Henry Hill was an FBI informant whose life was immortalized by the 1990 movie Goodfellas, where he was played by Ray Liotta. I could never understand why my mother always brought so much with her. So he grew up to be a gangster. Anders said her initial reaction was to say no - insisting that she had to work that day - however her beau of less than two months quickly convinced her otherwise, and they packed up her car and, along with her then-13-year-old son Kris, drove to Virginia City, Nevada, where they tied the knot. They wanted more information and his testimony. There was a reported two-million-dollar contract on his head and word was getting out that Hill was living in the Midwest. And Hill didnt just bring along his wife and kids; he tried to take two of his mistresses into protection, too. It helps, but is not necessary, to have read Wiseguy (I haven't) or seen Goodfellas (I have, multiple times). Vivian had always been protective of Sherry, who had a knack for choosing the wrong men. Pistol-whipped him! He married his then-girlfriend Dawn, who was a degenerate junkie like Hill. He told me once that the wiseguys were the only people who were nice to him. Wed 13 Jun 2012 11.51 EDT 50 Henry Hill has died - of natural causes. Sherry, who was paranoid about the whole situation, started sleeping with a gun under her pillow just as Hill had when he first entered Witness Protection. I am a Teacher who started creating online content for my students from 2016 so that they can get access to free knowledge online. My father thought it was funny, eating at Godfathers Pizza, and maybe it was funny, Gregg wrote. But right to the end, he managed to stay one step ahead of the mafia assassins he long feared. Along the way he peddled cookbooks, travel guides, posters anything for a buck, anything to relive, just for an instant, his days of glittering infamy. His thriving business made the front page of the Cincinnati Enquirer he was seen in a photo with a perm and a fake mustache, clearly trying to escape the photographers frame. His fights with Sherry (Im not your maid or your mommy!) were followed by make-up sex. After their first date, the two were inseparable. I cant get married today. The events of their lives were chronicled in the 1990 film Goodfellas and several books. Please enjoy this small glimpse into the life of a mobster/father that my family and I are able to share. In line with his eternal luck, Hill was rescued by the FBI. She found him at the bar next door. My mother always brought a big bag jammed with all kinds of stuff. At first, he was happy to hear the news. Profile. His greatest success, the heist that made him a minor legend in the New York underworld, was burglarizing an Air France strong room at Kennedy Airport in 1967 and walking out with $480,000. ', And when Hill turned up later he found his two wives in the home he shared with Karen. The book covers both the remembrances of the Hill children prior to their entry into WITSEC and their subsequent adventures. All I knew was that my father was in trouble, and I resented him for it. He got mad and threw her out of the car, miles from home, and tore off so fast that the tires threw gravel in her face. In 2006, at the encouragement of Liotta, Hill entered rehabilitation to combat his drug addiction problems. He was given a bulletproof vest to wear whenever he was with Hill, but he never wore it. He kept his assumed name Scott, finished college, and then law school. His name was John Ciaccio, and he owed a gambling debt to a friend of my father, a guy who ran one of the unions at Kennedy Airport. There was also another reason for why she didnt want to cut the cord Yes, she was pregnant. 220, and maybe a little precocious. Funnily enough, in a way that fit his lack of concern, his latest identity combined the names of his favorite comics: Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. He told her how much he still loved Sherry and managed to convince her to let him in the house. There was one day when Sherry ran into Karen her fellow survivor and had a chat about their husbands past infidelities. Hill went the other way, and Tony takes him to task for it. Karen today continues to use an alias to protect her identity, as do her two children, Gregg and Gina. They started double dating (with Vivian and her husband) and Hill always made an impression with his 100-dollar tips. How could she have been so blind? But when he drank, he was a loudmouth, which was how Karen heard about the pregnancy. Most girls would have been terrified, but my mom said she thought it was sexy. Hill grew up in Brooklyn, New York, where he admired local mafiosi, including Paul Vario, a capo in the Luchesse crime family. That gangster, shed say, only shed spit out the words. Ever since, Id suffered migraines, maybe once a week or so. Lorraine Bracco performed so stunningly as Karen Hill in the movie that