Mediaboss Marketing

A Hampshire Superior Court judge issued a preliminary injunction Friday allowing a Belchertown condominium owner to display a Black Lives Matter sign near her unit after she was ordered to remove the sign by condominium trustees.

Judge Richard Carey issued the injunction allowing Margery Jess, the owner of a condo in the Summer Hill Estates Development on Route 202 in Belchertown, to display her sign in a common area pending the outcome of her suit against the condo association.

Jesss attorneys argued that the condo rules and regulations did not prohibit signs, and besides Article 16 of the state Declaration of Rights declares, The right of free speech shall not be abridged.

Jess, along with the American Civil Liberties Union Western Massachusetts Legal Office and the Northampton law firm Sasson, Turnbull, Ryan and Hoose, filed the lawsuit earlier this month after the Chairman of the Trustees ordered her to remove the sign she had placed in a flower bed in front of her condo unit or face a $50 per day fine twice the amount allowed by condo rules.

According to the complaint filed on October 13, Jess placed her sign reading Black Lives Matter outside of her condo on May 30. The next day Frank Pudlo, Chairman of the Condominium Trust, sent her an email ordering the removal of the sign. At the same time, several other condo units had patriotic or ethnic placards posted and in one case hearts in appreciation of front-line medical workers. Condo trustees called the other signs decorative rather than Jesss political statement.

Follow this link:
Injunction allows Black Lives Matter sign to stay in Belchertown condo complex - masslive.com