Cityfile: New York's Most Notable and Influential

Nello Balan is the owner of Nello, the exceedingly mediocre Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side. He's also one of the city's most shameless—and most notorious—publicity hounds. Balan's latest attempt at drumming up attention, however, now appears to be exploding in his face. Last week, a receipt "surfaced" indicating that Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich had spent $52,000 on lunch. (The bill was for $47,000, but TMZ, which first reported the story, said the billionaire had tacked on a $5,000 tip.) But a spokesman for Abramovich tells us the bill wasn't his and the mogul may pursue legal action against Balan for suggesting otherwise.More

Whether or not hedge fund billionaire Julian Robertson was a resident of New York City way back in 2000 may seem like a trivial question. Unless, that is, you work for the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance and you're arguing he did spend the majority of his time in NYC that year and you'd like to see him cough up the $27 million in city taxes he owes. More

Does riding a mechanical bull sound like a fun time? If you do decide to engage in the activity and you head over to Johnny Utahs, one of the few places in the area that has the gizmo set up for its customers, keep in mind that if you get wasted and then fall off the bucking beast and injure yourself, you probably won't get very far if you file a lawsuit against the restaurant for negligence. More

JPMorgan Chase Cleans Up Its Portfolio | Many have criticized Wall Street firms for not doing more to manage risk in the lead up to the financial crisis and many have wondered just how much has changed over the past year. Let it be known that JPMorgan Chase is no longer playing by the old rules when banks were handing out loans to anyone who asked. If you're an accused murderer? Well, then, the new JPMorgan Chase wants nothing to do with you. More

Michael Bloomberg built his estimated $16 billion fortune thanks to Bloomberg LP, the financial news provider he founded in 1981. Thirty years later, it is now one of the most lucrative media operations on the planet. Banks and large corporations pay $1,250 a month for each Bloomberg terminal that's installed in its office. There are no discounts available and the company never engages in price negotiations. And while Bloomberg faces competition from the likes of Reuters and Dow Jones, neither company has been able to successfully dislodge the grip that Bloomberg has on the financial media marketplace. No wonder. Getting Bloomberg to cancel your monthly subscription is about as easy as getting Columbia House to stop billing your credit card for those "free" DVDs it insists on sending you every month, even after you've called the 1-800 number a dozen times to complain. More

• Barack Obama had lunch today at Craftsteak, just so you know. [NBC]
• Corsino, the latest restaurant by Jason Denton of 'ino and 'inoteca fame, has opened in the space previously occupied by Frederick's Downtown. [UD, GS]
• Unfortunate news for new NYT restaurant critic Sam Sifton: His predecessor, Frank Bruni, says it's impossible for critics to be anonymous these days. [CNN]
• Did you know LA has surpassed NYC as the "deli capital of America"? That's what the author of a new book on the delicatessen says, at least. [LAT]
• Megu is the latest restaurant to get slapped with a labor lawsuit. [GS]
• Bon Appétit isn't following in Gourmet's footsteps and closing down. But it did reportedly hand out pink slips to a bunch of staffers today. [Gawker]
• Fashion stylist Robert Verdi, who says "thin is in," isn't the most tolerant guy in the world: "I think food is for fat people and poor people," he says. [Cut]

Discrimination Suit or Publicity Stunt? | Did you hear about the $1 billion lawsuit filed against Greenhouse last week because the club allegedly denied entrance to a group of black partygoers? It turns out the crowd had turned up at the Soho club to attend a book party for Teri Woods, "a pioneer of the enormously successful urban or hip-hop fiction genre," and the author of the newly-released novel, Alibi. More

NBC Pleads Poverty | Remember that $2 million lawsuit that was filed against NBC a couple of weeks ago for using several fonts in a recent ad campaign without securing permission? NBC never responded to our request for a comment when we first reported on the suit. Fortunately, "Weekend Update" anchor Seth Meyers issued a response on Saturday Night Live this past weekend: "The joke is on them. We don't have 2 million dollars!" [NBC, previously]

