Preventing Affinity Scams for Seniors

I missed this one.  PASS ACT of 2011

This bill addresses "affinity scams" in which seniors are financially exploited by a trusted person- for example a caregiver, relative, or guardian. Financial institutions, including banks and credit unions, would need to implement training for staff and outreach/marketing materials for senior customers. Institutions would also need to offer "Senior Protection Accounts." If a transaction conducted through this account was possibly part of an affinity scam, the institution should not process it.

Bill Number HR 370 IH

Sponsor Representative Joe Baca (D-CA)

I'm writing to Mr. Baca....

State Supreme Court Holds Lawyers, Conservators Accountable In Probate Cases

March 23, 2012 Rick Green

The state Supreme Court stood up Friday for a simple right that matters deeply for all, but especially to the old, sick and disabled.

The job of a lawyer appointed by probate court is to fight for the client, whether he is healthy or a stubborn 86-year-old man.

In a unanimous ruling in the long-running civil rights case of Daniel Gross, the justices ruled that court-appointed lawyers do not have immunity from lawsuits if they abuse their clients. The court also ruled, in a divided opinion, that conservators appointed by probate have limited immunity. The justices also ruled that a nursing home does not have immunity from lawsuits in probate cases.

The ruling has far-reaching implications for our troubled probate court system. It means that a court-appointed lawyer, and to a lesser extent the conservator — who is appointed by probate when a person can no longer live independently — cannot ignore the wishes of a client. The message to probate court is clear: Lawyers and conservators must be held accountable.

For probate courts, this has huge implications because many of the unsettling and outrageous cases I have been writing about for the past six years stem from abuse by conservators and court-appointed lawyers and judges who don't pay enough attention.

Although Gross died in 2007, his civil rights case lived on. The lasting lesson is that the old or disabled — even if they are unwell and cranky — have the same rights as the rest of us.

"It means that if you get a court-appointed lawyer, that lawyer cannot have any doubt that the lawyer's job is to listen to you,'' said Sally Zanger, the Connecticut Legal Rights Project lawyer who represented Carolyn Dee King, Gross' daughter. "It's what the lawyer is supposed to be doing."

Amazingly, that's been the problem in the probate cases I've been telling you about since 2006. Gross' was the first and most heartbreaking case I stumbled upon, when a Legal Aid lawyer told me an unbelievable tale of an old man from Long Island being held against his will in a Waterbury nursing home.

Elderly but still independent, Gross became ill while visiting his daughter in Waterbury. He was hospitalized, and while his children fought over his care and who should control his finances, Waterbury Probate Judge Thomas Brunnock approved his involuntary conservatorship.

Gross wanted to go home to Long Island. He wasn't told of the hearing where he was ordered conserved. His court-appointed lawyer, Jonathan Newman, failed to object to the conservatorship, even though Gross just wanted to leave Connecticut. His conservator, Kathleen Donovan, had him placed in a locked, restricted ward at Grove Manor Nursing Home in Waterbury. His roommate was violent.

Later, when Gross was on a day visit to his Long Island home, he was hospitalized. Donovan brought him back to Connecticut in an ambulance against the wishes of Gross' New York doctor.

In June 2006, Superior Court Judge Joseph Gormley, at a dramatic writ of habeas corpus hearing, ordered Gross freed, declaring that "a terrible miscarriage of justice" had taken place and that the man had been "deprived of his liberty."

King, Gross' daughter, filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Brunnock, Donovan, Newman and the nursing home. Brunnock, as a judge, could not be sued, but the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals sent the question of immunity for the others back to the state Supreme Court for a ruling. King's lawsuit against Donovan, Newman and the nursing will now go back to federal court.

Newman's lawyer — who argued to the Supreme Court that his client's role was like that of a lawyer for a child — did not respond to my call. A lawyer for Donovan, Richard A. Roberts, said the ruling might mean that conservators and court-appointed lawyers will be forced to go to a judge for every decision they make.

