A convicted drug dealer from South Boston told a US District Court jury today that James “Whitey” Bulger ordered him to pay $100,000 in tribute in the 1980s, and that he only agreed to pay the money to the South Boston gangster after his 17-year-old brother was shot.
Anthony Attardo, 55, a retired Marine who manages The Sports Connection in South Boston, said Bulger showed up at his house the day after his brother was shot and told him “you’re next” if he did not pay the $100,000.
Bulger was never charged in the shooting, but Attardo said he believes he was involved. He had other siblings, so he agreed to pay. The teen survived the shooting.
“I grew up in Southie all my life…everybody knew his reputation,” Attardo said. “Very dangerous. He meant what he said.”
Attardo said he was selling 25 kilos of cocaine and making $35,000 a month in the 1980s – with cocaine he bought in Florida – but Bulger’s crew was angry he wasn’t buying from them.
Attardo said he gave Bulger $80,000 after the visit at his home, and that the gangster told him, “You can do what you want now.”
Henry B. Brennan, an attorney for Bulger, suggested through cross examination that Attardo has a history of lying on the witness stand, including about his own crimes. Attardo agreed he has lied before and tried to protect Kevin Weeks, one of Bulger’s cohorts who later cooperated in the case against Bulger.
Attardo was sentenced to eight years in prison in 1998 for trafficking prescription medication. He was also involved in a scheme to extort money from drug dealers from the Dominican Republic who were operating in South Boston. The dealers were really undercover law enforcement officers.
Earlier today, another former drug dealer from South Boston told the jury in Bulger’s racketeering trial that he sold drugs and paid rent to because he feared he would “get hurt.”
“He was the boss,” Paul Moore told jurors.
Read more on the trial here
SOURCE: Boston
In The Mixx: DJs Doing Work 