Patrons of Gay Bar Sue City, APD for Federal Civil Rights Violations ATLANTA, GA (WABE) - Nineteen patrons and one employee of a Midtown Atlanta gay bar Tuesday filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the City of Atlanta, the police department, and up to 45 officers involved in a Sept. raid of the Atlanta Eagle. WABE's Jim Burress reports.

Plaintiff Geoffrey Calhoun says the night of Sept. 10th, he was enjoying a beer at the Atlanta Eagle when the place turned chaotic.

"A person stuck his head around the corner and said Everybody get down on the ground.' He never identified himself as a police officer. He was showing no credentials, and my first thought was we were getting robbed."

Undercover officers say they'd previously observed illegal sexual activity. No patrons were arrested, although eight employees face charges of code violations.

But it's what Calhoun and 19 others allege happened during the raid that's now made this a federal case.

Plaintiffs claim APD violated their constitutional right against unreasonable search and seizure. Other allegations include false imprisonment, assault, battery, and trespass.

Dan Grossman represents the bar patrons:

"Imagine if police walk into a Wal-Mart and see someone shoplifting, and because they see what they think is a crime taking place at Wal-Mart, they take everyone at Wal-Mart, throw them on the floor, spread their legs, put their hands in their pockets, take their IDs, and put their names in a computer simply because they're at a place where someone else might or might not be doing something wrong."

Grossman, along with the Lambda Legal Defense Fund and the Southern Center for Human Rights, is seeking not only monetary damages, but for the court to force a change in city policy.

Shortly after the raid, Chief Richard Pennington said police acted according to code:

"Now if they ran the person's name through, we do that in normal procedures to make sure the person's not wanted."

WABE legal analyst Page Pate says such a public statement bolsters the plaintiffs' case:

"It's going to make it very difficult to in my opinion for the city to somehow back-off or disown that policy when they've been talking about it for so long."

Judge Timothy Batten has been assigned to the case.

City Attorney Rodger Bhandari says he has not yet reviewed the lawsuit, and cannot comment.

Jim Burress, WABE News.
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