LAKE STATION | The lawyer for one of the teens alleged to have been in an after-school fight with a 54-year-old substitute teacher filed suit on his client's behalf Thursday in Lake Superior Court in East Chicago.

The complaint and a demand for a jury trial was filed by Merrillville attorney Todd M. Conover on behalf of his client, Ronald Zellers, and Zellers' parents, Michael Zellers and Rhonda Somers, of Lake Station.

Zellers, 17, had been a senior at Edison High School up until the Oct. 15 incident in which it's alleged he and another teenager were involved in an after-school fight with substitute teacher Hiram Alamo, of Lake Station.

The school on Monday, following expulsion hearings held last week, agreed to expel both teens through the end of the school year.

Both teens had been suspended following the Oct. 15 incident.

Michael Back, an attorney for Alamo, said he doesn't understand the rush to file a complaint against his client by the Zellers family.

"My client is still under treatment. He was severely beaten and may have suffered permanent damage," Back said.

In the complaint, Zellers is seeking unspecified civil damages including battery and intentional inflictions of emotional distress, Conover said

"We've said all along this is self-defense. Mr. Alamo lives close to the police station and if he thought he was being harassed why didn't he go to police," Conover said.

Also in the suit it's alleged that Alamo grabbed the leg of Zellers while threatening to hit him with his fist, he said.

Conover said that in a civil complaint a specified amount of damages isn't sought.

"That would be determined at the jury trial we are requesting," he said.

Lake Station police, following the incident, had made separate presentations to both the Lake County Juvenile Court in Crown Point and to the Lake Station City Court.

Alamo was charged through the Lake Station City Court with two misdemeanor battery charges, according to Lake Station Police Chief Mike Stills.

Prosecutors in Lake County Juvenile Court reviewed the case and decided there wasn't sufficient evidence to charge the students, Stills said.

Alamo reportedly was knocked unconscious during the incident and had to be taken to a local hospital for treatment.

Stills said the teens maintained Alamo had followed them and they were just defending themselves after he challenged them outside a student's home.

Alamo told police it was the teens who followed him and then retaliated because of a disciplinary incident at school.

Alejandro Dominguez, the attorney for the second teen, said it had not yet been determined whether his client would file a similar lawsuit.