But Fairfield Probate Judge Daniel Caruso, president of the association of probate judges, said that his colleagues will welcome the ruling.
"When the Supreme Court articulates and provides brighter lines as to what is and is not within the bounds of immunity, it helps everyone," he said.

Public-interest lawyers hailed the decision because it provides new accountability to a court system that critics say still lacks oversight.

"Our legal system has safeguards. Even when you are appointed by the court you are accountable for what you do,'' Tom Behrendt of the Connecticut Legal Rights Project told me.

When I reached King, she reminded me of her father's humiliation before a court that was supposed to protect him.

"He was robbed of his humanity at the end of his life,'' King said. "He was used as a pawn. They just ignored him."

We can't change that, but the elderly man's lasting legacy is a powerful one. If you are old or disabled, probate court is a less-frightening place thanks to Daniel Gross.


Now, we need to work on getting this here.....

Good Faith Gesture

I'm getting sued for defamation now and hired an attorney because the lawsuit is so confusing. 

As a good faith gesture, I removed everything from Ludwig's website that's not within the statute... things I posted after 1/9/11 NOT because I'm guilty either.  What I wrote is true, it's my experience... I'm removing it to make a point.  99.9% stays put and I can prove it.  I'll look over this blog but not today... I saw the lawsuit, there are only eight posts.  Out of respect for my attorney, I changed Ludwig's photo to a free stock photo on the Internet.

How to WIN Guardianship in Cook County Probate Court

I just won my first custody case today (helping a pro se litigant) and I shouldn't say that because the woman I court watched for and counseled is amazing and deserves to be successor guardian. She will credit me; I will credit a gentleman at the State's Attorneys Office who let me in on this not so secret secret...

How to Win Guardianship

Three steps that are far from easy:

1. Do NOT join any online guardianship group until after you win custody.  (Joining one or being associated with one will not help you win.)

2. Apologize. They're going to emotionally abuse you and the AIP (Alleged Incapacitated Person). You're going to go off on the lowliest employee to the highest and everyone in between because you're protective instincts kick in. You can't help yourself because your loved one is an elder/disabled person that is defenseless and vulnerable... the people who entered their lives are just looking at them as cash cows.... it's very natural to go off but if you continue, you won't win custody. You need to apologize for your bad behavior. You don’t have to apologize to the lowliest employee that they (interlopers) set up to antagonize you but it’s really in your best interests to apologize to the rest…. You’ll understand why after.

3. Do NOT disrespect the Judge!  I CANNOT emphasize this enough!  I don’t understand it when people walk into the courtroom with chips on both shoulders then give the judge a piece of their minds? Let me give you a hint... if you're going to get into a power struggle with a Cook County Probate Court Judge, you're going to lose and lose big. If you can't say, "Yes ma'am", "No ma'am" or "Yes sir", "No sir" and "Your Honor" then you've got no business being anyone's guardian. Love has no pride; it has no shame and if you can't leave your ego out in the hallway then don't walk into that courtroom expecting to win.  The judge decides whether or not you're fit (and that includes blood relatives) and if you're acting like a hooligan, you're unfit.

These are the steps it takes and they're not easy but if you need help, you can contact me and I'll counsel you through it.  This advice won’t work for everyone either but it's a really good start.  After you win, I strongly urge you to tell others or blog about it.  Give a review of an attorney, who helped you, how, etc.  Blogging does nothing for reform, it does warn and help others.  You should get in contact with Latifa Ring at NOTEGA since she got all her members heard by the CFPB.  I'm a member of her organization.

I wrote this post because respect is earned, no one can earn that for you and without it you lose.

I can't take my eyes off this winning petition and I'm going to win more.... this is just the beginning.....

Teddy Roosevelt

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that HIS PLACE shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”

I have the same birthday as this gentleman and this quote resonates to my very soul because I DARED GREATLY and win or lose, that's all that really matters.......

An Age For Justice - Confronting Elder Abuse