From left: Empire State Building and Anthony Malkin

A group of investors seeking to block a deal to take the Empire State Building public were unable to convince a State Supreme Court judge that a plan to buy them out was illegal, Bloomberg Businessweek reported.

Justice Peter Sherwood yesterday denied the motion brought by the investors. Stephen Meister, an attorney for the investors, did not immediately respond to Businessweek’s requests for comment. He had earlier indicated that the judge was likely to deny the motion and said he planned to appeal the ruling.  [more]

Anthony Malkin of Malkin Holdings and the Empire State Building

Updated, 11:17 a.m., April 3: Malkin Holdings is within striking distance of its proposed $1 billion initial public offering for the iconic Empire State Building, having secured 94 percent of the votes needed for approval, according to a letter sent to investors seen by The Real Deal.  [more]

Anthony Malkin and the Empire State Building

A consortium of investors in the Empire State Building sought Monday to intervene in a class action lawsuit over Malkin Holdings’ plans to take the building public, saying November’s settlement of $55 million is “grossly inadequate and unfairly apportioned,” Law360 reported. The investors in Empire State Building Associates, who hold public securities that give them a stake in the building, said that they would be harmed by Malkin’s intent to offer a $1 billion initial public offering that seeks to turn the iconic skyscraper into a real estate investment trust. An explicit ban on the conversion, the investors said, had been a clause in the original investment agreement…. [more]

From left: Anthony Malkin and the Empire State Building

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission today approved the documents allowing Malkin Holdings LLC, the owner of the Empire State Building, to vote on the plan to turn the skyscraping property into a publicly traded REIT, Reuters reported. Today’s approval comes after months of review. [more]

Empire State Building

While the Empire State Building has been trimming its roster of tenants of late, it will be adding to that list the New York City law firm Clifton Budd & DeMaria. According to the New York Observer, the firm has inked a 10.5-year, 15,072-square-foot lease  on the 61st floor of New York’s most iconic office building. The firm will move from its current location at 420 Lexington Avenue in the second quarter of 2013.

Clifton Budd & DeMaria paid $55 per square foot, a spokesperson for building supervisor Malkin Holdings told the Observer. As The Real Deal previously reported, the average office asking rent in Midtown is $64.46 in October 2012. [more]

Anthony Malkin of Malkin Holdings

The Empire State Building’s list of tenants has been reduced to 171 companies, down from more than 600 in 2006, before Malkin Holdings took the helm. In addition, average rent has climbed to $42.10 per square foot, from roughly $26, the New York Observer reported.

According to Anthony Malkin of Malkin Holdings, a company that wants to take space in the building needs to be growing and on a positive financial path. “Cash flow, come talk to us,” Malkin told the Observer. “As companies grow up and mature, they look for better offices. We’re looking for the companies that have grown up and matured.” [more]

Empire State Bldg.

LinkedIn, the popular professional networking site, has signed a 10-year lease for an additional 40,780 square feet of space inside the Empire State Building, Crain’s reported.

The expansion, on the tower’s 23rd floor, brings the Mountain View Calif.-based company’s total space in the iconic tower to 73,000 square feet, Crain’s said. Asking rents in the deal were $51 per square foot. [more]

From left: Empire State Building and Leona Helmsley

The five executors responsible for handling the complex affairs of the late, notorious real estate baroness Leona Helmsley, will each be handsomely compensated for the task, DNAinfo reported. A Manhattan Surrogate Court judge recently approved payments of $900,000 for the executors, who include two Helmsley grandsons, her brother, her lawyer Sandor Frankel, and her friend John Codey, DNAinfo said.

The judge who signed off on the deal said Helmsley “entrusted her executors with an estate of singular magnitude and extraordinary complexity,” according to DNAinfo. Helmsley’s estate owns part of the Empire State Building, as well as hundreds of other properties, part of the vast empire Helmsley accumulated, all the while becoming a widely hated landlord. [more]

Jeffrey Johnson and the Empire State Building

The Empire State Building shooter was forced out of his Upper East Side apartment Friday, the same day he killed a former co-worker outside the city landmark. Jeffrey Johnson reportedly had blamed his target, Steven Ercolino, for not doing a good enough job selling his designs for Hazan Imports, which in turn laid him off.

The New York Post said that Johnson, now out of work and short of money, was then evicted from the one-bedroom co-op he rented on the Upper East Side. “This was the final straw that pushed him over the edge,” a police source told the Post. [more]

The scene outside the Empire State Building this morning (photo courtesy David Zar)

Ten people have been shot and two are confirmed dead just outside the Empire State Building, in a shooting thought to be related to a workplace dispute, Reuters and others reported. The New York City Police department told the New York Post that the shooter was killed in the ensuing gun battle with the police, and that some of those injured may have been hit by NYPD gunfire.

At a news conference today, Mayor Michael Bloomberg indicated that the shooter was a 53-year-old man, and the victim a 41-year-old man. The mayor also said that six men and two women were wounded in the incident, which occurred outside the iconic 34th Street building, on Fifth Avenue, according to Reuters. [more]