BOSTON (AP) -- A lawyer for reputed gangster James "Whitey" Bulger has told a judge a jury should decide Bulger's claim he had immunity to commit crimes from a former federal prosecutor.

But attorney J.W. Carney Jr. also said Wednesday outside court Bulger wasn't an informant. Carney didn't explain why Bulger would've had immunity if he hadn't helped federal law enforcement officials as an informant. Carney said he'd answer that at Bulger's trial.

FBI files and testimony in other cases say Bulger was an FBI informant during the 1970s and 80s, when he's accused of participating in 19 murders. He fled Boston in 1994 and was one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives until his 2011 capture.

At Wednesday's hearing a prosecutor asked the judge to throw out the immunity claim, saying any such agreement that included murder would be void.