Publication select ▼
ROSEVILLE — Another legal proceeding attempting to halt the sale and demolition of the former Sacred Heart church in Roseville may be drawing to a close.
At a Sept. 26 hearing, Macomb County Circuit Court Judge Diane Druzinski denied a preliminary injunction filed in a lawsuit aimed at stopping the sale and demolition of the former church to make way for a Sheetz gas station.
The motion was part of a lawsuit filed by Curtiss Ostosh, pastor of the Harvest Time Church in Warren, who claims a purchase agreement between his church and Mooney Real Estate Holdings from 2021 is still valid.
“To me, this is sacred ground. To me, it has to be preserved because it has historical value, it has spiritual value, it has religious value,” Ostosh said.
In 2021, Harvest Time made a $25,000 deposit to purchase the property. However, according to Ostosh, representatives from Mooney Real Estate Holdings never showed up for the closing.
Thomas Rheaume Jr., who represented Mooney Real Estate Holdings at the hearing, said they asked for a wire transfer, and that Mooney Real Estate Holdings doesn’t close in-person.
“We asked for a wire transfer. You might hear today that, oh, they didn’t close because somebody was out of town, somebody’s gone. Mooney Real Estate Holdings has never closed a transaction in-person. Every transaction is closed through an escrow agent,” he said.
Ostosh said the two sides couldn’t agree on who would pay for what he said is $600,000 in damages done to the building during the pending period of the sale.
According to Ostosh, damages were caused by a lightning strike that blew out part of the roof because the diffusion cable had been stolen, and the hole left in the roof allowed for flooding.
“The archdiocese is self-insured. They offered us about $50,000 in one of the addendums for all of the damages,” he said.
According to Rheaume, Harvest Time had placed a deposit on the property, and it was allowed to move in and begin renovations, but he blamed Harvest Time for failing to complete the deal. The sale was officially canceled in October 2021, and Mooney kept the deposit, Rheaume said.
“We sent them a letter saying you, Harvest Time, failed to close the transaction. The transaction is terminated, and as a penalty, we’re taking the earnest money deposit,” Rheaume said. “Thereafter, the title company funded us the $25,000 deposit, and we haven’t heard anything for four years.
Rheaume said that when the transaction failed to close, Harvest Time was notified that it needed to move its personal belongings out of the church and that the locks were going to be changed, which he said was done. He also said Harvest Time and the public were notified that the church was going to be relisted. It was transferred to St. Pio of Pietrelcina Parish in Roseville in 2022 after the sale fell through.
Ostosh also alleges that in 2024, after the property had been transferred from Mooney Real Estate Holdings to St. Pio, it had been illegally rezoned.
Matthew Zalewski, who represented the city of Roseville at the Sept. 26 hearing, told Druzinski there was no legitimate claim against the city.
Zalewski said the city is allowed to rezone property as it sees fit, and that approving the injunction could open the door for other people to file lawsuits to stop the city from doing projects that they disapprove of.
“The harm to the city would be tremendous if this preliminary injunction is issued, because it really would open the door to people who just dislike a project to come in and seek an injunction when they have no interest in the property, no cause of action,” he said.
At the hearing, Cindy Rhodes Victor, who was representing Harvest Time at the hearing, filed to withdraw the injunction and file an amended complaint, adding St. Pio as a defendant. Druzinski said she wanted the amended complaint to be filed within a week.
The denial of the motion also pushed back a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, filed by attorneys representing the defendants. According to court records, the amended complaint has been filed and a hearing has been scheduled for 8:30 Nov. 3. A hearing to dismiss the lawsuit has been scheduled for the same time, both in front of Druzinski.
In addition to the lawsuit from Harvest Time, Ed Stross, who owns the art studio across the street, attempted to sue the city on the grounds that it had failed to give adequate public notice of a Planning Commission meeting where the Sheetz proposal was approved. The lawsuit was dismissed in May, and the ruling was later upheld by the state Court of Appeals.
