Freedom Tower architect sued

A former architectural student is suing the designers of the Freedom Tower to replace the World Trade Center in New York that was destroyed in the 9/11 attacks, saying designs for the skyscraper mirror those he created at Yale University.

Thomas Shine is seeking unspecified damages in a Manhattan court for what he said was the theft of his designs.

The lawsuit alleged that the Freedom Tower was ”strikingly similar” to Shine’s designs for a Manhattan building for the proposed 2012 Olympic Games in New York.

It said Childs saw the designs when he served in 1999 on a panel of jurists invited by the Yale School of Architecture to evaluate the students’ work.

The Olympic design featured a twisting tower with a twisting structural grid and a textured facade, according to the lawsuit.