Crown Acquisitions’ Stanley Chera hospitalized

Developer and retail titan rushed to New York Presbyterian in recent days with an unknown illness

Stanley Chera
Stanley Chera

Stanley Chera, the founder of Crown Acquisitions and one of New York’s biggest retail landlords, has been hospitalized in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.

Chera, 78, was taken from his summer home near Deal, New Jersey to New York Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, with an unknown illness, the New York Post reported.

The developer is a close associate of President Trump, who had advised him to leave New York and spend time in Deal as the virus spread rapidly in the city, according to the newspaper. Deal is a popular vacation-home destination for many moguls hailing from the Syrian Jewish community that dominate New York retail.

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A spokesperson told the Post that Trump “connected with Stanley” and that “all is resolved,” while Haim Chera, Stanley’s son and head of retail at Vornado Realty Trust, said Monday that Stanley was “doing very well.”

Crown Acquisitions’ New York holdings include stakes in a prime Manhattan retail portfolio controlled by Vornado, One World Trade Center, 650 Madison Avenue and the Olympic Tower.

The Chera family started in the apparel business and invested in the buildings that housed its chain of children’s clothing stores, known as Young World, founded by Stanley’s father, Isaac. By the late 1980s, Stanley was investing in major Manhattan real estate. [NYP] — TRD Staff