New York ? Leona Helmsley, the haughty hotel baroness who once famously declared “only little people pay taxes,” has died of heart failure at her summer home in Greenwich, Conn., her spokesman, Howard Rubenstein, said Monday. She was 87.

Helmsley, who was known for the high-handed way she ran the Helmsley hotel empire – and for her cruelty to underlings – was remembered by Rubenstein as a good friend and generous philanthropist who “gave tens of millions of dollars to charity right up until the last months of her life.”

“Leona was a great businesswoman in her own right who created a tremendous brand and success with Helmsley Hotels and was a wonderful partner and wife to Harry Helmsley,” Rubenstein said in a statement. “I was very proud to represent her for so many years.”

In 2007, Forbes magazine ranked her as the 369th richest person in the world, with an estimated net worth of $2.5 billion.

Helmsley was so reviled by the public that many cheered when she was convicted in 1989 of evading $4 million in taxes. And after she fired a hotel manager because he was gay, she was forced to endure a humiliating trial, where she was branded a bigot and ordered to shell out $554,000.

In 2003, Helmsley’s lawyers took a poll and discovered that their boss was the most despised public figure in New York.

Never mind that Helmsley responded to the Sept. 11 attacks by giving $5 million to the New York Police & Fire Widows’ and Children’s Benefit Fund.

The public record shows that Helmsley was married four times to three men (she married and divorced garment industry executive Joseph Lubin twice).