Henchman Tells Of Whitey's Black Deeds

Criminal's Cohort Speaks For The First Time

(CBS) 
Weeks was one of the few people Bulger trusted enough to stay in touch. He says he was able to meet face-to-face with the most wanted man in America five times over the next two years in Boston, Chicago and New York, delivering forged identifications and keeping him apprised of developments back home. He says the meetings were always arranged by phone.

"We had code words for different places. When he wanted me to go to
New York he'd tell me, 'Meet me at the lions,' " Weeks recalls.

The lions referred to the two big lion statues in front of New York's public library.

Bulger told him big cities allowed him to hide in plain sight. One time, Whitey asked directions from a New York City cop.

"He walked up to him, and he was looking for a street, a restaurant, and he asked the cop for directions. And I couldn't believe it. I'm just looking at him," Weeks recalls, laughing. "This guy's wanted. But, he just gave him directions and stuff. He thanked him. We walked away."

Weeks says the last time he saw Bulger was in New York in 1996, almost two years after he vanished. He says Whitey told him he’d be in touch, but he never called again.

A few months later, there was this bombshell: reports that Whitey Bulger had been a top-level FBI informant since 1975. Bulger, who had killed anyone he thought was an informant, had all along been giving the feds information about rival criminals, as well as some members of his own gang. Weeks, who was still a player in the Boston underworld, was shattered.

"He betrayed me. He betrayed me the whole time. He betrayed all of us," Weeks says.

Asked how he was betrayed, Weeks says: "Well, we knew we were paying for information, that we had sources in law enforcement. So as far as we were concerned, the relationship was one-way. We were receiving information. We were paying for the information. Now we find out he's giving information.

"He was giving up some of his own people. He was giving up the competition. He was, I mean, he basically he made a deal with the FBI, and they gave him carte blanche to do what he wanted."

Weeks' turn to make a deal came in 1999, when he was arrested and charged with 29 crimes. Facing life in prison and abandoned by his boss, he decided to cooperate.

"We made a deal to sit down and talk. They wanted proof that I was telling the truth. So I led them to three bodies," Weeks recalls.

For years, Whitey Bulger’s victims had simply disappeared and police could never make a murder charge against him stick. Weeks knew where the bodies were buried, and eventually led them to six of them. When it was all over, prosecutors were able to charge Bulger with 20 additional counts of murder. In return for his cooperation, Weeks spent just 72 months in prison. He was released last year.

"A lot of people, particularly the families of the victims, have been outraged. I mean they look at it, 'We lost a loved one and this guys walking out on the street,' " Bradley says.

"They're entitled to their feelings," Weeks replies. "I mean, if someone killed a loved one of mine, I'd want to kill them. I wouldn't want them in jail. I'd want to kill them. So they're entitled to, you know, and they're probably correct."

Weeks says he isn’t worried about his safety. He’s refused the witness protection program, and is already back in Southie, where he says people now know the reality behind the myth of Whitey Bulger.

"We were supposed to live by a certain code," says Weeks. "And this was his teaching, too. You know, you never rat on your friends. You never rat on your family. You never give your own up. You have a problem, you take it to the street."

Asked if he has any idea where Bulger might be today, Weeks says no.

"I mean I believe he's probably over in Europe somewhere," he says. "I believe he went over to Europe, and I think he got trapped over there after 9/11."

The federal task force assigned to capture Whitey Bulger says the last confirmed sighting of him was in London in 2002.

Last week, the task force released this 26-year-old surveillance tape of Bulger in hopes that someone might recognize his walk or mannerisms.