Whitey Bulger’s strong ties to the South Shore

By Emily Sweeney, Globe staff

James J. ‘‘Whitey’’ Bulger’s name will always be associated with South Boston, but the aging gangster is no stranger to the suburbs south of the city.

Long before he became a fugitive from justice, Bulger made his home in Quincy with his girlfriend, Catherine Greig. The couple shared a condo off Quincy Shore Drive in the early 1980s. A few years later, when Greig moved into a gray split-level ranch in Squantum, Bulger hung his hat there.

The area’s most notorious mobster is accused, among other things, of shaking down a Dedham restaurant owner and burying two bodies along the banks of the Neponset River in Quincy. Several of his alleged victims and their families are from communities south of Boston.

Last June, Bulger and Greig were apprehended in California after 16 years on the lam, Bulger made his return. This time, his residence is a county jail cell in Plymouth.

As Bulger’s lawyer, J.W. Carney Jr., prepares to face US Magistrate Judge Marianne B. Bowler in court tomorrow for a status hearing in the criminal case against Bulger, the 82-year-old remains locked up at the Plymouth County Correctional Facility.

Bulger pleaded not guilty to a federal racketeering indictment that implicates him in 19 homicides, but when he will go to trial remains to be seen.

‘‘I don’t expect a trial date to be set until I’ve had the opportunity with my team to review all the discovery provided by the government and do my own investigation of the case,’’ Carney, who has been working on the matter with four other lawyers, said in a recent telephone interview.

‘‘The pile of boxes containing the discovery were taller than I am,’’ he said.
As the case unfolds in the federal courthouse in Boston, Bulger’s name no doubt will be in the spotlight again and again, as will stories of murders and mayhem he is accused of perpetrating over his years as a crime boss.

‘‘Quincy, being close to Boston, was a nice little haven for them,’’ said former Quincy police detective Richard Bergeron, referring to Bulger and associates such as Stephen ‘‘The Rifleman’’ Flemmi and kevin weeks. ‘‘The regular cops didn’t know them.’’

Bergeron, who spent a decade investigating.read more  Here