A 93-year-old South Carolina woman is fighting to keep her land and property after a developer sued her in what she insists is part of a relentless effort to force her off her property so they can use it for a nearby development.
The Bailey Investment Group approached Josephine Wright earlier this year asking to buy her 1.8-acre property on Hilton Head Island to use it for a 27-acre, 147-unit development called Bailey’s Cove.
She refused. The home has been in her family since just after the Civil War. The relatives of her husband, a Gullah Geechee islander, were freed by Union soldiers after they escaped enslavement.
“It’s historical. It goes back to the Civil War, and it’s been in the family since that time,” Wright said of her home at a news conference last week. “We want to keep our property within the family.”
In February, the group filed a lawsuit against Wright claiming that a satellite dish, screened-in porch, and shed were encroaching on the group’s property line and obstructing the construction progress behind her house.
Wright’s granddaughter, Charise Graves, told local outlet Live 5 News that the family spent thousands to remove items mentioned in the Bailey Group’s claim, but they continued to badger Wright. Graves claims the developer offered her grandmother $39,000 for the land.
In response to the suit, Wright, a grandmother of 40, filed a counterclaim alleging “a consistent and constant barrage of tactics of intimidation, harassment, trespass” to try and force her to sell her property.
Graves set up a GoFundMe page to help pay for legal expenses and the construction of a fence between Wright’s property and the Bailey Group’s development. The fundraiser has received nearly $120,000 in donations since it was launched. NBA star Kyrie Irving reportedly donated $40,000 to her cause.
