Danny Greene

Danny Greene married June Tears on December 17, 1953, and they divorced on February 28, 1956. The couple had two children.

On March 27, 1956, he married Nancy Hegler. In the late 50s they divorced but remarried in the early 60s, before finally parting ways in the mid-70s; with Nancy, he had three more children.

A book by a former Cleveland-area police lieutenant, Rick Porrello, on Greene’s war against the mafia, ‘To Kill The Irishman: The War that Crippled the Mafia’ was published in 1998. It was awarded a prize for the best non-fiction book and also adapted as a film, ‘The Irishman: The Legend of Danny Greene’.

Daniel John Patrick "Danny" Greene was born on November 14, 1933, in Cleveland, Ohio to John Henry Greene and Irene Cecelia Greene (née Fallon). Greene’s mother died when he was just three days old.

For some time, Danny stayed with his grandfather as his father lost his job as ‘Fuller Brush’ salesman due to his heavy drinking. Subsequently, Danny was placed in a Roman Catholic orphanage, ‘Parmadale’, situated in Parma, on the outskirts of Cleveland.

In 1939, Danny’s father married again and brought Danny back from the orphanage. However, the six-year-old resented his stepmother and on several occasions, ran away from home. His grandfather took him in again, and Danny lived with him for the rest of his childhood.

Enrolled at St. Jerome Catholic School, Danny did not fare too well in studies but excelled in sports and games, especially baseball and basketball. He got along very well with the nuns and priests who gave him latitude with his studies due to his sporting talent that brought the school credit.

He then shifted to St. Ignatius High School, where he found himself frequently involved in brawls with the Italian-American students and developed a very strong aversion to Italians; an aversion that stayed with him for the rest of his life. After being expelled from St. Ignatius High School, he attended Collingwood High School, which also expelled him for being habitually late.

Leaving the dockyards, Greene found employment in the ‘Cleveland Solid Waste Trade Guild’ as an enforcer. His abilities impressed both mobster Alex "Shondor" Birns and Frank "Little Frank" Brancato. A bombing incident that went wrong and almost killed him left the hearing in his right ear permanently damaged.

Disturbed by Danny involving the mafia and using violence, Mike "Big Mike" Frato quit the guild to set up a legitimate business. Greene, in September 1970, ordered Art Sneperger, an accomplice, to attach a bomb to Frato’s car but Sneperger informed Frato. As a police informer, he also disclosed the plan and that Greene was an FBI informer to Sgt. Edward Kovacic of the Cleveland Police intelligence unit.

In 1971, an apparent mistake while planting a bomb inside Frato’s car killed Sneperger but not Frato. The case was never solved, however, many theories abounded, including Greene murdering Sneperger for revealing his FBI informer status.

Greene was arrested and charged with the murder of Frato on November 26, 1971, at Cleveland's White City Beach. Despite Greene admitting to the killing, he was acquitted on grounds of self-defense. Apparently, Frato had first fired on him three times from a passing car as Greene was jogging on the beach.

Not long afterward, Danny was fired upon by a sniper as he was jogging on the same beach. Undeterred, Greene started firing on him while giving chase but the assassin could not be caught or identified.