch your nose or go to the men’s room alone. But when the federal marshals marched me on the plane, the flight attendant met us at the door and said, “You can’t bring him on like that.”
The federal marshals were a little upset and tried to object to removing my shackles and handcuffs, but in the end they had to do it. So they said, “Kevin, do you promise you won’t do anything?”
“Yeah,” I said, and they removed the handcuffs, waist chains, and shackles. I walked to my seat and went to sleep.
On March 22, 2004, in Boston Federal Court, U.S. District Judge Richard Stearns sentenced me. When I walked into the courtroom, I had no idea what he would give me. All I knew was that it could be anywhere from five to twenty years.
U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan wanted me to do fifteen years and considered my sentence one of the most distasteful things he had to do. But he did state that you have to deal with violent criminals to get more violent criminals. However, the agents who had been involved with me all that time, along with U.S. Attorneys Brian Kelly, who prosecuted me, and Fred Wyshak, who had worked with me, believed, based on my cooperation, that I deserved less than fifteen years. Kelly and Wyshak spoke on my behalf and kept their word to me, as did Agents Steve Johnson and Dan Doherty.
That day at least twenty agents and prosecutors from Washington and Connecticut and other states came in on my behalf. In the courtroom, they stated that my cooperation was unprecedented, unparalleled in Massachusetts history. All along