Photo via Jeff Rae
This article has been updated.
The resident of a house on Maryland Avenue NE who was facing eviction won a bit more time today after a group of demonstrators from Occupy D.C. gathered outside her house to prevent her from being evicted after the building’s owner was foreclosed upon.
Dawn Butler, who lives at 917 Maryland Avenue, got a stay from a judge in D.C. Superior Court after a few dozen members of Occupy D.C. protested in front of police officers and moving crews set to carry out an eviction Butler and Occupy say should never have been ordered. Demonstrators unfurled a large mesh banner with the phrase “Eviction Free Zone.”
Butler started renting the single-family house in March 2006. Its owner was foreclosed upon in August 2009 by JPMorgan Chase, with a Bethesda law firm, Rosenberg and Associates, handling the paperwork. Under D.C. law and her rental agreement, Butler was entitled to make a bid on the property, which she offered in spring 2010 after the house was assessed.
The real estate agent through whom Butler made the offer confirmed that it was received by the bank, according to Butler’s mother, Anne. But the offer went without a response for over a year. In July 2011, the Butlers finally heard back from Rosenberg in the form of a 30-day “Notice to Quit” ordering the former owner, Butler and any “tenants” to vacate the property. The owner did not reside at the house, while Butler had already shown the law firm a copy of her lease establishing her as the tenant.
“The same people who said she was the owner was the same firm that did the foreclosure and they have a copy of her lease,” Anne Butler said.
The case proceeded to the Landlord and Tenant Branch of D.C. Superior Court, but Butler was unable to make one court date and missed at least one other because, she said, the bank’s attorneys did not notify her. Butler eventually received a writ of possession on the house from the U.S. Marshals Service. Butler finally appeared in court last December, but she and members of Occupy D.C. say the judge refused her testimony and did not accept her status as a tenant.
After several more rounds in court, the eviction was scheduled for today. Butler contacted a hotline operated by Occupy D.C. over the weekend, said Mike Haack, a member of the economic protest movement who organizes the “Occupy Our Homes” activities that have focused on preventing evictions and foreclosures.
In addition to Dawn Butler being a longtime tenant of 917 Maryland Avenue, she and her mother spent about $250,000 making substantial improvements to the home, Anne Butler said. The property is currently assessed at $1,052,740, according to District records, and Anne Butler said she and her daughter would have been qualified buyers had Rosenberg and Associates not fudged the paperwork and been unresponsive.
After several hours of today’s protests, the eviction was called off and a different judge in D.C. Superior Court ordered a stay pending an April 19 hearing. Haack called it another successful outcome of a protest tactic that has seemed to breathe new life into Occupy D.C. after much of it was swept away two months ago when U.S. Park Police cracked down on the tent city erected in McPherson Square.
Last month, Occupy D.C. helped a Bowie woman, Bertina Jones, stay in her home and avoid a foreclosure sale after protesting outside the headquarters of the federally backed mortgage lender Freddie Mac. Jones took part in today’s rally.
