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On September 1, Montgomery County Maryland Judge Karla Smith issued a temporary restraining order impeding the sale of a historic African-American burial ground which was at risk of being purchased for millions.
According to WTOP, during a hearing for a lawsuit to contest the Montgomery County Housing Opportunities Commission’s (HOC) sale of the $51 million Westwood Tower Apartments, Smith chose to take action and put a temporary hold on the process.
The complex would be partially built upon the historic ancient burial ground, home to hundreds of ancestors in Bethesda, Maryland’s Moses Macedonia African Cemetery.
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The Bethesda African Cemetery Coalition (BACC) claimed that the HOC’s sale doesn’t comply with the state law that requires a judge to approve the sale on the cemetery process before it is sold.
Steve Lieberman, a partner with the law firm filing the suit, said, “That law was enacted to ensure the proper dignity and respect is accorded to the remains of people buried on the land.”
He also mentioned that the people buried in the cemetery are “hundreds of bodies,” including “the bodies of freed slaves and their descendants.”
Following the lawsuit, Lieberman spoke at a hearing on August 12, saying, “HOC, for whatever reason, chose not to comply to that statute. It has entered into an agreement with a private developer to sell the Moses African Cemetery. Why did HOC ignore the law? We don’t know that yet.”
Judge Smith explained in her order that the cemetery was made up of “freed slaves” and individuals “who had worked on one or more of the four plantations in the River Road area of Montgomery County prior to the Civil War.”
Smith’s order impedes the sale until September 27, when a preliminary injunction is expected to take place regarding the sale.