For gang hangout, a divine rebirth

Once, it was the headquarters of Somerville's notorious Winter Hill Gang, the auto body shop where debts were settled, along with old scores. There, James "Whitey" Bulger and Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi met and forged a partnership that would lead to murder, corruption, and a FBI scandal.

But soon the infamous hangout of gun-toting gangsters in the 1970s will be born again - as a Pentecostal church.

A preacher who bought the Marshall Street garage earlier this year from former gang leader Howie Winter said he plans to transform the building into the new home of the Somerville Church of God, which will open its doors in January.

The planned transformation was greeted yesterday with amusement by several of the gang's former members as they reminisced about the old days.

"Hallelujah!" said John Martorano, a 67-year-old hitman-turned-government witness who confessed to killing 20 people - including one victim that he shot to death in the garage in 1974. "I think it's great. I'm all for religion."

Winter, 79, who paid about $14,000 for the building in the 1960s and sold it for $330,000 in January, said he didn't realize the buyer was a preacher until after the sale.

"It's kind of odd," said Winter, mulling the idea of people praying in the building that once housed Marshall Motors, then Motorama, and served as the office for the gang's gambling and loan-sharking business for a decade. "I was just looking to sell it, and I had no clue who was buying it. I just wish the guy luck, whatever he does."

The Rev. Collin Green, who is relocating the church from Cambridge because he needed more space for his 50-member congregation, said he discovered the building's history just before he bought it, but wasn't concerned.

"The memories are there, but the people will see there is a transformation," Green said, adding that neighbors are excited about the church moving in.

Winter acknowledged that the building, damaged by fire and vacant for several years, has a place in Boston's underworld history, but said some of the tales have been exaggerated.

Shattering the myth that a trap door in the office was used to dispose of bodies, Winter insisted, "That's baloney."

He said the trap door was used only to access a furnace and fuel tank.

Martorano's brother, James, 66, who operated an auto body shop out of the garage, recounted yesterday how he thought he was going to die inside the building one night in the early 1970s when he tangled with a mountain lion.

The untamed cat, which gang members bought as a surprise birthday gift for Winter, was delivered by a woman who freed it from its cage, then left as it prowled the garage, James Martorano said.

"We had him cornered in the office, he was . . . angry and scared," he said, adding that he was saying "nice kitty" as he tried to coax the mountain lion back into its cage. "When he finally bolted, he ran right between my legs. I thought I was done."

The mountain lion was finally subdued and was later returned by Winter to the seller, James Martorano said.

"I'm more than happy to see a church there," he said, joking that some of his former associates might want to join the congregation.

Green, 51, said that any gang members who have repented their sins are welcome at the church, and so are their donations to the church's renovation efforts. "If they need Jesus, then we're here to present him to them," he said.

While testifying last week at the Miami murder trial of former FBI agent John J. Connolly Jr., Flemmi recounted how he and Bulger formed a partnership while hanging at the Somerville garage in the mid-'70s that propelled them to the top of the underworld while secretly working as FBI informants.

Flemmi is serving a life sentence for 10 murders and Bulger, who is wanted for 19 slayings and racketeering, has been a fugitive since 1995 and on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list.

When asked if he thought Bulger might slip into the garage-turned-church some day to hear a sermon, Winter quipped, "If he does it will be the devil coming."

Shelley Murphy can be reached at shmurphy@globe.com.