she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. That is where this book by Gregg and Gina Hill comes into play. I couldnt help but stare back and wonder what they must be thinking: New York hood on the run from the Mob.. Following his arrest for the robbery on April 27, 1980, detectives played him wire taps of other mob members threatening to kill him but he refused to talk, at least for a while. But Hill was still letting himself into Sherrys house at odd hours, one time writing I love you, Sherry Amour, HH on the bathroom mirror in lipstick. Hed been locked up a few times since Id been born, once for seventeen months; my mom took me to visit him in the Nassau County jail when I was about four. She then dragged him out of the bed by the crotch and beat him with a telephone. He wasnt the kind of man they wanted their oldest daughter to end up with, but he could be awfully charming. Karen found this incident so insulting that she angrily slapped him. They were so young, my dad twenty-two and my mom just nineteen. Thats how their life together started, nightclubs and pistol-whippings. But then federal prosecutors indicted them for extortion, which they could do because my father had crossed state lines. He was 13 and his sister Gina was just 11 and in only seconds their lives were changed forever. Janet meant real trouble for her family. Hill was now going by the name Martin Lewis. Late gangster Henry Hill - who was portrayed by Liotta in Martin Scorcese's hit 1990 movie - was taken into the FBI's witness protection program with his wife Karen and their two children, Gail and Michael, in 1980 after helping to jail members of his infamous mafia gang. Sherry had no clue. What that meant was that the Church offered legal provisions for one-party annulments under certain circumstances. Hill died at a hospital in Los Angeles in June 2012 having suffered a heart attack brought on by years of smoking, a habit he blamed on his nerves. As Janet went on and on about the details of Hills secret life, more and more of the puzzle came together for Sherry. It took quite a while for the DEA officials to confirm that their target Martin Lewis was actually Henry Hill, and when the news broke, choppers were hovering over the Hill house for weeks. Secrets & Wives Truly*Adventurous Medium. Now that the secret was out, Janet no longer had to tiptoe around. Jimmy Burke usually tucked a fifty in the guys shirt pocket for his trouble; thats where he got his nickname, The Gent. He wrote about the heist in a detailed form and from his point of view. Their dad was Henry Hill - immortalised in the book Wiseguy and the Martin Scorsese film. See Photos. However, we are getting this story from two people closest to Henry Hill: his son and his daughter, so we know it must be the awful truth. Henry Hill, an associate in the . As much as she tried to move on, Hill was always in her thoughts; she couldnt get him out of her mind. She was born in New York and raised in the Five Towns area of . According to his son and his daughter, Henry Hill was truly a despicable man. Karen immediately called Henry. Copyright 2004 by Gregg Hill and Gina Hill. See Photos. Henry Hill then became an informant to the FBI, which caused Karen and the children to enter the Witness Protection Program, where they were given new identities and lived in numerous locations through the 1980s. The small and striking brunette, 31, was a beautician who grew up around horses and knew her way around the track. She knew something wasnt right. He Was Not Ready For What He Discovered There, Buns in the Oven: Couple Gets Pregnant After 17 Years, The Murder Story of the Wealthiest Woman in Monaco. Im done with Sherry, she said in an interview. The day before he went to Lewisburg, the same day my mother was telling my little sister that he was going away for a while, he went out drinking with his friends. Gina flew to Florida, and although Justin was already in a foster home, Gina was able to obtain custody. Today, Karen and her two children, Gina and Gregg continue to use an alias to protect their identity. In time, I would grow to hate those words. When Sherry said no, she got violent again. Janet and two other female detectives at the agency were dubbed Charlies Angels. Gina also got married and started her own family. Sherry threw all my clothes out of her second-story bedroom window right into a pile of snow. The firm represented Jimmy Burke, Hills former Mob boss, a man who wanted him dead. Despite the obvious cons of being married to a con, she still loved him and had false hope that it would work out. Years later, she admitted, It was so devastating I wanted to kill myself, to be quite honest. Slowly but surely, she moved on and started doing hair and makeup for movies and TV shows. Henry Hill continued to be the same reprobate he always had been. Goodfellas didn't leave Henry's personal life behind and included his wife, Karen Hill (Lorraine