Emily Smith

Emily Smith

Celebrity News

Tribeca Film Fest co-founder dragged into discrimination suit

Entrepreneur and Tribeca Film Festival co-founder Craig Hatkoff is being dragged into the ugly discrimination lawsuit hanging over the famed Dakota building.

Hatkoff, who had lived at the Dakota with his wife of 19 years, Robert De Niro’s producing partner Jane Rosenthal, until they separated earlier this year, has been subpoenaed in the case filed by embattled hedge fund manager Alphonse “Buddy” Fletcher.

Fletcher, a Wall Street investor, filed a lawsuit against the Upper West Side landmark and former home of John Lennon and Judy Garland in 2011, alleging the board refused his request to buy a second apartment in the building for $5.7 million to combine with his current apartment.

The suit, filed in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, accuses the board of treating minorities unfairly, claiming there was an “extensive pattern of hostility toward nonwhite residents of the building.” Fletcher cited cases including Roberta Flack, who allegedly was forced to use a service elevator with her dog, and Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas, who were turned down by the board.

All new purchasers are required to show the building financial records, and the Dakota’s board said that Fletcher’s application was rejected “based on financial materials he provided. Any accusations of racial discrimination are untrue and outrageous.”

Supreme Court Judge Eileen A. Rakower last week approved a motion to subpoena Hatkoff and two others, Matthew J. Mallow, the general counsel of BlackRock, and Peter Sternberg. Hatkoff, a former board member who now lives elsewhere uptown, will be quizzed over the board members’ alleged statements about minorities and Fletcher’s finances.

Last November, The Post reported that Fletcher was “looking more and more like Bernie Madoff.” His hedge fund filed for bankruptcy protection in 2012 and it had “many of the characteristics of a Ponzi scheme,” a bombshell report compiled by a trustee said.

An attorney for Fletcher didn’t get back to us. Hatkoff’s rep declined to comment.