Mob Wives reality star, Angela “Big Ang” Raiola has died after a long battle with cancer.
Mob Wives star Angela “Big Ang” Raiola died early Thursday after a difficult battle with throat, lung and brain cancer. She was only 55.
“It is with sad regret that we inform you that at 3:01 a.m. Angelia Raiola peacefully ended her battle with cancer, and was called home,” according to a post on her Twitter page from friend Vinnie Medugno.
“She was surrounded by nothing but love from her immediate family, and the closest friends. YOU, (her fans) were some of the most special people in the world, and she loved you immensely. Thank you for your love, prayers, and unconditional support of Angela right to the very end.”
The statement continued, “She truly went out richer than any monetary value could ever amount to. The family asks for privacy and peace during this most difficult time. In typical Big Ang fashion, we knew she would say ‘Love you my babies!’ This page will remain open as a celebration of who she was and will always be.”
Angela Raiola was the nieve of Salvatore “Sally Dogs” Lombardi (a major leader in New York‘s infamous Genovese crime family), Raiola made her Mob Wives debut in 2012 and later appeared on her own spinoffs.
Doctors first found out about the lemon size tumor in Raiola’s throat, last year.
“Things happen for a reason,” Raiola told PEOPLE in September. “I’d smoked for 40 years. No one could tell me what to do.”
But her sister Janine Detore revealed in early February that Raiola had been hospitalized for stage 4 lung and brain cancer, and, after a little less than a month of chemotherapy, one tumor had increased in size and the other didn’t decrease in size at all.