Bracco), in the story. See Photos. Gram was always tough on Dad. She was notorious mobster Henry Hill's girlfriend - the dude from Goodfellas who passed away at age 69 yesterday. Karen and Henry's daughter Gina later described her mother's account of the aftermath of the Ted incident in the memoir On the Run: A Mafia Childhood: "My mom called my dad and he picked her up and drove her home, but instead of going into the house with her, he went across the street. There stood Karen, furious as can be, and she started beating Sherry with the same phone. Suddenly, a man who never knew life outside of the mob, was walking the streets as one of us. He told her that he recently dealt with a medical crisis and almost died. Watch a rare interview with one of the most famous wiseguys of all time Henry Hill, of "Goodfellas" fame. QUICK FACTS Birth Year:. She also didnt know that anyone who became close to him was a walking target. He had a few cover stories under his belt, about how he worked for the government (not so far from the truth). Henry Hill, Karen, Gregg, Gina. Hill was the hustler not her. But while their attraction to one another may well have been authentic, it was one of the only aspects of their fiery romance that was. Just like with the witness program, Hill assumed hed get away with it. You can imagine the look on Hills face when he came home to see both his wives talking at the kitchen table. The two met for the first time at a, Karen Friedman Hill was mostly unaware of her husbands illegal, Things took a nasty turn when Henry received a ten-year sentence for, Henrys children officially released a book titled On the Run: A Mafia Childhood, in the year 2004 that gives the readers an insight into the family's life. The electricity during those months was just absolutely volatile, just screaming. Raised a Mormon in rural Washington, the single mom was nave, if anything. He would disappear for days (probably to visit his actual family). Despite being under the supervision of the Feds, Hill became a violent drug addict and began dealing drugs to support his habit. He told others that he was an insurance investigator for arson cases (completely fake, but he had some experience with torching places down). Hide Self (2 credits) 2021 Narco Wars (TV Series documentary) Self - Henry Hill's Daughter. He was put behind bars in 1987 and later claimed he dodged at least two attempts by Vario and Burke goons who were in the same prison to have him killed. Hill, who died in LA in 2012, was taken into witness protection with his wife Karen and their two children, Gina and Gregg, in 1980, after helping the FBI to arrest several of his fellow gangsters. He was on a mission to apologize to all those whom he had wronged in his life. He torched a few buildings. She ended up seeing Hill one last time (she has always called him Martin). As for Karen she divorced Hill in 1990 and it was finalized in 2002. He said he felt closer to God now. Against his fathers wishes Hill got in with the mafia crowd aged 11 when he started hanging around with the infamous Lucchese family. Wed leave at eleven oclock, sometimes even later, and drive west into Pennsylvania. As usual, Hill was drunk. And Hill was everywhere she couldnt hide from him. Now, almost 25 years later, Gregg and Gina Hill are breaking their own silence in a new book called "On the Run: A Mafia Childhood. The siblings were invited to discuss the book on Today. Heres an excerpt: GINA: One of my earliest memories of my dad was my mom telling me he was going away. Finally, Karen figured out a way to dissolve Hills marriage to Sherry. This time, the family was placed in Redmond, Washington, and right off the bat, Hill spoke to an acquaintance in Kentucky asking him to ship one of the horses he had bought for his daughter to him, the one named Banana Split. So brazen was Hill that he even wore a 'Witness Protection Program' T-shirt while dating Anders. Henry Hills dead. She really did assume that Hill was dead, with all the drugs and drinking and wild lifestyle he ran. It was only a matter of time until Hill landed in prison. Those bastards. She made it sound like the government was picking on him over something petty. 