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93-Year-Old Woman and Grandchildren Kicked Out Of Home; Tyler Perry Will Build Them a New One
In Hilton Head, South Carolina, a 93-year-old great-grandmother found herself locked in a legal battle with a development corporation attempting to acquire her property. The company, which planned to build a 147-unit subdivision that surrounded her home, sued the matriarch after she refused their offers to sell. The 1.8 acres of land wasn’t just her home; it was a legacy, owned by her husband’s family since the end of the Civil War. When a lawsuit and what the family described as a campaign of intimidation failed to make her surrender her ancestral home, her story of defiance went public. The struggle caught the eye of filmmaker Tyler Perry, who stepped in with a promise that would change everything.
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The Lawsuit
The conflict began years before it hit the headlines, when a company named Bailey Point Investment, LLC, acquired a 29-acre parcel of land that completely encircled Josephine Wright’s 1.8-acre homestead. Their plan was to construct a large, 147-home residential community.
With the project surrounding her property, the company made offers to purchase Mrs. Wright’s land. According to her family, the developer proposed sums as low as $30,000. Mrs. Wright refused each time.
When the offers were rejected, the developer changed tactics. In February 2023, Bailey Point Investment filed a lawsuit against the 93-year-old and a co-owner of the property. The lawsuit alleged that three structures were encroaching onto the developer’s land: a storage shed, a satellite dish, and a screened-in back porch. The company claimed these were a “nuisance” that impeded their construction and would decrease the value of their new homes. The lawsuit went further, challenging Mrs. Wright’s legal standing as an heir to the property—a move aimed at undermining her right to even defend her home in court.
A Fight for Ancestral Land
For Josephine Wright, the developer’s lawsuit was about more than a porch or a shed; it was a fight over a piece of American history. The land had been in her husband’s family since the Reconstruction era that followed the Civil War. Family history holds that it was first acquired by relatives who were formerly enslaved people freed by Union soldiers, making the property a direct link to Black emancipation.
At the center of the conflict was Mrs. Wright herself, a matriarch to a family that included 40 grandchildren, 50 great-grandchildren, and 16 great-great-grandchildren. The property served as the gravitational center for her family, a sanctuary for gatherings where generations connected.
“I’ve pretty much been a fighter all my life,” she told a local news station, a statement that would soon become a rallying cry. “I guess they figured I would become so unnerved with the harassment that I would say take it,” she later said. “But they don’t know me.”
Her struggle was also part of a larger story. The property sits within the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor, a coastal region where descendants of enslaved Africans have maintained a unique culture for centuries. On Hilton Head, that culture has been under threat for decades as resort development caused property values and taxes to soar, displacing many families from ancestral lands. Mrs. Wright’s home was one of the few remaining parcels of historically Black-owned land on the island, making her battle not just a defense of her home, but a stand for a vanishing heritage.
A Campaign of Intimidation
The pressure the Wright family faced extended beyond the courtroom. In response to the developer’s lawsuit, the family filed their own countersuit, alleging what they described as a “consistent and constant barrage of tactics of intimidation, harassment, and trespass.”
The family detailed a series of escalating incidents that they believed were designed to make them feel unsafe in their own home. Their allegations included:
- Workers from the development repeatedly trespass onto the property.
- Trash and construction debris being left on Mrs. Wright’s car and around her home.
- Shrubs and tree branches being cut down without permission.
- The tires on her car were slashed.
- Most disturbingly, a large snake was discovered hanging from her bedroom window.
While Mrs. Wright stated she could not prove who was behind every incident, the family said the events created an atmosphere of fear. They felt compelled to install security cameras to document the intrusions, adding to the financial and mental toll of the ordeal.
Tyler Perry Steps In
As the family’s fight gained media attention, it reached one of Hollywood’s most influential figures. In June 2023, filmmaker and actor Tyler Perry saw a news report on Mrs. Wright’s situation. He immediately posted about it to his millions of followers on Instagram. Quoting her defiant statement, “‘I’ve pretty much been a fighter all my life,’” Perry added his own promise: “Well, that makes two of us. Ms. Wright, please tell me where to show up and what you need to help you fight.”
His support quickly moved from a public pledge to a concrete, strategic plan. Perry committed to financing and building a brand-new, five-bedroom home for the Wright family on their land.
The new house was planned for a different section of the 1.8-acre property, far from the disputed porch. This single move effectively checkmated the developer, making their lawsuit over the old home’s “encroachment” irrelevant to the family’s ability to live on their land long-term.
Perry’s high-profile involvement created a wave of support. A GoFundMe campaign started by Mrs. Wright’s granddaughter to cover legal fees ultimately raised more than $367,000. Donations poured in from the public and other stars. Hip-hop icon Snoop Dogg contributed $10,000, while NBA star Kyrie Irving donated a total of $40,000, adding more funds after a tree fell and damaged the roof of Mrs. Wright’s old home.
A Posthumous Victory and A New Beginning
Josephine Wright would not live to see the final outcome of her fight. On January 7, 2024, she passed away peacefully at the age of 94, surrounded by her family. Her relatives, however, vowed to see the battle through to the end in her honor.
Just two months later, in March 2024, the Wright family announced they had reached a settlement with Bailey Point Investment. The terms represented a complete reversal of the developer’s initial position. The company was now legally obligated to:
- Permanently cease all contact with the Wright family regarding the sale of their land.
- Pay to repair the damaged roof of Mrs. Wright’s original home.
- Construct a privacy fence, including landscaping, to create a permanent buffer between the Wright property and the new subdivision.
In parallel with the legal victory, Tyler Perry’s promise was fulfilled. By early 2025, the new five-bedroom home was standing on the property, a modern and secure house on the ancestral land Mrs. Wright fought so hard to protect. To ensure her struggle could help others, the family used the momentum and remaining GoFundMe donations to establish The Josephine Wright Foundation, a non-profit created to provide support and resources to other families fighting to preserve their land.
Featured Image Source: The Wright Family / GoFundMe