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Credit: Instagram
Dina Manzo‘s daughter, Lexi Ioannou, has broken her silence about her stepfather, Tommy Manzo.
After Tommy was sentenced to seven years behind bars for hiring an attack on Dina’s now-husband, Dave Cantin, Lexi, who appeared alongside her mother on past episodes of The Real Housewives of New Jersey, took to her blog, where she recalled her past experiences with Tommy and blasted her aunt, Caroline Manzo, for her “staggering betrayal” of Dina.
“For over a decade, I have kept silent in fear of poking Tommy Manzo, my stepfather of fifteen years—a proven to be dangerous man, who won the loyalty of my blood family,” Lexi began in an October 23 post titled “Don’t Poke the Bear” on her Boho Chicken blog. “I could write a novel as to what made Tommy such a complicated man to be raised by, but instead I’ll speak to how I came to fear a man who promised to keep me safe and what it feels like to lose the love of my extended family.”
Looking back on her childhood, Lexi recalled her mother and Tommy starting to date when she was six years old, saying that she trusted her stepfather and found him to be “extravagantly generous and charismatic” — at times.
“To know Tommy was to love him. Yet beneath this veneer of charm lay a complexity of darker undercurrents, raising questions about the true intentions of his relationships and the reality behind the façade,” she continued.
According to Lexi, Tommy was two-faced, acting one way publicly and another way behind closed doors.
“[He was an] unavailable husband, a notorious cheater, and a workaholic,” she alleged. “I watched as he dangled the promise of a better future in front of my mother while stripping away her confidence, breaking her down[,] and using me as leverage in his manipulations.”
Applauding her mother for the “sacrifices” she made, Lexi admitted she was never truly close to Tommy due to his “dysfunctions,” noting that he only showed love through “transactional gestures.”
“A forced seat on his lap and an awkward kiss on the cheek earned me a crisp $100 bill—a currency of affection I never asked for. He objectified me in his own strange ways as his beloved ‘daughter,’” she explained. “Tommy did love me, but his love for me was about himself.”
Immediately following Dina and Tommy’s split in 2012, Lexi said things were “amicable” because Tommy “was accepting of his failures as a husband.” However, the civil nature of their divorce came to a screeching halt once Dina moved on.
“The psychological warfare started when Tommy realized that my mother had begun to move on,” Lexi shared, revealing that Tommy had “forcibly” removed her from their family home.
“He violently shook me awake on a sleepy winter morning, giving me just thirty minutes to ‘get the f*ck out,’” she recalled. “In that chaotic moment, I lost not only my home but also irreplaceable heirlooms collected over generations along with my childhood keepsakes.”
“Tommy’s rage continued to manifest into acts of unspeakable violence, beginning with a calculated physical attack in 2015, aimed squarely at my mother’s new husband. A spineless act of jealousy and retaliation. This was followed by a harrowing home invasion in 2017, an attempt to instill terror in both my mother and her husband,” she continued.
Lexi went on to say that Tommy used her in his “twisted games” and held her “emotionally hostage” for years before detailing an April court appearance.
“I sat in court listening to Tommy’s attorneys plead not guilty, weaving mine and his relationship into their defense narrative. They painted his actions as misguided attempts to protect me,” she explained. “As I listened to the testimonies from mob associates, friends, and law enforcement, the magnitude of his obsessive rage became painfully clear. His reach was unnerving, employing private investigators and violent men to track our movements over the course of many years. I found myself covered in a veil of shock and shame, struggling to reconcile how I could be raised by a person capable of such harm.”
Tommy was ultimately found guilty on charges of a hired assault. But before he was, he received support from several members of their family, including Caroline.
“Caroline was more than an aunt to me; she often rocked me to sleep as a child and stepped in as a second mother, welcoming us into her home during the uncertain period following my mother’s separation from my father. Yet, in a staggering betrayal she would later choose the side of my [mother’s] abuser and go as far as writing a character letter in defense of Tommy,” Lexi stated. “What could compel someone to form an alliance with a felon over their own blood? Meanwhile, my mother’s sister Cookie continued to be employed by him and even appeared in court in his support. A troubling lack of loyalty despite having once shared a home with us and bearing witness to Tommy’s darkness.”
“Other family members chose the path of silence,” she added.
Lexi then noted that her relationships with family members have been “fractured” due to their allegiance to Tommy, and she added that despite his recent sentencing, her “phone is yet to ring.”
Dina Manzo appeared in a full-time role on The Real Housewives of New Jersey during the series’ first, second, and sixth seasons.
