Mario Batali and the two women who accused him of harassment in a Boston restaurant have reached a settlement. An extrajudicial pact on terms that have not yet been disclosed.
The accusations had been made by Natali Tene and Alexandra Brown. Batali, once the head of a restaurant empire and a TV star in the industry, was one of many public figures swept up in the #MeToo movement, also facing criminal prosecution.
For Batali, today’s is not the only settlement stemming from alleged sexual “misconduct.” He, his former partner Joe Bastianich, and the company they ran, paid $600,000 last year to at least 20 women and men who reported being harassed while working at Manhattan restaurants Babbo, Lupa and Del Posto.
This time the settlement came after New York State Attorney General Letitia James conducted an investigation of their restaurant group, revealing an extremely prevalent sexually charged culture of harassment and retaliation that can violate state and city human rights laws.
