Catherine Greig asked a federal appeals court Wednesday to effectively shorten her 8-year prison sentence for harboring James “Whitey” Bulger, arguing that a judge should not have allowed relatives of the gangster’s alleged victims to speak at her sentencing hearing.

In an appeal filed with the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston, her appellate lawyer, Dana A. Curhan, also said that because Greig’s illegal conduct was limited to harboring Bulger, her sentencing guidelines should have been lower.