Hank Greenspun was a convicted felon who, according to his FBI file, in the late forties stole .50 calibre machine guns from the US Navy and violated Arms Export control laws in order to arm the terrorist Irgun gang. Greenspun tried, but failed, to bribe federal officials with $25,000 into dropping smuggling charges against him. In the end he paid only $10,000 in fines and served no jail time.
Greenpun then parlayed huge smugglng profits into a Las Vegas media empire. /font>
Greenspun was “bad news,” said Dan Moldea, author of The Hoffa Wars and other groundbreaking works on organized crime. “Hank Greenspun was a journalistic nihilist who used his First Amendment protections to reward his friends and to punish his enemies, as well as to promote his personal causes and to accept money from nefarious individuals,” Moldea told SpyTalk. In 2006, Greenspun’s wife gave the Newseum $7 million, which named a terrace on Pennsylvania Avenue after him. The continuing presence of Greenspun’s name on the Pennsylvania Avenue terrace of the Newseum is an embarrassment to all legitimate journalists and news organizations.
Petition to rename the Greenspun Terrace