You might think flying business class is always about being fanned with palm leaves while flipping through books on golf, but sometimes there are real hardships going on behind that curtain, as Lynne Meadow, who makes $395,824 a year as artistic director of the non-profit Manhattan Theatre Club, discovered last August on a flight from Rome to New York on Continental Airlines. The Sun has it that Meadow (pictured) is now suing the airline after......

The Post has the latest "oh sweet Christ, what the hell is this thing in my food!?" story, and this one’s a keeper: 27-year-old John Agnesini plans to sue Subway after he found a large serrated knife baked into the bread of his 12-inch cold-cut sub. Agnesini bought it from a Subway on West 35th Street last month during his lunch break: After taking a few bites I could tell something didn't taste right. Then......

Earlier this month word came in that a Manhattan judge had ordered Jay-Z's 40/40 club management to turn over records of all employees in the past three years, for a class-action lawsuit filed by a former waitress. The suit claims the workers never received overtime or minimum wage. Now The NY Post reports that the club's general manager, Desiree Gonzalez, has told (ahem, threatened) some employees who might join in the suit. Allegedly she warned......

It’s been over a year since the City Council passed a bill regulating pedicabs, but police have been unable to enforce the laws because of a lawsuit brought by the New York City Pedicab Owners' Association, which is just one of several pedicab organizations in the city. Consumer Affairs Commissioner Jonathan Mintz tells the Post that the group is trying to claim all the 325 available pedicab licenses for themselves. But Chris Marlow, a flack......

Two days after being stuck in the Bronx Zoo's skyfari for five hours, one couple is suing for $10 million. The Post reports Damien Foster and Nandi Taylor--who is pregnant-- suffered "psychological trauma" because they were stranded for hours over the "fang-baring, flesh-eating baboons." They were ultimately brought back to the ground by emergency workers using cranes for high-angle rescues, but Foster and Taylor's lawyer said his clients "didn't know if they were going to......

The City Medical Examiner released the results of Esmin Green's autopsy; and King's County Hospital treatment, or lack thereof, of the dead woman may have had more to do with her death than callous neglect. The M.E. found that Green collapsed after blood clots that formed in her legs as she sat in the hospital's psychiatric ward waiting room migrated to her lungs and killed her. Green was seated in the reception area, waiting to......

The daughter of the woman who was neglected in a hospital waiting room and died after being ignored by staffers has will sue the hospital, city and city's hospital agency for $25 million. Last week, a video revealed that 49-year-old Esmin Green had been sitting in the waiting room of Kings County Hospital's psychiatric ward emergency area for almost 24 hours. Around 5:30 a.m., she collapsed on the floor, and while staffers saw her there,......

Three women who were training to be tasters at a Cadbury's research office in NJ are suing the British candy conglomerate. According to the Star-Ledger, the women were tested an "experimental high-intensity sweetener" that allegedly "left them with oral lesions and chemical burns that they say are affecting their ability to taste normally and eat certain foods without a burning sensation." The plaintiffs say they knew the sweetener was experimental and not yet approved, but......

Restaurant lawsuit season is in full swing! The latest is a $5 million lawsuit filed by a former employee against the Gramercy Park Hotel Chinese restaurant Wakiya, which Times critic Frank Bruni once derisively described as “a swindle.” A Dominican Republic-born American citizen is suing the owners for firing her for speaking Spanish when she was allegedly assaulted by a Spanish-speaking co-worker in the employee cafeteria. Her lawyers are seeking $5 million, which is “the......

Restaurant workers seem increasingly ready to hit their employers with lawsuits over tips – Buddha Bar and Tao are two of the latest to have their Zen calm shattered. But owners are also fighting back even after they lose, as three waiters at the Old Homestead Steakhouse are finding out. After winning $36,000 in a lawsuit over ripped-off tips, they’re suing their bosses again for harassment. The main gripe is that they’ve been punished by......

When a Girls Gone Wild video surfaced featuring Ashley Alexandra Dupre, aka the expensive hooker who serviced Eliot Spitzer, Dupre quickly moved to sue the GGW operation and founder Joe Francis for $10 million, claiming she was under 18 in the video. But then Francis fired back, by releasing a video showing Dupre saying she is over 18. Now her lawyer says she's dropping the lawsuit and will "focus on the positive." A statement released......

A judge ruled Google must turn over the logins and IP address of everyone who has ever watched anything on Youtube to Viacom, which is suing Google over copyrighted clips appearing on YouTube. Privacy advocates are criticizing the decision, but Viacom claims it will only use the information for its case, "It will be handled subject to a court protective order and in a highly confidential manner." Google's lawyer said, "We are pleased the court......

You may have already learned, with equal parts dread and anticipation, that TV personality and terrorist-scarf-wearer Rachael Ray is writing a memoir. Working title: EVOhno. Anyway, now it looks like she’ll have to add another chapter about eating disorders and workplace sensitivity, as an anorexic ex-employee has just filed a lawsuit in New York State Supreme court against CBS and The Rachael Ray Show. Payroll accountant Aaron Ferguson, an admitted anorexic for the past six......

In a clever ploy to undermine the city’s controversial proposal to lease out the 78-year-old Union Square Pavilion as a year-round restaurant, a group of activists sent a fake press release Monday that claimed to be from the Union Square Partnership Business Improvement District (BID). The release announced the BID’s decision to drop its push for “privatization of the famous park after overwhelming feedback from citizens across New York City.” (NewsBlaze still has the release......

Jay-Z's Manhattan nightclub 40/40 is under scrutiny for screwing over the little guy. The NY Post reports that a Manhattan judge has ordered the club's management turn over records of all employees in the past three years, for a class-action lawsuit filed by former waitress Celeste Williams. She claims that workers never received overtime or minimum wage, and now could have hundreds of others joining in on the suit (which already has around 20 bartenders......

