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Judge Denies Request By Widow Of Bulger Victim

The widow of one of James "Whitey" Bulger's victims won't get an extra-large share of the convicted mobster's assets, a judge ruled.

Elaine Barrett's request for 25 percent of the $822,000 cash and other assets seized from the gangster was turned down Thursday by the federal judge who handled Bulger's trial. The money is supposed to be split evenly among families of all 19 people Bulger was accused of killing.

Barrett, whose husband Arthur "Bucky" Barrett was killed by Bulger in 1983, argued for the larger share based in part on her husband's "extraordinary suffering" and the fact jurors found Bulger not guilty of all the slayings he was charged with.

She noted that families of some victims had already collected civil judgments because of the FBI's corrupt relationship with Bulger, according to The Boston Globe.

"Given the number of victims in this case and the nature of the evidence as to each victim, the court declines to exercise its discretion," U.S. District Judge Denise Casper ruled.

Two Bulger associates testified at trial that Barrett, a bar owner and safe-cracker who was suspected of a Medford bank burglary, was lured to a South Boston home, chained to a chair, and interrogated for hours before Bulger shot him in the head.

Bulger was sentenced by Casper in November to two consecutive life sentences plus five years. In August, a jury found him guilty in 11 of the 19 killings, along with dozens of other crimes.

The former boss of the Winter Hill Gang, Boston's Irish mob, Bulger fled the city in 1994 after being tipped off by a former FBI agent that he was about to be indicted. He was located in California in 2011.

This article was originally published on February 14, 2014.

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