A police officer in suburban Cleveland, Lt. Rick Porrello serendipitously began his writing career when curiosity about the mysterious murder of his grandfather and several uncles led to penning his first true-crime saga, The Rise and Fall of the Cleveland Mafia. Porrello went on to write a second book, To Kill the Irishman which recounts the story of Irish-American racketeer Danny Greene who took on the Cleveland Mafia and was murdered in 1977.