By Jim Smith
BOSTON — the accused killer of Boston anti-gang prosecutor Paul McLaughlin was convicted of first-degree murder Saturday in Suffolk Superior Court, ending an agonizing search for justice that lasted nearly four years.
Jeffrey Bly, 24, was immediately sentenced to life in prison without parole.
The verdict drew sighs of relief and tears from the many friends, relatives and colleagues of the 42-year-old prosecutor who packed the courtroom.
McLaughlin’s murder, the first-ever homicide in Massachusetts of a prosecutor by a defendant, had shaken the state’s criminal justice system to its core.
Bly, a gang leader notorious for intimidating and silencing witnesses against him, was convicted of shooting McLaughlin in the head at point-blank range after jumping out from behind bushes and grabbing the prosecutor as he was getting into his ’82 Toyota at a West Roxbury railway station after completing work at the DA’s office on Sept. 25, 1995. On the following day, McLaughlin was set to begin prosecuting a carjacking case against Bly, who police say had recently failed in a conspiracy to kill the key witness against him.
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Bly’s reputation for violence and vengeance created an atmosphere of tension throughout the course of the trial. Camera coverage was sharply curtailed, and two jurors were excused just prior to the start of the trial after they expressed fear for their safety.
McLaughlin’s murder had capped a weekend of horror for the city’s Irish-American community. On Sept. 23, 1995, two days before McLaughlin’s murder, Irish student Orla Benson was raped and murdered in Allston. Her killer, Pedro Rosario, received a life-without-parole sentence on June 13, 1997.
The case against Bly consisted of testimony from some of Bly’s former gang allies and from two women who said they heard him boast about the crime. Another witness testified she saw Bly near the scene of the crime around the time of the murder.
In addition, experts testified that Bly’s DNA profile was found on clothes left behind on railroad tracks near the murder scene. In his closing arguments last Wednesday, special prosecutor Thomas Brennan told the racially mixed jury of seven women and five men that Bly was the only person "on the planet" who had a motive to kill McLaughlin.
Bly’s defense lawyers had argued that DNA testing was flawed and that gang associates were under intense pressure from Boston police to implicate Bly in the murder. One defense witness testified that Bly was with him around the time of the shooting, but his testimony contradicted earlier statements he had made to law enforcement officers.
Bly winced, shook his head once from side to side and slumped in his chair when the verdict was announced Saturday afternoon. He was then shackled and ordered to remain in the courtroom while Paul McLaughlin’s 78-year-old father, former Mass. Lt. Gov. Edward McLaughlin, read a moving and eloquent impact statement from the witness stand.
McLaughlin said that about one month before his son’s murder he had suggested to him that he might want to consider leaving state service for more lucrative opportunities in the private practice of law. "He looked at me and said, ‘Not yet, Dad, I still think in time I can make a difference.’ "
"He worked so hard and so fearlessly to try to make the neighborhoods safe so that the residents, and particularly the young people, could lead peaceful and secure lives," McLaughlin said. "I can only hope and pray today that he has now found his peace with God, to which I think his dedicated work on this earth has so richly entitled him."