Federal discrimination lawsuit accusing Westport business owners of using liquor licenses, lease agreements and so-called Good Neighbor Agreements to keep Black-owned businesses out of one of Kansas City’s most popular entertainment districts has taken a major new turn.
Civil rights attorney Cecilia Brown said a third amended complaint filed in March significantly expanded the case, adding new civil conspiracy allegations tied to what plaintiffs describe as efforts to cover up discrimination claims rather than correct them.
Brown discussed the new filing last week during the lawsuit’s second appearance on Roland Martin’s Roland Martin Unfiltered daily digital show. The case was first featured on the national program in November 2025, and Brown said that national attention helped generate new witnesses, recordings and evidence that led directly to the latest amendment.
“What we found in discovery — and quite frankly media, your show, Roland — has allowed witnesses to come forward,” Brown said. “This RICO, this conspiracy, just continues to grow, and we are so fortunate that we keep ending up with all of the evidence.”
Brown said the third amended complaint was filed after plaintiffs uncovered recordings showing business owners allegedly tried to recruit another Black entrepreneur with a $300,000 investment offer — not to create opportunity, she said, but to help undermine the discrimination case.
She said the goal was to “refute the discrimination claim.”
Brown further alleged the offer was made to someone they believed they could control because of his criminal record.
“What you’re doing is hiring a house Negro to do what you want to do and to be the mask of ‘we’re not racist,’” Brown said on the show.
The lawsuit was originally filed in early 2025 and has since grown through multiple amended complaints. It was brought by three Black business owners — Christopher Lee of Euphoric LLC, D’Mario Gray of UniKC LLC and Robert Thorpe of The Sourze LLC — against the Westport Community Improvement District (CID), its all-white board and several business owners and landlords connected to the district.
The complaint alleges a coordinated effort to use race-neutral sounding rules in discriminatory ways to prevent Black entrepreneurs from opening or keeping businesses in Westport, a nightlife-heavy entertainment district near downtown Kansas City.
At the center of the case is what is known as the Good Neighbor Agreement.
Westport has had real safety concerns over the years, including late-night fights, shootings and violence tied to the entertainment district. The CID has argued the agreements were intended to improve safety and accountability.
Per a November 2025 article in The Kansas City Star, the agreements require bar owners to maintain a no-weapons policy, fund and maintain security cameras, share footage with police, and pay financial penalties to the CID for repeated violent tavern disturbances involving police. Businesses that do not sign must instead pay an additional fee that can be as much as 20% of their annual CID assessment.
The agreements were designed to give Westport stakeholders a way to enforce safety standards through contracts and financial leverage instead of relying only on police or city departments.
Brown argues the problem is not that safety rules exist, but how those rules were enforced.
“I think if you look at U.S. history, you’ll find a lot of covenants and agreements drawn up with seemingly neutral terms that actually held a very racist intent and were enforced in a very racist way,” Brown told The Star.
The plaintiffs argue the Good Neighbor Agreement became a gatekeeping system used to decide who could and could not succeed in Westport.
According to the federal complaint, recorded statements show business owners were told that signing the agreement meant agreeing to strict CID control over operations — including language that if they violated the agreement, they could be forced to surrender their liquor license and pay the CID’s legal costs. One recording described it as “written pretty one-sided,” and another stated, “If we don’t have a contractual agreement, we do everything we can to put them out of business.”
The lawsuit says “99 percent” of property owners would not sign consent forms for a liquor license unless the Good Neighbor Agreement was signed .
That pressure is central to the plaintiffs’ civil conspiracy, extortion and racketeering claims.
Thorpe says his planned Daiquiri Shop was blocked after he was told Westport did not want more bars “especially those patronized by the hip-hop crowds,” which were said to “equate to violence.” After paying rent and expenses, he says he was told the concept would no longer be allowed .
Gray says after signing a lease for a club space, neighboring business owners questioned him about whether he would attract an R&B and hip-hop crowd and what “type of crowd” would come. The next day, he says he was locked out. His landlord later paid him $100,000 to walk away from the lease .
Lee says after signing a lease to reopen the former Ale House space, he was denied keys after Westport leaders objected to what they called his “type of crowd.” He says he was later told he should target “an older crowd” and “not that young hip-hop crowd” .
The lawsuit took another major turn in October 2025 when U.S. District Judge Roseann Ketchmark approved a significant expansion of the case, allowing plaintiffs to add racketeering claims alleging the CID used coercion, extortion and liquor license pressure to control business access and limit Black ownership in the district.
The case now reaches beyond Westport merchants and directly to City Hall.
Gwen Grant, president and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Kansas City, said Kansas City became complicit by turning too much authority over to the district itself.
She said the city passed a street vacation ordinance that effectively gave the merchants control over the streets and security decisions in Westport, allowing them to determine who enters the district and how rules are enforced.
“The city has ceded its responsibility,” Grant said. “They vacated their responsibility.”
Brown said discovery also showed former Kansas City Regulated Industries Director Jim Reddy helped the CID learn how to work around city ordinances involving liquor license approvals.
She alleges he showed them how to use Good Neighbor Agreements to effectively bargain for liquor license approval — something the city’s own consent forms explicitly prohibit.
“We are currently naming Jim Reddy and the City of Kansas City in our third amended complaint,” Brown said.
The Urban League of Greater Kansas City and the NAACP have filed an amicus brief supporting the plaintiffs. An amicus brief, often called a “friend of the court” filing, allows outside organizations to formally support one side of a case because of its broader public importance.
For Brown and Grant, the case reflects a much larger national pattern.
Martin noted similar tactics have happened across the country — from discriminatory dress codes to businesses changing music formats or shutting down when too many Black customers arrived.
Kansas City is not alone. Wichita’s Old Town entertainment district faced similar complaints for years over dress code enforcement and Black musicians saying they struggled to get gigs.
“It’s 2026 and we’re seeing the exact same patterns,” Brown said.
