Frank Sheeran
Frank Sheeran was a US Army veteran who served in combat during the Second World War, seeing action in Sicily, the Italian campaign, the invasion of Southern France, the Battle of the Bulge, and the invasion of Germany. He later claimed to have witnessed and participated in war crimes, including the execution of German POWs and other reprisals, which led him to develop a callous disregard for human life. After his discharge from the Army, he found work as a truck driver but also began committing crimes including truck hijacking and according to his own admission, murders for hire. This attracted the attention of the Bufalino crime family.
Sheeran became a close associate of the leaders of the Bufalino family, who introduced him to Jimmy Hoffa. Hoffa used Sheeran as a bodyguard and as muscle, including the elimination of rivals in the Teamsters Union and officials of other unions which Hoffa feared were encroaching upon his authority. Sheeran continued to be used by the mob as a professional killer for hire during his time with the Teamsters, and was instrumental in the union’s corruption by organized crime. When Hoffa was introduced to Sheeran he said “I heard you paint houses”, Mafia code for paid killings. Sheeran replied “Yes, I do my own plumbing too,” meaning that he also disposed of the bodies.
In 1972 Russell Bufalino hired Sheeran to kill Joey Gallo, a member of the Colombo crime family. Sheeran caught up with Gallo at Umberto’s Clam House, where he was sitting at a table celebrating his birthday with his wife and young daughter. Sheeran opened fire on Gallo, who staggered outside before collapsing, while his family ducked for cover. They were unharmed but Gallo was dead. Sheeran walked to a waiting car and escaped. His account of the murder of Gallo differs considerably from that reported by the newspapers at the time, which described multiple gunmen taking part in the murder, and that more than twenty shots were fired in the restaurant.
Sheeran also claimed to have been involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, delivering three rifles to David Ferrie for eventual distribution to the three gunmen. According to Sheeran, the assassination was a Mafia-planned operation, intended to disrupt the investigations into union corruption which were spearheaded by Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. Sheeran claimed to have been involved only to the level of delivering the rifles, which he carried from a warehouse in Brooklyn to an undisclosed location in Florida, where he handed them over to Ferrie.
Sheeran also claimed to have been hired to kill Jimmy Hoffa. According to his story, which he related to Charles Brandt who published it in a 2004 book, Hoffa was lured to meet Sheeran, who then rode with him and two others to a house in a Detroit suburb. Hoffa and Sheeran went into the house as the others drove off and Sheeran shot the union leader twice in the back of his head. He claimed the body was cremated in a mob-controlled crematorium. The house was later examined by the FBI and bloodstains consistent with Sheeran’s story were found, but could not be definitively linked to a single person. Sheeran later served 13 years in prison for racketeering and died in 2003.