Dan Carden

A long-running defamation lawsuit involving two of Northwest Indiana's biggest personalities will continue a while longer.

Speros Batistatos, past president and CEO of the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority (SSCVA), recently filed suit at the Lake Superior Court against Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr., the city of Hammond and McDermott's "Left of Center" podcast in response to allegedly false and harmful remarks McDermott made in 2021 about Batistatos on the podcast and elsewhere.

The defamation claim initially was included in a still-pending federal lawsuit Batistatos is pursing against the SSCVA and its board members related to the July 15, 2021, end of his 30-year tenure as Lake County's tourism chief.

However, U.S. District Judge Damon Leichty said in a

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