Children
are often warned about creating monsters, usually in the context of spoiling
someone to the point where he thinks he can get away with more than is allowed.
Typically, the means of spoiling are rather benign – too many sweets or poor discipline
resulting in bad diets or social ostracism due to bad behavior. As adults, the
threat of spoiling others is no less real but the consequences are more
devastating than the effects of too many chocolates. The film Black Mass, an adaptation of the life of
Boston crime boss Whitey Bulger while he was an FBI informant, illustrates the
reality of creating monsters on several levels.
The
film starts in the 1970s, when Bulger was already an established crime leader
in South Boston, heading the Winter Hill Gang. That he had a penchant for crime
is unquestionable, although at this point he is seen as a somewhat sympathetic
character – he helps elderly women and is a doting father. He has experienced
time in prison, which appears to have made him tougher and better suited to
lead a criminal enterprise. He has also established a network of trusted
associates with whom he shares an increasing affiliation as the depth of his
organization grows.
At
the same time, the film presents the character of John Connolly, who grew up in
South Boston with Bulger before parting ways to join the FBI. Years later,
Connolly returns to Boston, this time as a FBI agent. Part of his portfolio
involves investigating a rival gang to Bulger’s – neither Connolly nor his
fellow agents have a great deal of success in doing this. There is an initial
tension between Connolly’s professional life and personal life in terms of past
associations with Bulger and continual loyalties to those with whom he grew up.
After
failing to infiltrate the rival gang through other methods, Connolly devises an
unusual plan for gaining information– co-opt Bulger as an informant. Initially,
Connolly’s superiors are reluctant to embrace the use of a known crime leader,
particularly when this could lead to them having knowledge of Bulger’s illegal
activities but being unable to doing anything based on the agreed upon terms of
the informant relationship. Ultimately, the combination of a lack of success
through other means and Connolly’s persuasion convince his superiors to use
Bulger as an informant. Bulger is at first somewhat uncomfortable with the
concept of being an informant since he does not tolerate “snitching” from
within the ranks of the White Hill Gang. However, seeing the utility of the
arrangement in terms of eliminating a rival, Bulger crafts a justification
between informing on his own people and informing on others for the benefit of
the White Hill Gang.
Bulger
becomes a productive source of information and Connolly is able to use this to
further his cases and career. As the information provided by Bulger becomes useful
he becomes emboldened, knowing that he has great value to Connolly. At the same
time, Connolly and those around him become increasingly amenable to overlooking
illegal activities on Bulger’s part – particularly murder, which was strictly
forbidden under the original agreement – because of the value of his
information. The film depicts a shift in Bulger’s operations from relatively
minor to a massive criminal network that operates across other states under the
protections afforded by the informant arrangement. At the same time, Connolly
draws closer to Bulger and his lifestyle, collecting kickback money, traveling
with Bulger and his associates, and adopting a different persona – this is
visible to the audience and to Connolly’s wife, an outsider to South Boston who
seems to provide a check on Connolly’s growing inability to draw a line with his
informant. Even this relationship is shattered, as ultimately Connolly and his
wife separate in large part due to his personal and professional involvement
with Bulger.
The relationship
between Connolly and Bulger continues with few internal institutional checks.
There is, it appears, a laissez faire attitude toward the symbiosis that has
been created and many are willing to look the other way as long as the
arrangement produces successful outcomes. The amount of grey area amassed
around the arrangement is thus quite large. This changes when a new Assistant U.
S. Attorney questions the true value of Bulger’s information. With stunning
rapidity it becomes clear that Connolly has been passing off old or irrelevant
information from Bulger as important tips and falsifying other information. In
the aftermath, Bulger is publicly exposed as an informant and a wanted criminal
and goes on the run for decades. Connolly is arrested. In the end, the
informant relationship takes all involved down with it.
In
film and in fact, there is no question that Bulger was involved in criminal
activity before he became an informant. In this sense, the monster created was
not pure to begin with. However, as the film portrays it, Bulger had completed
his prison sentence and was working marginally far from the law before the
informant relationship developed. Prior to the informant relationship, Connolly
is portrayed as a rising star within the FBI.
At
the beginning of the informant relationship there was a nexus in needs –
Connolly and the FBI needed information and Bulger needed immunity and freedom
to develop his organization. Both Bulger and Connolly knew that they were
violating some element of the core tenets of their organizations – informing
for Bulger and condoning criminality for Connolly – but the benefits appeared
to outweigh these issues. It is clear that Bulger and Connolly were operating
in a space that was outside the rigid confines of the law – a fact that
eventually brought the relationship down – however each believed that they were
doing what was necessary to protect their organizations and further themselves.
The
risk of creating a relationship that functioned in the grey areas of law – be
it statutory law or the code of an organization – was worth the reward and
there were certainly rewards to be had for both parties. In this way, the
informant relationship functioned symbiotically – each party can be seen as
creating a monster in the other through the informal mechanism that was
achieved between them. Perhaps obviously, Connolly creates a monster in Bulger
by empowering – and encouraging – him to engage in criminal behavior under the
cover of providing vital information. What is perhaps less obvious is that
Bulger created a monster in Connolly by encouraging him to condone and indeed
be a party to criminal activities knowing that Connolly could hide under the
cover of his official status. Through the use of informal understandings of the
relationship that were allowed to function outside of the formal law per se, all parties to the relationship
were “spoiled” in a sense, and all parties became monsters as a result. In this
instance, however, the result was far greater than a stomach ache from too many
candies.
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