Embattled former Democratic Gov. Eliot Spitzer allegedly threatened to stab a man in the genitals for praising his longtime enemy, philanthropist Kenneth Langone, while dining at an upscale Manhattan restaurant.
Jamie Antolini claims he was innocently dining with business partners at Avra Madison Estiatorio when Spitzer, who resigned from office amid a high dollar prostitution scandal, began harassing and threatening him.
“Spitzer lost his mind,” Antolini told the Daily News of the Jan. 2 incident.
“I’m going to fucking stab you with a fucking knife in the cock,” the 48-year-old Antolini recalled Spitzer saying. Spitzer was at the restaurant to celebrate his mother’s 90th birthday.
Antolini, who claims he never saw a knife and did not file a police report, said Spitzer was walking by and overheard him praising Langone as an “amazing guy.”
“All I said was, ‘Ken Langone would have been the best President ever,'” Antolini recalled.
Langone, a former NYSE director and Home Depot co-founder, shares a bitter history with Spitzer stemming from the latter’s 2004 lawsuit against former NYSE CEO Dick Grasso over pay packages. Langone was a co-defendant in the suit, which was settled in 2008.
Antolini said he remained seated during the roughly 20-minute altercation, which finally ended when security escorted Spitzer out.
“This guy’s got real issues. Real problems,” he noted.
Lisa Linden, a spokeswoman for Spitzer, told the Daily News that Spitzer was blameless and only responded to Antolini’s provocation.
“The patron persisted in making aggressive remarks, which Mr. Spitzer initially ignored. An argument ensued, but at no time did he make any threats,” she said in a statement.
Russian model Svetlana Travis Zakharova provided a June, 2016 recording to police Friday, which she claims implicates Spitzer in threatening and berating her. Zakharova went to jail later that year for blackmailing Spitzer, demanding $400,000 for her silence on their illicit relationship.
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