Elena Semander

popular name: Rocco Marinucci

date_of_death: March 15, 1982

age: 30

cause_of_death: Murdered - mob hit

claim_to_fame: Crime and their Victims

best_know_for: Rocco Marinucci was a pizza restaurant owner (Pop’s Pizza in South Philly) and a Philadelphia crime family associate. He was responsible for planting a bomb under mob boss Philip Testa's porch, killing him instantly. Rocco Marinucci worked as Peter Casella's chauffeur and bodyguard within the Philadelphia crime family, and he was recruited into the conspiracy to whack Philip Testa. On March 15, 1981, he planted a bomb on Testa's porch, killing him. Testa's son, Salvatore Testa, was given permission by Nicky Scarfo to kill those responsible for his father's death. Marinucci was killed by Testa on March 15, 1982 - exactly one year to the day since his father's murder. Marinucci's body was found on Federal Street in Southwark, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with bullet wounds to the neck, chest, and head. His mouth was stuffed with three firecrackers. But don't feel too sad for Rocco - one of his associates flipped and confessed to helping Marinucci murdering his neighbors for playing their music too loud. Upon his death, he was interred at Grave of Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon, PA.

popular name: Frank Palermo

date_of_death: May 12, 1996

age: 91

cause_of_death: Natural causes

claim_to_fame: Crime and their Victims

best_know_for: Boxing has a dark history of gangsters, crooked fights and mysterious murders. In the world of boxing at the time, Frank “Blinky” Palermo, a member of the Philadelphia Cosa Nostra crime family, was indeed royalty. Along with his partner, Frankie Carbo, a New York Lucchese crime family member, Palermo managed and controlled many of the professional boxers around the country. Although this Philly hustler was only five feet tall, he was a giant at assault and battery, big at bootlegging, jobbing, racketeering, numbers runner, petty thief, shakedown artist, wiseguy - Blinky was a man of many talents. Palermo's partner was Mafioso Frankie Carbo, a soldier in New York's Lucchese family who had been a gunman with Murder, Inc. During the 1940s, Frankie Carbo became a boxing promoter, working along with Ettore "Eddie" Coco, James "Jimmy Doyle" Plumeri, Frank "Blinky" Palermo, Harry "Champ" Segal, & Felix Bocchicchio. The group was known as "The Combination", together they were highly successful in fixing high-profile boxing matches. Even worse Palermo would cheat his stable of fighters out of their share of the purses of their fights. In 1961, the Feds zeroed in on Carbo and Palermo and were charged, tried and convicted of committing a dozens of crimes. Blinky Palermo was sentenced to fifteen years in prison. Upon his death, he was laid to rest at Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon, PA.

popular name: Stringbean Akeman

date_of_death: November 10, 1973

age: 58

cause_of_death: Homicide - gunshot wounds

claim_to_fame: Crime and their Victims

best_know_for: David "Stringbean" Akeman was an American singer-songwriter, musician, comedian, actor and semiprofessional baseball player best known for his role as a featured original cast member on the hit television show Hee Haw and as a member of the Grand Ole Opry. Akeman was well-known for his "old-fashioned" banjo-picking style, careful mix of comedy and music, and his memorable stage wardrobe (which consisted of a long nightshirt tucked into a pair of short blue jeans belted around his knees — giving him the comical appearance of a very tall man with stubby legs). Akeman and his wife were shot and murdered by burglars in their rural Tennessee home near Ridgetop in 1973.