'But I moved in with her for a short period of time; it didn't last long because I kept going home to Karen and the kids. This is one of the menus in my father's restaurant. She thought a nice Jewish girl like my mom should have married a doctor or a lawyer, not some hoodlum Catholic from Brooklyn that shed met on a blind date. Sherrys next move was breaking the bad news to her mother, who adored her son-in-law, and to her son, Kris, who was heartbroken. It was like another country, Henry later said. According to Gregg Hill, his father constantly cheated on his wife, Karan, and he even got married again to one of his drug buddies while he was still married to Karen. Henry Hill. What he lacked in the looks department he made up for with his charisma. He bragged about having a Kings X a term for being exempt from the rules of a game. While he was worried about making any disturbances at work, his dad would be getting hammered at the bar. Lisa, of Italian-American descent, shared a Malibu home with Hill (who was portrayed . Sherry came with a small handgun in her purse, just in case, and asked her friend to call the police if she didnt hear from her by 2 p.m. At the diner, seeing a table of uniformed cops offered her some relief. It was during his relationship with Anders that Hill began working on his book Wiseguys - whichwould inspire the 1990 Martin Scorsese crime classic Goodfellas in which he was played by Liotta alongside Robert de Niro and Joe Pesci. In 1955, Hill began to warm up to Paul Vario by running some errands for the mafioso at Vario's meat stores,. Apparently, he had a thing for pistol-whipping. He still wore his expensive suits and shiny loafers, but he had nowhere to go except to the store for milk. With this, Karen went into panic mode. Lorraine Bracco depicted Karen Hill in the film Goodfellas, which was directed by Martin Scorsese. She walked into Sherrys home, which was unlocked, and went straight to the bedroom to find her husband sleeping. 2005 The Jane Pauley Show (TV Series) Self. And again, Sherry escaped. And then wed get to the prison. Its just temporary, she said. I began this blog to simply tell part of my father's story through my eyes. The man was flirting with disaster. One day, Hill announced that the four of them were going on an impromptu trip to Canada immediately. The funny thing is he never even showed up to court. That was my mom, trying to make something very big sound very small. Related: Goodfellas True Story: The Real Life Gangster Morrie . Just a few years, she said, like a few years was a long weekend. I just married him. But Karen repeated herself: No, hes my husband. Thats when Sherry said, We need to talk. Sherry followed the car to the familys ranch-style home. Its not easy getting up on the stand, he later said of turning his back on his ex-mentors. When I was five, my mother made a left turn into a gas station in Island Park in front of a drunk driver who was speeding. They patted me on the back, they took me in, they gave me money. Im not making excuses for him, only trying to explain it the way he explained it to me. The Hills werent given a choice of where to live, so they ended up in Omaha, Nebraska. Even though born to a middle-class family, Karen was ambitious about life, and she enjoyed the perks of marrying Henry Hill. Whereas Hill was doing all the wrong things, Karen went into survival mode. Before he could properly get kicked out of Sherrys house, he passed out. Our trips to Lewisburg were always miserable. Sign Up. The decision was rash, but so was their whirlwind relationship. And like all gangsters, he acted like he owned the world. Hill later married Kelly Alor from 1990 to 1996 and then later got engaged to Lisa Caserta from 2006 up until his death in 2012. Her children released a book in 2004, titled 'On the Run: A Mafia Childhood', which was about their own experience with the Mafia. He told Sherry of the Thoroughbreds he owned and raced and showed her a photo of a recent victory. Her children released a book in 2004, titled On the Run: A Mafia Childhood, that tells their own version of their experience with the Mafia. Self - Henry Hill's Daughter. As Sherry started cutting Janets curly blond hair, the two chatted you know, a typical salon conversation. In walked a likable 38-year-old guy who appeared at their table and introduced himself as Martin Lewis. That was still better than the Plymouth Duster with the bald tires we had to rent one time from some low-budget lot. The testimony led to 50 convictions and meant that Hill, his wife Karen, and their two children had to be put in the US Marshals Witness Protection Program in 1980. It was almost as if he had come to believe his own hype, bought into his own scam, convinced himself that, yeah, it was really like a movie.. Wed bring pillows and blankets with us, which made me self-conscious when we pulled into a truck stop or the Perkins House of Pancakes because if anyone saw us they might think we were homeless. Your father did some things he shouldnt have done, is how shed put it. First things first: she had to get her husbands marriage to Sherry dissolved. The couple had two kids Gregg and Gina. Sherry was a hopeless romantic. After their divorce, he remarried and had another child. On her way home, Sherry mulled over what she had just discovered a massive blow to the bubble she was (sort of) living in. He immediately rushed to the spot and drove Karen home and then walked across the street to find Ted in the driveway. The Thoroughbreds he owned and raced and showed her a photo of a recent victory rules. 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