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Florida becomes a focus in hunt for Whitey Bulger

E-mail|Link|Comments () August 25, 2009 02:41 PM

FBI

One of the photos issued by the FBI today, which added hair to previously released age-adjusted photos.

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

The hunt for fugitive South Boston gangster James "Whitey" Bulger has increasingly focused on Florida over the past year because the FBI has received numerous tips that the elderly gangster was spotted throughout that state, according to the FBI.

"We're getting an increase in leads coming from Florida,'' FBI Agent Richard Teahan, who coordinates the multi-agency Bulger Task Force, told reporters during a press briefing today at the FBI's Boston office.

None of the reported sightings has been confirmed and many were eliminated as Bulger lookalikes, but the tips have prompted the task force to focus more efforts in Florida and the Northeast over the past year, he said.

Bulger, who will turn 80 on Sept. 3, has been a fugitive since he fled Boston just before his January 1995 indictment on federal racketeering charges. Since then, he's been charged with 19 murders and publicly identified as a longtime FBI informant. He remains on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list and the agency is offering a $2 million reward for information leading to his capture.

The last confirmed sighting of the gangster was in London's Piccadilly Square in September 2002, according to the FBI.

The Florida tips have included calls and e-mails reporting that a man resembling Bulger was spotted in Clearwater, where Bulger previously owned a condominium, Jacksonville, and Kissimmee. One caller claimed Bulger was standing on a street corner outside a Walgreen's Pharmacy in Daytona Beach.

The Bulger Task Force has averaged about 30 leads a week over the past year from tipsters throughout the world claiming to have information about Bulger's whereabouts, Teahan said. The task force has also followed leads this year in England, Ireland, Canada, and throughout Central and South America.

Bulger is believed to be traveling with his girlfriend, Catherine Greig, 58, formerly of Quincy, who is charged with harboring a fugitive.