Lawsuit claims Portage union members attacked workers
Post Tribune
June 07, 2016
http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/post-tribune/news/ct-ptb-portage-union-members-sued-st-0607-20160607-story.html
A lawsuit claiming a group of Northwest Indiana union members attacked workers at a Dyer construction site will continue after it was moved to the U.S. District Court in Hammond.
The lawsuit, filed by Illinois-based D5 Ironworks and five of its employees, was transferred last week after originally being filed in Illinois.
According to the lawsuit, employees for D5 were working at the site of Plumb Creek Christian Academy, at U.S. 231 and Calumet Avenue, on Jan. 6, when Thomas Williamson Sr., a member of Local 395 Ironworkers, based in Portage, arrived.
Williamson spoke with Richard Lindner about D5 coming to a labor agreement with the union but was refused, according to the lawsuit. He then went to Dyer Baptist Church, owner of the school, and told officials there that not using union workers was unethical.
Williamson returned the next day and got into an argument with Lindner, who told him to leave, the lawsuit said. The lawsuit claims Williamson then shoved Lindner and said, "I'm taking this back to old school."
The lawsuit says that on the same day at about 3 p.m. Williamson, his son Thomas Williamson Jr. and 10 other men arrived in two cars and proceeded to attack Lindner, Scott Kudingo, Bill Tonnesen, Joe Weil and Harry Harper, punching, hitting them with scrap wood from the construction site and kicking them with steel-toe boots.
As they beat the D5 workers, the lawsuit says, the attackers yelled out that it was union work and this was their territory.
According to the lawsuit, D5 stopped working at the school site after the attack.
The lawsuit names the union and both Williamsons as defendants, as well as the other unidentified attackers.
Kudingo suffered a broken jaw and had to be taken to a hospital, according to the lawsuit.
Harold Abrahamson, an attorney for both Williamsons, declined to comment on the case. An attorney for Local 395 could not be reached for comment.
Lake County court records do not show that either of the Williamsons have been charged in the incident.
D5 is asking for an injunction against the union, including barring the union from trying to stop anyone from doing business with D5 and staying away from any D5 employee. The plaintiffs are also asking for at least $3 million in actual damages as well as unspecified punitive damages.
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