via Federal Judge: American Arab Chamber of Commerce Can Be Named as a Defendant in Civil Rights Lawsuit Involving Arrest of Christian Missionaries at Arab Festival | AFLC – American Freedom Law Center.
Detroit, Michigan (November 28, 2012) —
Yesterday, Federal Judge Stephen J. Murphy III, sitting in the U.S.
District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, issued an order,
granting the American Freedom Law Center’s (AFLC) request to file a
second amended complaint in its civil rights lawsuit brought on behalf
of four Christian missionaries who were unlawfully arrested for
preaching the Gospel to Muslims at the 2010 Arab International Festival
in Dearborn, Michigan. The order permits AFLC, a nonprofit
Judeo-Christian law firm representing the Christians, to amend its
lawsuit to name as an additional defendant the American Arab Chamber of
Commerce (AACC), which is the organization responsible for the conduct
of the Dearborn Arab Festival, an event where the police and festival
workers have historically discriminated against Christians.
David Yerushalmi, AFLC Co-Founder and Senior Counsel, commented: “The
detailed allegations of our 100-page civil rights complaint set out a
pattern of misconduct that had the purpose and effect of depriving our
clients of their fundamental constitutional rights.” The
federal judge agreed with Yerushalmi’s assessment. In his order
granting AFLC’s request to add the AACC as a defendant, the judge
stated, “[T]he Court finds that Plaintiffs do properly allege a
civil conspiracy among Defendants, including the AACC, to deprive
Plaintiffs of their constitutional rights sufficient to survive a motion
to dismiss.”
On June 18, 2010, four Christian
missionaries, Dr. Nabeel Qureshi, David Wood, Paul Rezkalla, and Negeen
Mayel, were thrown in jail by Dearborn police officers for peacefully
preaching to Muslims at that year’s annual Arab festival. The City
charged the Christians with “breach of the peace” and ordered them to
stand trial. In September 2010, Robert Muise, AFLC Co-Founder and Senior
Counsel, represented the Christians during a five-day criminal trial.
At the end of the trial, the Christians were acquitted by a unanimous
jury verdict.
Following the acquittals, Yerushalmi and
Muise drafted and filed a civil rights lawsuit against the City of
Dearborn, its mayor, John B. O’Reilly, its chief of police, Ronald
Haddad, 17 City police officers, and two executives from the American
Arab Chamber of Commerce, which is now a defendant. The lawsuit alleges
that the Christians’ constitutional rights were egregiously violated
during the Arab festival. The case is in the discovery stage, and a jury
trial is currently scheduled for next August.
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