Considered one of three inmates charged within the loss of life of James (Whitey) Bulger, the Boston underworld determine who was fatally bludgeoned inside hours of his being transferred to a jail in West Virginia, pleaded responsible on Monday to a cost of mendacity to federal brokers.
The defendant, Sean McKinnon, 38, escaped extra jail time after prosecutors dropped a extra critical homicide conspiracy cost.
He was initially charged with serving as a lookout, whereas two different inmates on the Hazelton federal jail, Fotios (Freddy) Geas and Paul DeCologero, rained a collection of savage blows on Mr. Bulger’s head. They’ve additionally been charged within the case. The assault occurred lower than 12 hours after Mr. Bulger, 89, was transferred to the correction facility in Bruceton Mills, W.Va.
Underneath his plea settlement, Mr. McKinnon confronted as much as 5 years in jail on the mendacity cost in addition to a high-quality of $250,000. However he was credited with the just about two years he spent in jail after his indictment within the case, and U.S. District Decide Thomas Kleeh allowed him to depart the courtroom on Monday with out a further sentence.
On the time of Mr. Bulger’s slaying, Mr. McKinnon was serving an eight-year sentence for stealing a dozen firearms and buying and selling them for heroin and cocaine. He was launched in the summertime of 2022 however was rearrested shortly afterward on the brand new expenses stemming from Mr. Bulger’s loss of life.
Mr. Geas and Mr. DeCologero additionally reached plea agreements with the federal government final month, however solely the small print of Mr. McKinnon’s association have been made public up to now since he’s the primary of the group to be sentenced. Mr. DeCologero was scheduled to be sentenced on Aug. 1 and Mr. Geas on Sept. 6.
Mr. Bulger, in failing well being and reliant on a wheelchair, was discovered overwhelmed to loss of life in his cell on the morning of Oct. 30, 2018, shortly after being transferred from a Florida jail the place he had been serving two consecutive life sentences for his position in 11 murders.
Questions have lengthy been raised about why Mr. Bulger, a fugitive from justice for 16 years till his seize in Santa Monica, Calif., in 2011, was positioned within the common inmate inhabitants at Hazelton, which housed inmates linked to organized crime. Prosecutors have by no means formally provided a motive for his killing, however it was broadly identified by then that Mr. Bulger was a federal informant who for years had offered info to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
4 years after his loss of life, the Justice Division’s inspector common concluded {that a} outstanding collection of preventable administrative errors, incompetence and well being system failures inside the federal jail system itself had led to his loss of life.
The inspector common discovered that jail officers had not put into place any further safety measures to guard Mr. Bulger, regardless that he was somebody who would doubtless be focused. The report additionally discovered that these officers allowed phrase of Mr. Bulger’s arrival at Hazelton to get round to numerous bureau staff and, in the end, to inmates.
Mr. McKinnon had beforehand publicly insisted that he had nothing to do with Mr. Bulger’s homicide. However in his plea settlement, he admitted to creating false statements to F.B.I. brokers on the day of Mr. Bulger’s loss of life in 2018, when he instructed them that he was not conscious of what had occurred to Mr. Bulger. He acknowledged throughout his interview on the time that he had spoken with Mr. Geas and Mr. DeCologero that morning however not about Mr. Bulger.
Actually, in response to the courtroom doc, Mr. McKinnon knew that Mr. Geas and Mr. DeCologero had carried out the deadly assault; Mr. McKinnon had met with and mentioned the assault with the 2 different inmates, it stated.
A lawyer for Mr. McKinnon didn’t return a name and an electronic mail looking for remark. A spokeswoman for the U.S. lawyer’s workplace declined to touch upon any of the instances.
Mr. Geas is presently serving a life sentence for the 2003 killing of the chief of the Genovese crime household in Springfield, Mass. In 2022, a grand jury investigating the Bulger homicide indicted Mr. Geas on expenses of first-degree homicide, conspiracy to commit first-degree homicide and first-degree homicide by a federal prisoner serving a life sentence.
Mr. DeCologero has been serving a 25-year sentence for operating a violent gang within the Boston space and, earlier than the brand new expenses had been introduced, had been eligible for launch in 2026. Within the Bulger killing, he was charged with first-degree homicide, conspiracy to commit first-degree homicide and assault leading to critical bodily damage.
Kitty Bennett contributed analysis.