• The New York City Wine & Food Festival is underway, although if you haven't secured tickets by now, you can forget about attending any of the events. [GS]
• What should Andre Balazs call the Standard's Boom Boom Room now that legal issues have forced a name change? "Mile High Club" gets one vote. [NYT]
• Buddha Bar has been sued over 400K in unpaid legal bills. [Eater]
• There's a pasta renaissance taking place in the city, apparently. [NYP]
• A Q&A with Katie Lee Joel, who has a new cookbook (and who says she'd be just as well known today even if she'd never married Billy Joel). [TONY]
• The Times Magazine's "food issue" is now online. [NYT]

NBC's legal team has one more headache on its hands. On Tuesday afternoon, the company was served with a lawsuit by the Font Bureau, one of the country's leading typographic design firms and the company responsible for crafting typefaces for the likes of Apple, Microsoft, and the New York Times Co. What would prompt a company that designs fonts to wage a legal assault on the media conglomerate? It seems NBC didn't secure the rights to use a handful of Font Bureau's trademarked typefaces. The same ones, we should add, that have been used as part of NBC's fall marketing campaign to tout shows like The Jay Leno Show, Saturday Night Live and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.More

Madoff Trustee Closes Out the Week with a Bang | When Irv Picard makes a promise, he keeps it. A few days ago, the trustee overseeing the Madoff mess said he planned to file a lawsuit against several other members of the Madoff clan—including Bernie's brother, two sons, and niece—for treating the family firm like a "piggy bank." And today he delivered, filing an action in federal bankruptcy court seeking the return of $199 million.More

Hedge fund mogul Dan Loeb paid $45 million for one of the city's poshest apartments last year, a 10,000-square-foot penthouse at 15 Central Park West. His move-in, however, didn't go so smoothly, it seems. It's unclear what took place precisely, but the moving company that Loeb and his wife Margaret hired to help them settle in, Auer's Moving & Rigging, filed a lawsuit against the couple in Manhattan Supreme Court earlier this year claiming breach of contract. (Panorama on the Park LLC, which is also listed as a defendant, is the company Loeb set up to acquire the property.) The high-end moving company is demanding that Loeb cough up the $98,689.07 which it says it's owed. Last week, though, an attorney for the Loebs responded to the suit by filing a motion to dismiss. So what went wrong? Was the prickly hedge fund manager's grand piano damaged by a faulty crane? Did a burly mover accidentally step on Biggie, the couple's miniature pinscher? The legal papers don't indicate why Loeb decided to withhold payment—let's hope that Biggie wasn't harmed—but you can review the documents for yourself below. More

More Madoff Suits on the Way | The Madoff show goes on. In an interview that aired on last night's 60 Minutes, court-appointed trustee Irving Picard said he plans to file a civil suit against Bernie sons, Mark and Andy, this week which will seek the return of $198 million. And just so no one in the immediate family feels left out, he'll be suing Bernie's brother Peter and niece Shana, too. [Dealbook]

Biggest Lawsuit Ever | Many people are pissed off at bankers in the wake of the financial crisis. Dalton Chiscolm is angrier than most. He's filed a lawsuit against Bank of America for "$1,784 billion trillion," damages he says he deserves because BofA didn't deposit a couple of checks into his checking account. (As for how much "$1,784 billion trillion" actually is, it's approximately 9 trillion times more than Bank of America is worth.) The good news: The judge assigned to the case is Denny Chin who presided over Bernie Madoff's $65 billion Ponzi scheme case, so he's used to big numbers. [Daily Finance, Dealbreaker]

Simon van Kempen and wife Alex McCord of the Real Housewives of New York City spent much of Fashion Week attending parties for the free champagne and gift bags. One of his employees, however, clearly wasn't in the mood to party. Last week a maintenance worker at the crummy hotel that van Kempen manages, the Hotel Chandler, slapped the property with a lawsuit for refusing to pay workers for overtime, a violation of New York's labor laws. Does this mean Simon's chances of winning the award for "Hotel Manager of the Year" are now totally dashed? While you ponder that very real possibility, you can look at the full lawsuit after the jump.More