Goodfellas mobster Henry Hill has died in Los Angeles at the age of 69.

The former gangster, whose life story inspired Martin Scorsese's classic crime movie Goodfellas, passed away in the hospital after a long battle with ill health.

His girlfriend Lisa tells TMZ.com, "He had been sick for a long time... his heart gave out."

Hill spent almost 30 years as a member of a New York mafia gang but turned informer following his arrest on drug charges in 1980, helping to bring down some of the city's most feared mobsters.
 
He spent several years under witness protection but was eventually dropped from the program after committing several offenses.

Scorsese's 1990 Oscar-nominated film, based on Nicholas Pileggi's biography Wiseguy, starred Ray Liotta as Hill.