Maryland Legal Aid sues Baltimore County over eviction law deeming property abandoned

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A Baltimore County eviction law that allows tenants’ property to be thrown away without due process is facing a legal challenge, two years after a similar law in Baltimore City was deemed unconstitutional.

Maryland Legal Aid on Thursday sued the county over an ordinance that treats renters’ property as “abandoned” when removed from the home during the eviction process, leaving renters with no way to get it back.

“The ordinance deems everything, including the tenant’s essential medication, passport, furniture, or even cash, to be abandoned the moment the Sheriff arrives,” the complaint states. “(It) imposes a fictional presumption that tenants have ‘abandoned’ their personal property and provides the tenant no opportunity to rebut that fiction.”

Legal Aid is representing Sherry Gudger, a single mother living with multiple sclerosis, who was evicted from her Halethorpe apartment last August — on the first day of the school year for her 8-year-old son.

Gudger received notice on or about August 7, her complaint states, that she would be evicted on the 25th. During that time she “did her best to remove her personal possessions from her third-floor apartment,” the complaint states, but didn’t manage to remove everything by the eviction date.

On the morning of the eviction, she walked her son to school and came back, and was informed that her belongings had been thrown away. She lost a passport card, her son’s bed, tools from a vocational training program, clothing and more.

“I became part of this lawsuit because I believe everyone should be treated fairly,” Gudger stated in a news release from Maryland Legal Aid.

“A lot of people are going through hard times right now, and what happened to me and my family could happen to someone else. People deserve to know what can happen to their property and have a chance to recover the belongings that are important to them.”

A spokesperson for Baltimore County Executive Kathy Klausmeier declined to comment on the pending lawsuit.

The complaint, filed in Maryland U.S. District Court, brings two causes of action for due-process violations under the 14th Amendment. Gudger is asking to be compensated for the property she lost and for the ordinance to be struck down.

In July 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit struck down a similar Baltimore City law that deemed renters’ property to be abandoned at the time of an eviction.

Maryland Legal Aid filed an amicus brief in that case, in which the Fourth Circuit upheld $186,000 in damages awarded to the plaintiff. The court ruled the city violated her right to due process, writing that it was “eminently fair to hold a municipality responsible for harm caused by a failure of due process.”

After the ruling, tenant advocates urged Maryland lawmakers to guarantee a process for renters to reclaim their property.

“Losing your housing is already extremely destabilizing,” said Zafar Shah, advocacy director for the human right to housing at Maryland Legal Aid.

“But then, for the county law to strip you of essential belongings such as identification documents, clothing, work equipment or sentimental items, is simply kicking people when they are down. It becomes even harder to recover and regain stability. This policy deepens poverty.”