A local business owner plans to take legal action against Mayor Anthony Staffieri and his two sons, Anthony Jr. and Paolo, over a business dispute at a popular downtown bar.
Jeffrey Hughes, who owns Connie’s Restaurant with the mayor’s sons, said he filed a civil complaint last week at Superior Court in New Haven.
The catch — Hughes’ brother Ken is the president of the city’s Board of Aldermen and ran the mayor’s re-election campaign.
Jeffrey Hughes provided a copy of the complaint, dated May 20, to the Valley Independent Sentinel Tuesday. The case wasn’t listed Tuesday in the state’s online database of court cases.
In the two-page complaint, Hughes claims Anthony Jr. and Paolo illegally pushed him out of the business by changing the locks on the Elizabeth Street building and voting for Hughes’ resignation out of the restaurant’s LLC without his knowledge.
Hughes said Mayor Staffieri became involved in the dispute when Staffieri allegedly called police on Hughes two months ago.
A message was left seeking comment with Mayor Staffieri on his cell phone Tuesday evening. He was not immediately available.
Anthony Jr. and Paolo were unable to be reached for comment at their home or at Connie’s.
Through the complaint, Hughes is seeking monetary damages and an order allowing him to go back into the building.
The complaint is shown in the document below. Article continues after document.
On Tuesday, Hughes said he also wants back-pay for the time he has not been able to work as the bar’s manager.
The Locks Were Changed
Hughes said he returned from a vacation in early March to find the locks to the business had been changed. He said his partners would not give him new keys.
On March 11, he attempted to force his way into the building, which he owns with Anthony Jr. and Paolo, through a back door.
First, he called police to notify them what was happening — namely, that he was entering his own property.
Several minutes later, officers responded to the bar, Hughes said.
A police report provided by Hughes lists Mayor Staffieri as the person who called police about a break-in at the business.
“The mayor had called police on me stating an illegal break in, when he knows I’m the owner of that business,” Hughes said.
Hughes was not arrested, but said he was later instructed that any future attempts to force his way into the building would result in his arrest.
Hughes said he hasn’t spoken to his business partners since then and has hired an attorney — Ira B. Grudberg — to help him fight it out in court.
Political Implications
In an interview Tuesday, Jeffrey Hughes claims there were political reasons for the action, and said the brothers have been spreading rumors about why Hughes left.
Hughes says he believes the only reason he would be suddenly booted from Connie’s is because the Mayor wants to develop the property in the plaza and needs the restaurant building available.
“Through putting two and two together, word on the street and talking to people, it comes to mind that he wants to develop his property, and I’m in the way of that,” Hughes said.
Hughes’ brother, Ken Hughes, is the Republican president of the Derby Board of Aldermen — the second highest elected official in Derby — and the former campaign manager for Staffieri.
Ken Hughes criticized the Staffieri family for the situation.
“I understand business partners can have irreconcilable difference and would need to part ways, but there is a right and a wrong way to dissolve a business,” Ken Hughes said in a written statement. “And in my opinion, this was the wrong way.”
When asked if this situation would affect the city because of the personal and political connections, Hughes said:
“I was elected by the voters of the Third Ward to be their voice in Derby government, and that has not changed.”
