The owners of a fireworks business who filed a tort claim in November against Highland for denying them the ability to set up shop in town are now suing it for racial discrimination.
More Top Picks Best Rice Cookers For Healthy Grains
Ghassan Odtallah, of Munster; and his brother Wajdy Odtallah, of Hammond, are suing the Town of Highland, as well as Town Council President George Georgeff, R-1; and Police Officers John Freyek and Addison Barnhill individually, for arresting Ghassan Odtallah on January 10. The lawsuit, filed Sept. 2 with the U.S. District Court Northern District of Indiana in Hammond, claims that the town violated the Odtallahs’ Fifth and 14th Amendment Rights because they’re Palestinian, currently “a group surrounded by controversy and in the hot seat of U.S. politics,” according to the suit.
“Highlands’s disparate treatment of the Odtallahs in the permitting and lease process was motivated, primarily, by racial prejudice and discriminatory action,” the Odtallah’s attorney, David Wu, wrote in the suit. “Highland violated the equal rights provision of the (Fifth) Amendment, as applied to the states via the 14th Amendment, through its wrongful denials of permits and unequal treatment of the Odtallahs — for no other reason than to discriminate against the Odtallahs on account of their belonging to a minority group.
“The demographic makeup of the Town of Highland is approximately 90% white, with ‘other’ accounting for only 3.4% of the population … The Town of Highland’s Police force is almost entirely white.”
According to the 2020 U.S. Census website (https://data.census.gov/profile/Highland_town,_Indiana?g=160XX00US1833466#race-and-ethnicity), 17,610 — or 73.4% — of Highland residents classified themselves as White only. Of the 23,984 residents in Highland, 10,843 of them classified themselves as Black, Latino, American Indian, Asian, or “Two Races.”
The Odtallahs alleged in the lawsuit that Georgeff entered the property “without right and without permission” and harrassed Ghassan Odtallah “in retaliation for a notice of tort claim filed against the Town related to the Property.” Georgeff then ordered Freyek and Barnhill to arrest Odtallah for trespassing, the suit alleges.
Highland Town Attorney John Reed said the town wouldn’t comment on pending litigation.
Following a Access to Public Records Act request, the Post-Tribune viewed body cam footage from the two officers who arrested Ghassan Odtallah in January. In the first video that’s timestamped at 1:40 p.m. January 10, Freyek is seen walking into a building at 7950 Kennedy Ave., on the town’s north side. Freyek told a man, later identified as Ghassan Odtallah, that dispatch received a call of men going into the building and asked if they’re coming to clean it out, the Post-Tribune previously reported.
Odtallah told him he and the two other men with him were there organizing stuff they had stored there, to which Freyek told him that the building belongs to the town. Odtallah told Freyek he leases the building and that the town didn’t buy it, and that the whole matter is going to court, the footage showed.
Freyek then asked for Odtallah’s ID and told the second officer on the scene — Barnhill — that he was going to call Highland Police Chief Ralph Potesta for guidance as they walked away from Odtallah. As he called Potesta, Code Enforcer Brian Orth arrived and told Freyek and Barnhill that Building Inspector Ken Mika confirmed with him that the building is going to be the town’s new animal shelter, the footage shows.
Orth left, and Potesta can be heard on the video telling Freyek that he would send Georgeff to the scene. Freyek asked Potesta whether Georgeff had the paperwork showing the town purchased the property; Potesta said he didn’t know but that Freyek should “see what George wants to do” and remind Georgeff to get the locks on the building changed if he didn’t have a key.
Odtallah, who said he was going to call his attorney, then walked up to the officers and asked for his ID, and as Freyek told him once again that as far as he knew, the town bought the building, Odtallah asked for documentation of the sale and reiterated that he has a lease on the building, but said he “didn’t want to talk to nobody.” At this point, Georgeff arrived on the scene and told the officers that the town closed on a sale of the building two weeks prior and that he has the key to the place, the footage showed.
Georgeff then told Freyek and Barnhill to give Odtallah a trespassing warning, but if he showed up again, he would be arrested, according to the footage.
Freyek again told Odtallah that he needed to vacate the premises; Odtallah turned to Georgeff and asked him if he’s a lawyer for the “city,” telling them he has the keys to the building, the footage showed. Georgeff went to use the key he had to open the building door, but it didn’t work.
One of the two men Odtallah brought with him to the building then attempted to calm him down, but Odtallah remained defiant. Freyek told Odtallah if he “doesn’t get the (expletive) off the property, he’s going to arrest” him, to which Odtallah said, “Take me.” Freyek and Barnhill then arrested Odtallah, who appeared to struggle as they cuffed him, the footage showed.
A man identifying himself as Odtallah’s son arrived as Odtallah was arrested and told Georgeff and the officers that he doesn’t understand how they wouldn’t have access to the building on which they’re paying a lease. Georgeff said that they hadn’t paid anything to the town of Highland, and Freyek added that the situation is a civil matter between Odtallah and Donald Webber, who sold the building to the town and from whom the Odtallahs leased the property in the first place.
Barnhill’s camera footage confirms Freyek’s account.
Ghassan Odtallah was taken to Lake County Jail and charged in May with criminal trespass, not having contractual interest in the property and disorderly conduct, both misdemeanors, according to court records.
The tort claim dated January 15 that the Post-Tribune obtained said that Wajdy Odtallah and his brother, Ghassan Odtallah, leased the building in May. The men, who own several Northwest Indiana businesses as Rock the Sky LLC, planned to open a fireworks store there because one had been there in the past, the Post-Tribune previously reported.
Wajdy Odtallah had applied for and received state permitting as well as purchased inventory for the store, the claim said.
The town, however, indicated to the men that it was interested in purchasing the building for its own use and therefore would neither grant the Odtallahs a business license nor let them hook up utilities, it said. To mitigate what they believe to have been $750,000 in losses, the Odtallahs then told the town they would they would open a smoke/smoke accessories shop, for which the building was zoned correctly, the claim said. The Town still wouldn’t allow them to either get their business permit or run utilities to the building.
More Top Picks Camera
“Even if the (town) had serious intent to purchase the Property, it is not an acceptable justification to deny permits where all permitting conditions are met or to deny utility services to a valid leaseholder. Odtallah had and has a valid lease on the Property, which is zoned for the business he intends to conduct. Whether the City has ethereal plans for the Property does not alter the rights and protections to which Odtallah is entitled,” the claim said.
Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.