WARNING: EXPLICIT MATERIAL

Dr. Francis E. Sweeney

AKA:

The Cleveland Torso Murderer

Birth Name:

Francis Edward Sweeney

Birth Date:

May 5, 1894

Birth Place:

Kingsbury Run, Cleveland, Ohio

Death Date:

July 9, 1964

Place of Death:

Veterans' Hospital, Dayton, Ohio

Age:

Cause of Death:

Natural causes

Cemetery Name:

Calvary Cemetery

Claim to Fame:

Crime and their Victims

Associates:

From 1935 to 1938, 12 bodies – some people say 13 - were dumped in the area known as Kingsbury Run, a creek bed that ran from East 90th Street and Kinsman Road to the Cuyahoga River. The victims included seven men and five women. Most were hobos and prostitutes, people living on the edge at a time when Cleveland was hard hit by the Great Depression. Many weren't missed for months. After 80 years after Frank Dolezal was murdered in his prison cell as the suspected serial killer, multiple investigators have uncovered both old and new evidence that most certainly points to Dr. Francis Sweeney as the actual Cleveland Torso Murderer. Dr. Sweeney perfectly fit the profile of the Cleveland Torso Murderer and had the medical expertise required for dismembering human bodies. Alas we was never arrested as he committed himself to a mental hospital after extensive questioning by Eliot Ness, special agent assigned to the killings.

Fun Fact

Dr. Frank Sweeney was consider by those who worked closely with him as highly intelligent with a strong work ethic. Raised in near poverty when both parents passed away in his youth, Frank worked his way through undergraduate work, pharmacy school and medical school, all the while holding down full-time jobs. His classmates in medical school elected him vice president of his sophomore class and his professors recommended him without reservation. He graduated from medical school in St. Louis in 1928 and became a surgical resident at St. Alexis hospital in the Kingsbury Run area. It wasn’t until 1929 when he was a surgeon that he started developing paranoid schizophrenia.

In May 1938, Eliot Ness interrogated him for two weeks in a room in what is now the Renaissance Cleveland Hotel.

Cemetery Information:

Final Resting Place:

Calvary Cemetery

10000 Miles Avenue

Cleveland, Ohio, 44105

USA

North America

Map:

Cemetery map of Calvary Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio.

Grave Location:

Section 81, Lot 801, Grave 1

Grave Location Description

As you enter the cemetery drive straight back and under the bridge and take the first right. Located in Section 81 bordering Section 113 and directly below the service road into Section 113, Frank Sweeney’s grave has a monument but it is not marked with his name. Look for the name McGreevy with a blank name plate on the right side of the monument 4 rows into Section 81 directly behind the tree.