Fotios “Freddy” Geas, 51, is under investigation for links to the lethal assault on Bulger who was beaten with a lock wrapped in a sock and had his eyes partially gouged out.
Private investigator Ted McDonough told the Boston Globe: “Freddy hated guys who abused women.
“Whitey was a rat who killed women. It’s probably that simple.”
Bulger, who was killed aged 89 at USP Hazelton, in West Virginia, had cut a deal as a FBI informant in 1975.
This was said to give him a free hand in crime for decades except for murder.
Geas himself is serving a life sentence in Hazelton having been convicted in 2003 of murdering mafia boss "Big Al' Bruno" after the man who ordered him to do the hit testified against him.
Along with his brother Ty, 46, the gangster is said to be well known for violent impulsive behaviour.
Although Greek and therefore unable to become "made" mafia members, they were hired by them as muscle.
A source close to the investigation has told the Boston Globe Geas has not disputed his role in the killing.
Meanwhile David Hoose, Geas' lawyer during the mafia killing trial, said he was not surprised his ex-client refused to talk.
He said: “He wouldn’t rat on anybody and he had no respect for anyone who would.”
Bulger had been serving a sentence of life in prison for killing 11 people, was found dead at USP Hazelton, in West Virginia.
His death is being investigated as a homicide, a prison union official has confirmed.
Authorities did not immediately release a cause of death – but reports say three men with mafia ties wheeled him away from security cameras before beating him and gouging out his eyes.
Whitey Bulger was once one of America’s most wanted fugitives after living a double life as one of Boston's most notorious mobsters and as a secret FBI informant.
He was arrested in Los Angeles in 2011 after 16 years on the run.
Wheelchair-bound Bulger was serving a life sentence after being convicted in 2013 of a string of gangland crimes in the 1970s and 80s, including participating in 11 murders.
A source told DailyMail.com he had been talking about outing people in the FBI prior to his death.
Bulger terrorised Boston’s underworld as the leader of the notorious Winter Hill crime gang, murdering and extorting to get his way.
He cemented his grip on the crime scene through ties with corrupt FBI officials who shared his Irish background.
They turned a blind eye to his crimes in exchange for information they could use against the Italian Mafia.
Bulger was said to have been an inspiration for the gangster played by Jack Nicholson in Oscar-winning 2006 film The Departed.
Bulger was also portrayed by Johnny Depp in a 2015 film Black Mass.
He was convicted in August 2013 of 11 murders, among other charges including racketeering, and sentenced to two consecutive life terms plus five years.
Prison had been something Bulger had gone to great lengths to avoid – killing potential witnesses, cultivating corrupt lawmen and living as a fugitive for 16 years.
But it all ended when a tip from a former Icelandic beauty queen led to his capture in June 2011 in Santa Monica, California, where he was living with a long-time girlfriend.
Bulger and his Winter Hill gang had operated for more than two decades in the insular Irish-dominated South Boston neighbourhood, engaging in loan sharking, gambling, extortion, drug dealing and murder.
Prosecutors said he strangled two women with his hands and tortured a man for hours before shooting him in the head with a machine gun.
Kevin Weeks, a former Bulger lieutenant who would eventually testify against him, said: "We took what we wanted.
"We made millions through extortion and loansharking and protection.
"And if someone ratted us out, we killed him. We were not nice guys."
Bulger grew up in South Boston where he was nicknamed "Whitey" because of his light blond hair.
As a teenager he joined a gang known as The Shamrocks and ended up in prison from 1956 to 1965 for robbing banks
After his release he fell in with the Irish mob in South Boston, working his way through the ranks as a bookie and loanshark, becoming a leading figure in the area's underworld by the early 1970s.
His career was boosted by his relationship with rogue FBI agent John J. Connolly, who Bulger had known since they were boys.
Connolly was supposed to be in charge of getting information out of him and Bulger did provide information that helped the FBI go after his main rival, New England's Italian Mafia, as well as local criminals.
In return, Connolly let Bulger know about working investigations while Bulger and close associate Steve "The Rifleman" Flemmi carried on with impunity.
After he retired from the FBI, Connolly tipped off Bulger about a coming indictment, sending the mobster on the run in 1995.
Connolly was convicted in 2008 of racketeering, taking bribes and second-degree murder for his role in the slaying of an accountant who Bulger and Flemmi feared would testify against them.
Bulger's former associates turned on him while he was at large and their information led to a 2000 indictment that originally charged him with 19 murders.
Tom Foley, who worked on Bulger cases for the Massachusetts State Police, said: "The guy is a sociopathic killer.
"He loved that type of life. He's one of the hardest and cruelest individuals that operated in the Boston area. He's a bad, bad, bad guy."
When Bulger fled, he first took Teresa Stanley, his girlfriend of 30 years, with him.
After a few weeks at large, however, Stanley wanted to go home so Bulger dropped her off and picked up another of his girlfriends, Catherine Greig, and disappeared again.
Bulger spent his final years of freedom in No. 303 of the Princess Eugenia apartment complex in Santa Monica with Greig.
One of their neighbours, Anna Bjornsdottir, a former U.S. television actress and Miss Iceland of 1974,
She earned a $2 million reward for turning in Bulger.
She had been watching a news report about the Bulger manhunt when she recognized the man she knew by the name Charlie Gasko and notified the FBI.
At first he denied his identity but eventually told authorities: "You know who I am. I'm Whitey Bulger." More than $800,000 in cash and a cache of weapons was found hidden in the walls of his apartment.
Greig was sentenced to eight years in prison and fined $150,000 for helping Bulger evade capture.
She is scheduled for release in September 2020.
A parade of former associates testified against Bulger at his two-month trial for murder, giving brutal details about how he would kill enemies and then take a nap.
Sometimes Bulger sat silently at the defendant's table and at other times he engaged in profane shouting matches with witnesses such as Flemmi.
Bulger, who denied ever being an FBI informant, refused to testify on the grounds that the trial was a sham.
The U.S. Justice Department paid more than $20 million in damages to families of people killed by Bulger on the grounds that he was operating under government supervision while killing.
While Bulger was robbing banks and killing people, his younger brother Billy was acquiring political notoriety and power.
Billy served in the Massachusetts legislature for 35 years, including several years as president of the Senate, and then was president of the University of Massachusetts.
He was forced to resign the latter job in 2003 after it was learned that eight years earlier he had spoken by phone with Whitey, who was a fugitive at the time, and did not report it to authorities.
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