Teacher sues city and IV Mall for his arrest

A local teacher took Imperial Valley Mall and City of El Centro to federal court for allegedly violating his First Amendment Rights.
Robert Holzman was arrested at IV Mall in August of last year. He said the humiliation was painful.
“I was doing just this, handing out flyers and getting petitions signed to stop the use of nuclear weapons. And they forced me off the property and I spent the night in jail,” Holzman said.
He claims the arrest violated his First Amendment Rights.
“We’ve got a lawsuit against the imperial valley mall and the El Centro Police Department for stopping me from exercising my freedom of speech,” Holzman said.
He was passing anti-nuclear war flyers on the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan.
“It’s degrading. You’re out in public. They cuff you. Carry you away cuffed in the back of a police car,” Holzman said.
He said he’s handed flyers at thousands of places in Southern California and never had a problem with either the malls there or the police.
“I’ve been to malls all over San Diego County doing similar things like this, never had to ask permission or tell the mall in advance.”
The charges against him were dropped but he decided to sue in federal court.
“an attorney came to my assistance.”
IV Mall and the city settled on Thursday morning. The details are confidential.
“We want to cause the Imperial Valley Mall to change their regulations on allowing people access to their property,” Holzman said.
He plans to keep passing flyers in public places about preventing nuclear war.
“One of our leaders of our country could use a nuclear weapon on hundreds of thousands of civilians,” Holzman said.
“It’s the right of the public to be educated about things that are going on in our society,” Holzman said.
IV Mall officials were not available for comment.