Kelly Mannarino

Kelly Mannarino emerges in Frank Sheeran’s account as both a close friend of Russell Bufalino and a figure whose hospitality and generosity gave that friendship a domestic face. His association with Russell extended from long meals and private jokes to business ties and a wider network that reached Cuba; when Kelly fell gravely ill, Russell’s grief revealed how deep their bond ran.

Friendship with Russell Bufalino

For as long as Sheeran knew him, Russell Bufalino liked Sheeran to drive him west to the Pittsburgh area to visit Kelly in New Kensington. Kelly and Russell cooked tomato sauce together, calling it gravy, and let it simmer all day, sometimes through the night. At dinner, their hospitality came with a friendly obligation: guests had to eat both men’s cooking, and neither dish displaced the other. There was still room, at the end, to dip bread into the gravy left on the plate.

Russell made prosciutto gravy, and Kelly was a capable cook in his own right. Their cooking became a contest, but Sheeran remembered the homemade wine and the relaxed company as the real winners. The men joked about each other’s dishes and shared a strong sense of humor. Kelly’s friendship with Russell was not only a matter of business or meetings; it was sustained in the repeated pleasures of cooking, eating, and laughing together.

A Place in Sheeran’s Life

Kelly and Russell treated Sheeran as someone close to the family. Sheeran said Russell treated him like a son, while acknowledging that he could not be certain whether Russell thought of him in quite those terms. Kelly and Russell had no children, and Sheeran understood that Russell liked having him around. The recollection gives their hospitality a personal weight: Sheeran did not describe himself merely as the driver who brought Russell to visit, but as someone welcomed into the friendship’s everyday rituals.

Kelly also ran a candy company. Sheeran singled out its giant chocolate-covered Easter eggs, filled with coconut nougat or peanut-butter nougat. When Sheeran was away in school, he sent those eggs to his lawyers’ wives. The detail places Kelly’s business in the same remembered world as the visits and meals: his presence reached beyond New Kensington through a gift Sheeran continued to share with others.

Illness and Grief

The only time Sheeran saw Russell show emotion was when Kelly developed cancer in 1980, shortly before Sheeran’s first trial in Philadelphia. Over six months, Kelly’s weight fell to 100 pounds. Russell cried simply at the sight of him. In Sheeran’s account, the change was stark: the man usually remembered through food, jokes, and easy companionship became dangerously ill, and Russell’s tears exposed the depth of his attachment.

Business, Cuba, and Community

Kelly and his brother were partners with Meyer Lansky in the San Souci casino in Havana. Sheeran used that connection to describe organized crime as broader than its Italian-American component, encompassing Jewish and other groups as well. He recalled Kelly and Russell as particularly close to Lansky, who commanded considerable respect. The casino partnership placed Kelly within a network extending well beyond the local visits Sheeran described, and Sheeran said Kelly, his brother, and Lansky lost much in Cuba, as Russell did.

Kelly also had business dealings with Russell, and, like Russell and Angelo, opposed drugs. Sheeran said there were no drugs in their circle. He remembered Kelly’s generosity in practical terms: people in his area received food at Thanksgiving and Christmas, whenever else they needed it, and coal in winter. Kelly thus appears not only as Russell’s intimate friend and a participant in a far-reaching business network, but as someone whose care for local people was expressed through recurring, material assistance.