The public interest law firm that challenged the use of eminent domain in the landmark case Kelo v. City of New London is urging the U.S. Supreme Court to stop Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards development in Brooklyn.

In a friend-of-the-court brief recently filed in the federal high court, the Arlington, Va.-based Institute for Justice called on the court to hear an appeal brought by a handful of residents who would be ousted by the Atlantic Yards project. The Supreme Court has not yet indicated whether it will hear the case.

In 2005, the court allowed the city of New London, Conn., to expel homeowners from a residential neighborhood and deliver their property to private developers in the name of economic development. Lawyers for the Institute for Justice, which represented the homeowners in Kelo v. City of New London, argue that the Supreme Court should use the Brooklyn case to clarify how much leeway courts still have to halt the use of eminent domain.

The Brooklyn residents claim that politicians, including Governor Pataki, approved the Atlantic Yards project — which calls for a basketball arena, as well as towers of housing and office space — primarily as a favor to the president of Forest City Ratner, Bruce Ratner. So far, two lower federal courts have said that, even if this allegation were to be proved, the Kelo decision forbids federal courts from blocking eminent domain seizures so long as the development project provides some public benefit.

Lawyers for the Institute for Justice argue that the Supreme Court should overturn the two lower courts and affirm that the use of eminent domain is unconstitutional when the seizure of property is made in “bad faith or for pretextual reasons,” such as to benefit a private developer, the brief said.