She played the rapper music as a child, stood by him during his career and navigated the legal and artistic questions that arose after his killing.

Voletta Wallace worked to elevate her son's short-lived but influential career to hip-hop greatness. Notorious B.I.G. was gunned down in 1997 in Los Angeles.

According to the Monroe County Coroner’s Office, 78-year-old Voletta Wallace was pronounced dead on Friday, Feb. 21. Wallace’s son, Christopher George Latore Wallace, was a famous rapper in the 1990s who was better known as the Notorious B.