Bulger accuser is found dead in Lincoln

By Alice Waugh

Lincoln police have confirmed that the body of Stephen Rakes, 59, of Quincy was found off Mill Street in Lincoln at about 1:30 p.m. yesterday afternoon. Rakes had hoped to testify against mob boss James “Whitey” Bulger, claiming that Bulger forced him under threat of death to sell his recently opened South Boston liquor store in 1984, according to a 2001 Boston Globe article.

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner is conducting an autopsy to determine the cause and manner of death, though there were no obvious signs of trauma, according to a press release from the Middlesex District Attorney press office.

The Boston Globe reported today that Steve Davis, the brother of alleged Bulger murder victim Debra Davis and a close friend of Rakes, said Rakes had talked about buying property in Lincoln and suggested that Rakes may have been in the town to look at property. The Globe also reported that Boston attorney Anthony Cardinale, who represented Rakes’s ex-wife, Julie Dammers, said he doubted that Rakes’ death had anything to do with the the Bulger prosecution. According to the New York Times, Rakes recently learned that we would not be called as a witness in Bulger’s trial.

When asked on Thursday by the Lincoln Squirrel precisely where on Mill Street the body was found and by whom, Lincoln Police Chief Kevin Mooney referred all questions to the DA press office, which declined to answer further questions. The incident remains under investigation by Massachusetts State Police assigned to the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office and the Lincoln Police Department.