Ashley
SHATTERED: Jennifer Riggitano (left) leaves the funeral of sister Ashley (right) yesterday after giving a eulogy for the beauty who jumped off the GW Bridge. (
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She was a troubled, young soul, driven to a desperate suicide by a gossipy, bullying clique she once called her friends.
But to her loving sister, the one who watched her grow, Ashley Riggitano was a constant inspiration, a daring young diva who was the coolest kid on the planet.
More than a week after she signed off on Facebook and jumped to her death from the George Washington Bridge, Ashley, 22, was remembered by family and friends as an outgoing fashionista with a future as bright as her snow-white smile.
At a tear-filled funeral at Our Lady of Visitation in Paramus, NJ, Ashley’s sister Jennifer, 25, recalled a fairytale childhood filled with Barbie dolls, a tree house, makeup and fun.
“I’ll miss the laughter that only Ashley, in her bold, bubbly way, could bring into a room,” Jennifer told nearly 200 mourners. “I will miss our diva dates getting manicures and pedicures. I will miss those phone calls that started with, ‘Don’t tell Mom.’ ”
Ashley, who graduated from a Manhattan fashion school, ran a fledgling jewelry design business with sometime pal Victoria Van Thunen.
Van Thunen was among five women Ashley blasted and barred from her funeral in a multi-page, handwritten suicide note she left in her Louis Vuitton bag before she flung herself into the icy Hudson River on her 22nd birthday.
Ashley had been engaged in an ongoing feud with a group of perceived enemies who she said had bullied her and suggested she kill herself. Ashley had attempted suicide once before.
“Go try to kill yourself on Xanax again, you untable [sic] loser. Go f–k yourself and never speak to me again,” one of the frenemies wrote in a Facebook message directed at Ashley.
The hurtful words stung.
“To any funeral, these people should not be allowed based upon words and actions,” Ashley’s final note said.