[caption id="attachment_67296" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="James "Whitey" Bulger."]
BOSTON --- The Boston Globe has identified the tipster who collected the $2 million reward for turning in notorious Irish-American gangster James "Whitey" Bulger to the FBI.
Anna Bjornsdottir, who was Miss Iceland in 1974, contacted the FBI in June after seeing a CNN report about the manhunt for Bulger and his girlfriend, Catherine Greig, according to a news story in Sunday's Globe.
According to that report, the 57-year-old Bjornsdottir, who is a graphic designer and yoga instructor, had lived periodically at a Santa Monica, California hotel across the street from the fugitives' apartment building when she was not in her native Iceland.
She reportedly struck up an acquaintance with Bulger and Greig when they came outside to feed a stray cat.
The disclosure of the woman's name has sparked a debate in the media about whether the Globe should have printed her name, and whether the FBI did enough to protect the confidentiality of its source.
A news story in Monday's Boston Herald included expressions of concern by editors at that daily paper about the safety of the tipster now that her name has become public.
And in its Tuesday edition, the Herald had a news story in which U.S. Rep. Dan Burton of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said that whoever released the name to the Globe should be "kicked out of the FBI."
In the same story, U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts asked, "Would she have cooperated if she knew her name would get out? She may not have been willing to take that risk."
In defense of their position, Boston Globe editors said in a news story in Tuesday's edition that they are convinced that the printing of the name poses no danger to the woman and that it quelled speculation that the FBI had fabricated the story about an Icelandic tipster.
"We asked people directly involved in the investigation if she would be in danger if we named her," said Jennifer Peter, the Globe's deputy managing editor for local news. "No one told us she would be in danger at all."
The FBI has declined to say whether it authorized the release of the tipster's name to the media. Bulger, who is implicated in 19 murders, is due back in federal court next month.
