Celebrating organ donation that changed Italy, parents return 30 years after son’s death

After Nicholas Green’s death in a 1994 carjacking, his donated organs helped save 7 lives, and changed Italians’ attitude to organ donation

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Nicholas Green’s parents Maggie and Reginald and officials of the Italian Association for the Donation of Organs, Tissue and Cells attend a commemoration of their son on the 25th anniversary of his death. The couple have returned to Italy for the 30th anniversary. Photo: Instagram/@adrianocorigliano

Published: 4:15pm, 30 Sep 2024Updated: 8:12am, 1 Oct 2024

For the Green family, the memory of October 1, 1994, is many things at once: the date of their greatest pain and their finest hour; a day of unspeakable loss and life-giving gifts.

It is the date their seven-year-old son, Nicholas, died in an Italian hospital, two days after being shot during an attempted robbery on a family holiday from California, in the United States.

Upon receiving the news, his parents, Reginald and Maggie, made an impromptu decision that would change their lives and those of countless others: they chose to donate his organs.

Seven people, five of them teenagers, received Nicholas’ corneas, kidneys, liver, heart and pancreas. The family’s story prompted a surge in interest that continues to drive new donor registrations in Italy.

30 years on, the Greens are returning to Italy for a series of public appearances and to meet some of their son’s surviving recipients. It is the latest chapter in a phenomenon the media long ago dubbed “the Nicholas effect”, a chain of events that has both saved lives and kept their son’s memory alive.