Biography
Teodoro Di Donna was one of six young men held in the Sing Sing death house after conviction for the killing of a Brooklyn BMT station employee. The December report describes their relatives seeking clemency and says allegations of coercive interrogation were denied. These are disputed allegations, not an independent finding of innocence. The May 12 report identifies the same defendant as Theodore Di Donna, gives the sentencing day as May 11, and says the defendants were arrested three days after the September 2, 1935 killing; September 5 is derived from that explicit interval. The sources vary in the victim’s name (Edwin Esposito and Edward Oposito) and in the defendants’ names. No actual execution, later outcome or completed custody duration is inferred. Corroborating May report: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n114-NY-May-12-1936-DW-Q.pdf Daily Worker, December 18, 1936, page 1. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n303-XX-dec-18-1936-DW-Q.pdf
The memorial notice names Theodore DiDonne, aged thirty-one, alongside Joseph Bolognia as the two men executed in Sing Sing “last Thursday.” Its original six Brooklyn defendants and 1935 Edwin Esposito holdup-killing prosecution match the case already recorded here under Teodoro Di Donna, also known as Theodore Di Donna. The printed DiDonne spelling is retained in this source attribution. Relative to the issue’s Thursday, January 14, 1937 masthead, “last Thursday” means January 7, 1937; this day is derived from the explicit calendar relation. The Friday memorial was still prospective, but the executions were reported as completed. The notice supplies no physical jail-admission date or complete custody duration.
Daily Worker, January 14, 1937, original PDF page 5, Memorial for Two Who Died in the Chair.