Last month Tavern on the Green settled a discrimination lawsuit for $2.2 million dollars; today the Times has a detailed profile on the lead complainant, an East African immigrant who grew up in refugee camps before escaping to the U.S. as a teenager. She says that while working at Tavern as a hostess, “I was asked to perform sexual favors in great detail by this manager. And when I refused, I was told that I......

Billionaire investor Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to charges that he paid girls for sex (as the Smoking Gun put it, "if investigators are to be believed, Epstein has a thing for teenagers, vibrators, and assorted massage lotions") in Florida. Profiled in 2002 as an "International Moneyman of Mystery" in New York magazine, Epstein was sentenced to 18 months in a Palm Beach County jail and a year of house arrest. Besides being designated as a......

Following the announcement that a judge will allow some of Naked Cowboy's lawsuit against Mars Inc. to move forward, the tighty-whitey bearing Robert Burck appeared on the Today Show this morning. The 38-year-old entertainer is hoping to make some extra coin in the case, but Mars says they had a right to parody and are protected under the First Amendment. Amongst many, many other things, Burck noted: “I came to New York City to be......

In the ongoing battle between New York City and those suing it, claiming they got sick from working at Ground Zero after the September 11 attacks, the city now says 31% have mild illnesses, "like [a] runny nose or cough." Of course, the city would like to have as many of the thousands of lawsuits dismissed or settled as easily as possible, and the plaintiff's lawyers claim the city's review is skewed. The NY Times......

Remember when the Naked Cowboy http://gothamist.com/2008/02/13/naked_cowboy_to.php">sued M&M's maker Mars Inc. for $6 million, claiming a commercial showing a blue M&M in a cowboy hat, boots, and white underwear and holding a guitar in Times Square infringed on his trademark look? Well, a federal judge sent most of the lawsuit to pasture, but is allowing the Naked Cowboy's claim that it seems like he's endorsing M&M's to stand.......

Today the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal by 11 Brooklyn property owners and tenants whose homes and businesses would be razed to make way for the $4 billion Atlantic Yards project. Coincidentally, today marks the third anniversary of the Supreme Court’s narrow 5-4 ruling in the case of Kelo v. City of New London, which affirmed the government’s power to use eminent domain to accommodate private development. The plaintiffs vowed to file their......

After 50 Cent's ex, Shaniqua Tompkins, accused him publicly of burning down the home he owned that her and their son were living in -- she followed up with a restraining order. 50 may have had to surrender any guns he's been toting around as a part of the ruling, but the rapper then responded with his own legal papers...a $20 million defamation suit against Tompkins. It's been about one week since they were last......

The Department of Buildings confirmed to the Daily News that it found cracks in a crane at a construction site in lower Manhattan. The crane happens to be a Kodiak tower crane owned by New York Crane & Equipment Co.--the same model and firm involved last month's fatal crane collapse at East 91st Street and First Avenue. Cracks were found in the crane's turntable; the crane in the May collapse also suffered from cracking (it......

For many people, the best part about watching hockey is the fights. For those fight-lovers, there's some rumbling between the Rangers and the National Hockey League that could interest you. Back in September, Madison Square Garden sued the NHL for antitrust violations, claiming the league monopolized team promotions via the Rangers' website. Court papers filed yesterday included a letter from NHL commissioner Gary Bettman that asked the court to rule that the Rangers were in......

Jerry Seinfeld’s lawyers urged a judge yesterday to throw out a defamation lawsuit brought against him by litigious cookbook author Missy Chase Lapine. In addition to suing Seinfeld’s wife Jessica for plagiarizing her book about sneaking healthy food into kids’ meals, Lapine has also sued Jerry for slander after he likened her to an assassin on David Letterman's show: "If you read history, many of the three-name people do become assassins. Mark David Chapman and,......

Self-Googling may prompt you to sue for $100 million, but it doesn't mean the judge will allow the lawsuit to go forward. Yesterday, a Manhattan judge dismissed a doctor's lawsuit, which claimed his name was purposefully associated with porn sites by enemies as well as claimed he now can't stop self-Googling. The would-be plaintiff, Dr. Arden Kaisman, had been sued by ex-employees for sexual harassment last year (he sent them emails with "sexually explicit images"),......

Who knew radio could be so dangerous? The Daily News reports that deejay Wendy Williams' husband (the two are pictured together) had plotted to kill one of Hot97's deejays, a rival who allegedly trashed his wife on the air. According to the federal lawsuit charges filed yesterday, hubby Kevin Hunter sought out help from a WBLS studio employee in finding a hit man to "off" Hot97 personality Tarsha Jones. The allegations are part of a......

After the roof over her head burned to the ground, Shaniqua Tompkins found herself in court where a Manhattan judge ruled that she owes Fifty Cent $4,500 for May rent that she never paid (previously a judge ruled she owed double that for past due rents). The NY Post reports that she has until Friday to come up with the cash."She better pay it by the end of the week. Do you understand?" Edmead told......

The family who found a California King snake wrapped around a 7-month-old baby's leg on Monday has decided to sue the mattress manufacturer and store where the mattress was purchased. ...

The NY Post reports that one of their own, Denise Buffa, is suing Con Ed. Buffa, a Post reporter, told the heartbreaking tale of her dog being shocked last June; the 100-pound Italian mastiff died after his encounter with the electrified light pole in Marcus Garvey Park. Regarding the negligence suit against them, a Con Ed spokeswoman told The Post that they "weren't involved because the city owns the light poles," and the DoT declined......