Bangert: Was gun check retaliation for lawyer’s questions about Tippecanoe Co. courtroom? As he asked for records tied to gun rights, a lawyer was escorted to a courthouse bathroom for a gun check. He wants to know: Were the two related?

Dave Bangert | Journal & Courier

Who instructed two bailiffs to ask a Lafayette attorney to step into a Tippecanoe County Courthouse bathroom so they could check to see whether he was carrying a concealed weapon?

And was it an effort to scare him and get him to back off pointed questions he was asking county officials, calling out plans for what he called “a phony courtroom” in a new county annex across the street – a move that would prevent him and anyone else with a license from carrying a handgun into the building that houses the prosecutor’s and public defender’s offices?

“It’s Agatha Christie stuff – a real whodunit,” Kirk Freeman said about a May 17 incident when he was asked to step into a men’s room to prove that he had no handgun as someone had reported to police.

Freeman was in court Monday morning, arguing for the right to get depositions from a pair of bailiffs to find out who claimed he was carrying a gun – prohibited in a building with a courtroom – so he could line up a defamation lawsuit. The county argued that if Freeman actually plans to file a lawsuit, he could question the courthouse security officers in open court.

Tippecanoe Circuit Court Judge Tom Busch agreed with the county – Freeman would have to come up with another way to find the answers he wants.

In a situation that pulls together elements of gun rights, personal reputations, accusations of government bullying and straight-up courthouse scuttlebutt, Freeman said he’s not letting go of the moment he was questioned in that courthouse bathroom.

“Was it the prosecutor? Was it a court employee? Was it the public defender or some other court employee? Another attorney in the courthouse? A drunk in the back of the courtroom – I don’t know,” Freeman said. “I don’t know if the person who reported I was carrying a gun was used as a cat’s paw by someone else or that drunk in the back of the courtroom. … I can’t let them get away with this.”

Here’s how it all started.

In April, Tippecanoe County moved a number of offices to a renovated building at 111 N. Fourth St. During a tour of the new office space, Freeman said he was shown a locked door to what he was told would be an auxiliary courtroom. At that moment, the space was being used for storage.

On May 2, Freeman, who is on the board of directors of the Indiana State Rifle and Pistol Association, submitted a number of questions via an Indiana Access to Public Records Request, pressing county officials about the courtroom and how it would be used.

The upshot: Was the room actually what he was told it was or was it simply a ploy so 111 N. Fourth St. would meet a state code that prohibits licensed owners from carrying guns in any building with a courtroom?

“It started as an intellectual pursuit,” Freeman said. “What makes a courtroom? Just walking over to a utility closet and saying, ‘This is a courtroom?’”

As he waited for an answer, Freeman used social media to go public about his request and why he was asking.

Two weeks later, on May 17, according to court documents, Scott Hodson and Michael Fincher, Tippecanoe County Sheriff’s Department officers assigned to the courthouse, confronted Freeman, telling him they’d been told he was carrying a gun. In court documents, Freeman said the bailiffs also mentioned that he had discussed – “the noun ‘rant’ was used” – his public records request on social media.

Sheriff Barry Richard said his bailiffs told him that Freeman cooperated.

“They went to a place out of the way – a restroom – to ask him about what they’d heard,” Richard said. “He denied it and apparently raised his coat to show that he didn’t have anything. It kind of ended there.”

Freeman said he didn’t blame Hodson or Fincher – “they were just doing their jobs.” He said the officers never laid a hand on him. Still, he said he asked the bailiffs who had made the accusation but couldn’t get them to say. According to court documents, Freeman also filed an open records request with the sheriff’s department but was told there was no record.

Freeman said that while “it’s no secret” where he stands on the Second Amendment, “I respect time and place” – including those at the courthouse, where restrictions exist on who may carry a weapon.

Asked by the J&C after Monday’s hearing, Richard said he was told that concerns that day came from a couple of people in the courthouse, including Magistrate Tricia Thompson.

“We were just following up on questions from a credible source,” Richard said. “I think it’s something that was a credible concern and we checked. That’s about it.”

Thompson on Tuesday said, “It would not be appropriate for me to answer questions regarding security. … As a judicial officer, it is inappropriate for me to comment about a pending case – including one before a Tippecanoe County judicial colleague.”

On June 12, Doug Masson, the county’s attorney, answered Freeman’s open records request. Masson wrote that “there have been general discussions” about space for “overflow court functions in the 111 building, however the plans have not yet become concrete.” That means, Masson wrote, that it’s legal for those with a permit to carry a gun into the new annex. (The same rule applies to the County Office Building at Third and Columbia streets.)

By then, Freeman was deep into questions about retaliation, posting periodic updates on his law firm’s Facebook page about whether county officials were trying to silence him.

From May 23: “Let's see where the evidence takes us and how deep this rabbit hole goes. Who is ‘someone’ and who told ‘someone’ to make this fake complaint? When the government attacks you, you have two boxes to select from: victim or not. I choose not.”

June 1: “I won't let them get away with this attack on me. If they can attack me, (government) can attack anyone. Better for them to lose their teeth biting into my armor than impaling and digesting others. Besides I fight back when others cannot/will not.”

On Monday, Freeman told Busch he wasn’t on a fishing expedition. He said he’s ready to make his case that being checked for guns – just as he was getting noisy about county operations – amounted to grounds for a potential defamation lawsuit. He said he just needs to pin down who should be answering the questions.

“Like I said,” Freeman said, “a real whodunit.”

Reach J&C columnist Dave Bangert at 765-420-5258 or at dbangert@gannett.com.