Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein’s office has secured a court order forcing the owner of a Hilltop building to address a “laundry list” of fire code violations and illegal conditions, including an unauthorized shooting range and an illegal gambling machine on the premises.
The mixed-use building, located at 2403-2409 West Broad Street, contains upper floor apartments and first floor commercial spaces, including Noor Food Mart, Klein said in a media release. The building is owned by Khaled Kurdi, who is the landlord.
Referencing court documents, Klein said that the Columbus Divisions of Police and Fire, Building and Zoning Services, and Code Enforcement found several fire and safety code violations throughout the building, including blocked exits, unauthorized residential occupancy, electrical hazards such as open electrical wiring in residential common areas, and cockroaches and animal feces in the store.
During an undercover operation, Columbus police detectives played and won money on an illegal “Golden Buffalo” gambling machine inside of Noor Food Mart, according to court records. Officers also found evidence that the basement had been converted to a shooting range, where they found spent shell casings, bullet-riddled targets, and other shooting-related materials.
“This case demonstrates that persistent code violations and illegal activity often go hand in hand,” Rob Doersam, an attorney with the City Attorney’s Property Action Team, said in a prepared news release. “Thanks to the work of our partners at the Division of Fire, Columbus police, Building and Zoning Services, and Code Enforcement, we were able to build a strong case documenting the full scope of illegal activity and code violations at this property. We’re grateful the [Franklin County Environmental] Court acted quickly to force owners to clean up their act or face further accountability.”
The injunction secured by Klein requires Kurdi to correct all of the code violations, ensure sanitary conditions, remove exterior trash, and to stop using the basement as a shooting range. It also forces Kurdi to end unauthorized residential occupancy until the property receives the required zoning approvals, according to the media release.
Kurdi has 30 days to address the violations, according to the court order.
Kurdi told The Dispatch he was surprised by the allegations and said he did not know about either the code violations or the illegal shooting range. He said the accusations were troubling and maintained that he was unaware of the activity taking place inside the building, including the shooting range.
He said he began leasing the space to the owners of Noor Food Mart earlier this year and that this was the first time he had encountered problems of this nature with tenants.
“I don’t know what’s happening when I’m not there,” Kurdi told The Dispatch. He said that he visits the building twice a week to check on the people who are leasing the building from him.
According to Kurdi, the owners of the store are on a 10-year lease, but said he may have to break the lease to get them to leave.
Reporter Shahid Meighan can be reached at smeighan@dispatch.com, at ShahidMeighan on X, and at shahidthereporter.dispatch.com on Bluesky.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Hilltop building owner ordered to fix code violations, illegal firing range
Reporting by Shahid Meighan, Columbus Dispatch / The Columbus Dispatch
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Shahid Meighan, Columbus Dispatch | USA TODAY Network
