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\u201cZones of abandonment \u2026 accelerate the death of the unwanted. In this bureaucratically and relationally sanctioned register of social death, the human, the mental and the chemical are complicit: their entanglement expresses a common sense that authorized the lives of some while disallowing the lives of others.\u201d This story is about a day in the life of Sherry Gudger, a resident of Halethorpe, in Baltimore County, in Maryland. Sherry Gudger is a single mother living with multiple sclerosis. On or around August 7 of this year, Sherry Gudger received a notice stating that she would be evicted on the 25th<\/sup> of August. According to Ms. Gudger, she \u201cdid her best to remove her personal possessions from her third-floor apartment<\/a>\u201d. She didn\u2019t manage to remove everything. August 25th<\/sup> was the first day of school for her 8-year-old son. Ms. Gudger walked her son to school, returned to the apartment, and found that all her belongings had been thrown away. These belongings included \u201cher passport card, clothing, work tools, her eight-year-old son\u2019s bed, and other furniture.<\/a>\u201d The trashing of her estate was completely legal. Baltimore County has a \u201cPlacement of Personal Property\u201d ordinance, which says that a tenant\u2019s belongings removed during an eviction \u201cshall be considered abandoned\u201d. Sherry Gudger has joined a lawsuit challenging both the loss of her possessions and the law itself. The action was \u201clawful\u201d, but was it right? Further, and really, did Sherry Gudger \u201cabandon\u201d her personal property \u2026 or was she abandoned by the processes of eviction?<\/p>\n These questions have already been asked and answered. In 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit struck down a similar law in Baltimore City. According to Maryland Legal Aid<\/a>, representing Sherry Gudger, \u201cIn that case, the court held that tenants are entitled to clear notice that they could permanently lose ownership of their possessions during an eviction and that due process requires a meaningful opportunity to determine whether property was truly abandoned.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nJo\u00e3o Biehl, Vita: Life in a Zone of Social Abandonment<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n