{"id":97,"date":"2016-03-21T18:11:52","date_gmt":"2016-03-21T22:11:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/?p=97"},"modified":"2020-08-04T17:35:36","modified_gmt":"2020-08-04T21:35:36","slug":"sinbads-dine-and-dash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/2016\/03\/21\/sinbads-dine-and-dash\/","title":{"rendered":"Sinbad\u2019s Dine and Dash"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Constantine Mittendorf<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"SinbadsToday, Sinbad\u2019s restaurant looks like a shipwreck next to San Francisco\u2019s Ferry Building. A demolition crew is on site and Sinbad\u2019s is in bankruptcy court. The classic restaurant-bar recently lost a series of legal battles that ultimately shut it down after 40 years of continuous operation.<\/p>\n

To sum up what happened, Sinbad\u2019s had been operating since the mid-1970\u2019s. With its stunning views and location on Pier 2 at the foot of Market Street, it had a mixed clientele of locals and tourists. In turn, it paid rent to the City of San Francisco.\u00a0Eventually due to population growth in the Bay Area, the City decided to expand the number of ferry terminals serving the City\u2019s Financial District. The San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission held public hearings in 2012 about the plan to expand the ferry terminals and remove Sinbad\u2019s. Despite being notified, Sinbad\u2019s didn\u2019t show up. Hearing no objection from Sinbad\u2019s, the agency decided that a new ferry terminal was a good plan, Sinbad\u2019s would have to go, and Sinbad\u2019s even signed an agreement to vacate the property by the end of 2014. The plan was for demolition to start in March 2015 to pave the way for a new ferry terminal.<\/p>\n

Two years quickly went by, Sinbad\u2019s reneged on the deal, and it refused to leave. After some attempts at negotiation, Sinbad\u2019s sued the City for allegedly acting in bad faith and the City filed an eviction lawsuit. Sinbad\u2019s fought the eviction, but lost a jury trial in July 2015.<\/p>\n

However, Sinbad\u2019s refused to go quietly. In fact, the restaurant operated for several more months despite losing the jury trial. It stayed open until the Sheriff\u2019s department announced that it would physically intervene and shut the restaurant down in mid-October 2015. On the dramatic day of the eviction, Sinbad\u2019s filed for bankruptcy, effectively removing jurisdiction from the Sheriff to enforce the eviction. This meant that Sindbad\u2019s didn\u2019t have to close its doors, and it stayed open even longer.<\/p>\n

After stalling almost a year past the original agreed upon closure date, proceedings in federal bankruptcy court finally forced its hand.\u00a0 Sinbad\u2019s made its last call in the end of November, 2015.\u00a0 Today it is being bulldozed and creditors are trying to mop up the mess.<\/p>\n

Recent filings reflect Sinbad\u2019s claims only around $10,000 in cash on hand and several auctions of fixtures, furnishings, and equipment (\u201cFFEs\u201d) have netted less than $4,500. This pales in comparison to the claimed liabilities over $1,000,000. The bankruptcy administrative costs for this case alone are over $30,000, and Sinbad\u2019s claims it cannot pay.<\/p>\n

With the former restaurant literally in shambles, the City finally got what it wanted —\u00a0minus the\u00a0back-rents owed to the City.\u00a0 In that respect,\u00a0it sure looks like Sinbad\u2019s left without paying the bar tab.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Constantine Mittendorf Today, Sinbad\u2019s restaurant looks like a shipwreck next to San Francisco\u2019s Ferry Building. A demolition crew is on site and Sinbad\u2019s is in bankruptcy court. The classic restaurant-bar recently lost a series of legal battles that ultimately shut it down after 40 years of continuous operation. To sum up what happened, Sinbad\u2019s … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Sinbad\u2019s Dine and Dash”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[89,88,90,91,13,92,38,41,93,44,94],"ppma_author":[201],"class_list":["post-97","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-bankruptcy","tag-california","tag-chapter-11","tag-chapter-7","tag-constantine-mittendorf","tag-demolition","tag-eviction","tag-jury-trial","tag-restaurant-lease","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-bay-conservation-and-development-commission"],"authors":[{"term_id":201,"user_id":6,"is_guest":0,"slug":"duanemorris3","display_name":"Duane Morris","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/843ff6e7a8fe5fc92109b47a45f34b6cf0ea499e6e788db23456c838b0ae6747?s=96&d=blank&r=g","0":null,"1":"","2":"","3":"","4":"","5":"","6":"","7":"","8":""}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/thelegaldish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=97"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}