Former FBI agent admitted that he lied at trial of mobster

                         
Boston, USA: Fitzpatrick pleaded guilty to the 12 charges brought against him by the prosecution

A former FBI agent pleaded guilty on Monday of perjury and obstruction of justice to admit that he lied in 2013 during the trial of former mob boss in Boston, James "Whitey" Bulger.

At trial, the former special FBI agent Robert Fitzpatrick, 76, said he had tried to break the FBI ties to criminal Boston, who came to act as an informant, to bring him to justice, but would have been unauthorized by his superiors.

Fitzpatrick pleaded guilty to the 12 charges brought against him by the prosecution.

"The admission of Mr. Fitzpatrick's guilt on all charges makes clear the consequences of lying to a federal court," said the federal prosecutor Carmen Ortiz.

"In this case, the fact that the accused is a former official high-ranking law makes his behavior more atrocious," he added.

As a special agent, Fitzpatrick oversaw the program to combat organized crime in Boston between 1981 and 1986, a period when Bulger was accused of involvement in eight murders while serving as an FBI informant.

If federal Judge F. Dennis Saylor accept the admission of guilt, Fitzpatrick could be sentenced to 24 months probation and to pay a fine of $ 13,700.

The sentence will be announced on August 5.

Bulger, 86, was sentenced to life imprisonment after being found guilty of 11 murders. He spent several years on the run before being arrested.


A version of Bulger's story was adapted for the cinema last year with "Crime Alliance" in which the star Johnny Depp plays the criminal.