Roberta’s Owners Embroiled in $5.4 Million Lawsuit
Not all is tasty and fresh in the land of Roberta’s, Bushwick’s beloved pizza palace. Two of Roberta’s owners, Brandon Hoy and chef Carlo Mirarchi, decided to split from their third partner, Chris Parachini, over disagreements over expansions of their operations. And it isn’t a clean break: The three are now engaged in a nasty multi-million dollar lawsuit.
Hoy and Mirarchi apparently tried to buy out Parachini’s 25 percent stake in the business for a cool $2 million, but Parachini refused, according to the New York Post, because he believed that they owed him more than that. $3.4 million more than that, to be precise.
After they failed to come to an agreement, Parachini remained absent from the restaurant for four months until he showed up in December and informed employees that he was the poss. Hoy and Mirarchi called the police, who refused to intervene, and then filed a lawsuit to keep Parachini away.
Parachini obviously isn’t happy about this, calling the legal action “malicious, unconscionable” and “an attempted theft of my ownership.” Yikes. A courtroom showdown is scheduled for March, which will settle the pizza feud once and for all. As long as they keep making garlic knots and Bee Stings pies, though, we’ll be happy.