The problem may be journaling, that useful file system tool that keeps your data relatively safe from major corruption. It turns out that it cannot handle large files. Turn journaling off temporarily by opening Disk Utility (normally in the Utilities sub-folder of the Applications folder). Select the partition on which the large file has been "trashed." Then, under File select the Disable Journaling item, or just type Command-J to disable it. If there is an Enable Journaling option under File instead of Disable Journaling, then journaling is not your problem, and this hint won't help.
Return to the Finder and try emptying the Trash again. You can re-enable journaling by returning to Disk Utility, and selecting Enable Journaling under the File menu again, or by typing Command-J.
I do not not know whether there is some inherent limit to the file size, or whether the problem is that journaling needs enough free disk space to copy the file. In my case there was roughly 2.7 GB of free space available, more than the 2.49 GB file size, but not by much.

