A former Mafia hitman was sentenced to 25 years in prison Friday in the 2018 fatal prison bludgeoning of notorious Boston gangster James "Whitey" Bulger .
Federal prisoner Fotios "Freddy" Geas was sentenced in federal court in northern West Virginia after pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter and assault resulting in serious bodily injury.
Prosecutors said Geas used a lock attached to a belt to repeatedly hit the 89-year-old Bulger in the head hours after he arrived at the troubled U.S. Penitentiary, Hazelton, from another lockup in Florida in October 2018. Defense attorneys disputed that characterization, saying Geas hit Bulger with his fist.
Geas, 57, already was serving a life sentence for previous violent crimes. The Justice Department said last year that it would not seek the death penalty against him in Bulger's killing.
Bulger, who ran the largely Irish gang in Boston in the 1970s and '80s, also served as an FBI informant who ratted on his gang's main rival, according to the bureau. Bulger strongly denied ever being a government informant.
