Landmark Hotel developer fired

The developer of the nine-story, 100-room Landmark Hotel on the Downtown Mall has been sacked.

“I can confirm that Mr. Minor has fired me,” said Lee Danielson, who had been working on the 100-room luxury hotel project for the past five years. “Any other questions, you should refer them to Mr. Minor. I would be greatly interested in seeing how this all plays out. I wish them luck.”

The luxury hotel’s owner, Halsey Minor, has said that the construction project would screech to a halt after a Georgia bank failed last month to deliver on its full $24 million loan commitment. For its part, the lender, Silverton Bank, disputed Minor’s assertions and said it was meeting all of its obligations under the loan agreement.

Minor, a wealthy entrepreneur and co-founder of CNET, said that the bank’s supposed missed payments would inevitably lead to a significant delay for the hotel’s opening, which was originally projected for July 2009.

For more than a week, Minor continued to portray the Landmark Hotel project as being in serious jeopardy.

Danielson, however, remained optimistic — and critical of Minor. The hotel’s construction, Danielson said, was moving along ahead of schedule and within budget.

In a Nov. 12 interview, Danielson suggested that Minor was “a little confused” about the project’s fiscal health.

“He’s not a real-estate guy,” Danielson said at the time. “He keeps his own counsel. I don’t know why he says the things he does. … Maybe Mr. Minor knows something I don’t. But I doubt it.”

Danielson, a native of California, has a long history of real-estate development in the area. He built the Charlottesville Ice Park and Downtown Regal movie theaters. He is widely credited with helping to revitalize the Downtown Mall in the early 1990s.

Minor did not return several phone calls Thursday and Friday for comment about Danielson’s dismissal.

On Nov. 15, Minor said the project had been closed and Danielson had been fired. Danielson denied that he had been removed, then represented the project on behalf of Minor Family Hotels at a Nov. 18 meeting of Charlottesville’s Board of Architectural Review. When asked at the time if he was still on board, he replied simply, “I am.”

At one point, Minor said that Danielson would be the “world’s best developer” if the hotel’s construction managed to continue uninterrupted. As it turned out, it did. Contractors continued to work on the project as recently as Thursday.

With the loss of Danielson, it was unclear Friday who is the developer of the Landmark Hotel.

Meanwhile, Minor has found himself in an unrelated legal battle involving the sale of high-end American art.

Minor filed suit against art auctioneer Christie’s Inc. on Wednesday in San Francisco, alleging that the New York-based company had hindered his sale of seven Richard Price paintings worth an estimated $25 million.

The lawsuit, first reported by Reuters, says that Christie’s was holding the paintings for Minor for a possible consignment sale, but refused to return them when he requested them back, beginning in May and ending in November.

“Christie’s offered a series of shifting excuses and conditions that it demanded be satisfied before the artworks would be returned,” it said. “Only after Minor threatened legal action did Christie’s drop these spurious excuses and conditions, and unconditionally return the artworks. But by then the damage was done. During the intervening months in which Christie’s had refused their return, the artworks fell precipitously in value.”

The lawsuit accuses Christie’s of breach of implied contract, breach of fiduciary duty and fraud, among other allegations.

In response, a Christie’s Inc. spokeswoman disputed the lawsuit claims in a statement Friday afternoon. The New York-based company, she said, intends to fight back.

“We believe this lawsuit has no merit and we will defend Christie’s vigorously,” the statement said. “Furthermore, we intend to sue Mr. Minor for the $10 million-plus that he owes Christie’s, as well as related legal fees.”

Another auction house, Sotheby’s, sued Minor on Sept. 2 after he did not pay $16.8 million for three paintings, including Edward Hicks’ “The Peaceable Kingdom with the Leopard of Serenity.” In response, Minor filed a counterclaim against Sotheby’s, saying that the auction house had concealed its financial stake in the paintings’ sale.