Before he was being held on $5 million cash bond on charges of grand larceny, tax fraud and falsifying business records, NYC developer Nir Meir was known for spending a fortune on fine wines, exotic cars and other flights of fancy.
Meir, 49, has pleaded not guilty in Manhattan Criminal Court, and says he’s broke after being forced to declare bankruptcy earlier this month.
But there was a time when the developer had deep pockets. In 2021, he sold a mansion in Southampton to Patriots owner Robert Kraft for a cool $43 million, and his estate was on the same street, Meadow Lane, as finance titans like Ken Griffin, Leon Black and Henry Kravis.
Sources told that Meir was once known for popping $50,000 bottles of wine in the Hamptons, as well as for his extensive car collection, and even having ducks in his pool a la Tony Soprano, a source said. (Though the ducks in “The Sopranos” were the wild kind, and used as symbolism for Tony’s conflicting feelings about his life.)
Said one source of Meir as a host, “He’d pull out a wine [for guests] and pour a glass, and say, ‘You’ve never had a wine like this in your life.’” The insider added that the same went for scotch and cigars.
According to Curbed, Meir had knocked down a 10-bedroom beachfront “cottage” on Meadow Lane to erect the modern 6,600-square-foot mansion he later sold to Kraft.
At the estate, the outlet reported, “Meir and his wife, Ranee Bartolacci, regularly hosted omakase nights, bringing a sushi chef from Manhattan for private dinners. Sometimes omakase nights would be followed on Sundays with pizza catered by Nolita’s Pasquale Jones.”
The dinners allegedly cost $10,000, the Real Deal reported.
A former staffer at Meir’s onetime firm, HFZ Capital, told the publication that, “Nir spent more money than God.”
The Hamptons home was mired in lawsuits before Meir successfully sold it to Kraft, and was also embroiled in…
Read the full article here
