Disgraced former Gov. Eliot Spitzer threatened to knife a patron in the privates at a posh Midtown eatery for praising his longtime foe, philanthropist Kenneth Langone, according to the allegedly aggrieved diner.
Jamie Antolini said he was with potential business partners at Avra Madison Estiatorio on E. 60th St, near 5th Ave, when he spied Spitzer, who resigned as governor in 2008 after he was outed as the high-priced prostitution patron “Client 9.”
“Spitzer lost his mind,” Antolini told the Daily News.
“I’m going to f–king stab you with a f–king knife in the c–k,” the 48-year-old recalled Spitzer spewing during the Jan. 2 flap.
Spitzer was walking by Antolini’s table when he heard the diner lauding Langone — the billionaire who helped launch Home Depot — as an “amazing guy,” Antolini said.
“All I said was, ‘Ken Langone would have been the best President ever,’” Antolini recalled.
He didn’t dare turn to look at Spitzer as the heated spat dragged on for 20 minutes, in Antolini’s account. Security eventually escorted Spitzer out of the upscale Greek restaurant, he said.
“I never left my seat. When the video tapes come out, it will show I sat in my chair with a glass of wine in my hand,” said Antolini.
Jamie Antolini said he encountered Spitzer at a Manhattan restaurant on Jan. 2 during a business meal.
(ASTRID STAWIARZ/GETTY IMAGES)
Antolini, who said he never saw a blade, did not file a police report, and the NYPD had no record of the counter.
“This guy’s got issues, real problems,” Antolini quipped.
But Lisa Linden, a spokeswoman for Spitzer, blamed the brouhaha on Antolini and said Spitzer was simply there to celebrate his mother’s 90th birthday.
“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.
An employee who answered the phone at the restaurant where the fracas took place declined to comment.
Spitzer was accused of attacking and threatening Russian bombshell Svetlana Travis Zakharova in her Plaza Hotel room after she told him she was returning to her homeland.
Zakharova, 27, was arrested later that year on charges that she blackmailed Spitzer out of nearly $400,000 and threatened to reveal their relationship to the media and his family. On Friday, she gave NYPD detectives an 18-second recording of what her lawyer said is the Spitzer berating and threatening her during a February 2016 phone call.
