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By Milton J. Valencia and Travis Andersen, Globe Staff Howie Winter, the 83-year-old former powerful head of the WinterHill Gang and the predecessor of gangster James Whitey Bulger,was arrested Thursday evening on charges of trying to extort twopeople, the Middlesex district attorney s office said. Authorities said Winter was arrested at his home in Millburywithout incident. He is scheduled to be arraigned Friday morning inSomerville District Court, along with an alleged accomplice, JamesMelvin,70, of Braintree, on charges of attempted extortion andconspiracy. Former lawyers for the men could not be reached for comment lateThursday night. Winter and Melvin repeatedly met with the victims at the Sons ofItaly club in Medford beginning in February and allegedlydemanded that they each pay Winter $35,000, District AttorneyGerard T. Leone Jr. s office said in a statement. The victims, whom Leone s office declined to name, had secureda $100,000 loan late last year for a man who wanted funding for abusiness venture, the statement said. After the man stoppedrepaying the loan, Winter allegedly told the victims they had topay him for loaning out the money without consent, the statementsaid. When one victim asked who Winter was and why he was involved inthe loan agreement, Winter allegedly said, There s no one in the[expletive] country that don t know who I am, the statementsaid. Melvin, working in concert with Winter, allegedly threatened thevictims several times and they feared for their safety, thestatement said. Winter became a mob boss when he replaced Buddy McLean, who waskilled in the Irish mob wars in the 1960s. Winter was laterindicted, along with 20 other people, on charges that he fixedhorse races. Bulger, who was a FBI informant at the time, escaped charges in theinvestigation and replaced Winter as mob leader. Winter was released from prison in the late 1980s, but was laterconvicted of dealing cocaine. He was released from prison again in2002 and has been working as a property manager out of his home inMillbury. Melvin also has a checkered past. He was one of six men convictedin the 1991 attempted robbery of an armored truck in Abington. TheFBI moved on the two vehicles the men were traveling in at the timeand seized two submachine guns and other firerarms. In 1998, Winter told the Globe he was surprised to hear that Bulgerand Stephen The Rifleman Flemmi were federal informants andthat Bulger had cooperated with authorities against him oncharges that put him in jail. It s still hard for me to believe, he said. Federal prosecutors then asked Winter to cooperate against Bulger,who had been a fugitive by then. Winter had four years left on a10-year sentence. But he refused. If it was my worst enemy, I wouldn t cooperate against them, Winter said. Myself, I think I d rather take a cyanide pill thango to trap someone else to save my own ass. Winter also said that he met Bulger in the 1970s, when Bulgerenlisted his help in resolv ing a bloody dispute betweenrival gangs in South Boston. Bulger later began hanging aroundWinter Hill in Somerville, eventually teaming up with Flemmi. During court testimony in 2002, John Martorano, a former hitman forBulger, implicated Winter in the 1976 slaying of a Reverebookmaker. Winter was never charged with murder. Court records show Winter has battled health problems in recentyears. In a 2006 motion to have his federal probation termshortened, a lawyer for the aging gangster wrote that Wintersuffered from prostate cancer and had also been treated for skincancer on his face and nose. In a filing objecting to Winter srequest, prosecutors called him one of the most infamouscriminals to be prosecuted in this District. The fact that he has complied with these [release] conditions (orat least not been caught violating them) is not a reason to rewardhim, prosecutors said. A judge denied Winter s request. Milton J. Valencia can be reached at mvalencia@globe.com. Followhim on Twitter @MiltonValencia. Travis Andersen can be reachedat tandersen@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @TAGlobe. I am an expert from shineder-lace.com, while we provides the quality product, such as China Metallic Lace Fabric , Polyester Lace Fabric, Elastic Lace Fabric,and more.
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