George has served 19 years although she missed most of past two years
By Jameson Cook
Macomb County Probate Judge Kathryn George will retire early next
year after 19 years on the bench due to the lingering impact of injuries
suffered in a car crash two years ago.
George, 70, who took the bench Jan. 1, 2003 following her election,
hasn’t been on the bench for a year, last serving in November 2020
shortly after she won re-election to another six-year term. She served
about one-third of the working days in 2020 following the 2019 traffic
accident.
George was a nurse for many years before she started a legal career and served on the Sterling Heights City Council.
“My time on the bench was the highlight of my professional career and
I will greatly miss serving the people of Macomb County,” George said
in a news release from the county courts. “Unfortunately, medical
issues caused by an auto accident have forced my retirement.”
Judge James Biernat Jr., chief jurist of Macomb County courts, said
in a statement: “I have worked with Kathryn for many years, and I wish
to offer my sincere congratulations on her retirement. I hope this next
chapter in her life is a happy and fulfilling one, and I wish her all
the best.”
The absence of George, who has been collecting a salary of $156,000
salary plus benefits, has placed a burden on the county courts.
Macomb Circuit Judge Carl Marlinga, a former probate judge, in
September agreed to handle her wills and estates cases, which make up
the bulk of probate cases. Marlinga retained his civil caseload while
his civil docket has been split among the nine other circuit judges who
carry a criminal/civil docket. Marlinga had been taking probate cases on
and off during George’s absence.
Biernat and circuit Judge Matthew Switalski have been splitting the
remaining cases involving mental incapacity and the developmentally
disabled.
George is one of two judges at Macomb Probate Court; the other Judge
is Sandra Harrison, who also has taken on an increased caseload.
Macomb
County Probate Judge Kathryn George in 2017 chairs a meeting of the
county Elections Commission, which also included county Treasurer Larry
Rocca and then-clerk Karen Spranger.MACOMB DAILY FILE PHOTO
George’s seat will be filled by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who also is
expected to appoint a replacement for retiring Macomb Circuit Judge Mark
Switalski, who serves in family court, and is leaving in January with
three years left in his term.
Finalists for Switalski’s position are said to be Judge Matthew
Sabaugh of 37th District Court in Warren; Elizabeth Pyden, who was
defeated in 2018 by Judge Julie Gatti for a newly created judgeship in
Macomb County; and Teri Lynn Dennings, who ran for one of two open seats
at Macomb Circuit Court in 2016 that were captured by judges Michael
Servitto and Rachel Rancilio.
George for a time was chief probate judge and served as chairwoman of
the county Election Commission, which among other functions approves or
rejects ballot language for recall petitions.
George in her statement commended Harrison “for her collegiality and tremendous assistance” while serving.
“I also wish to thank the current and former Macomb County Probate
Court and Circuit Court judges,” George said. “It has been an honor to
have served alongside all of you.
“In addition, I wish to express my gratitude to my personal staff,
the Macomb County Probate Court staff, and the court administrators.
Their professionalism and commitment throughout my time on the bench has
been exceptional. A special thanks to the Macomb County legal community
for their exemplary service to Macomb County.
“Finally, I wish to thank the voters and residents of Macomb County,
who provided continuous support for the last 20 years. It has been an
honor to have served as your judge.”
George earned her law degree from the University of Idaho in 1988.
She was appointed to the Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board by then
Governor James Blanchard and later worked as a general practitioner with
an emphasis on probate and family law.
She has received awards from the Macomb County Probate Bar and the
Macomb County Bar Association. In 2005, the Michigan National Guard
presented her with an award for her support of U.S. military members and
their families. In 2007, George was inducted into the Macomb County
Hall of Fame for her outstanding community service. She received a
Certification of U.S. Congress Special Recognition for valuable and
dedicated assistance to Macomb County and its communities.
George grew up in Macomb County and earned a register nurse
certification from Harper Hospital School of Nursing in 1973 and a
bachelor’s of science degree in nursing from Oakland University in 1985,
working as an acute care nurse before beginning her legal career.
A former prosecutor in
Baltimore City was indicted on charges including extortion, misconduct
in office, stalking and harassment.
by Elizabeth Janney
BALTIMORE, MD — A former
assistant state's attorney for Baltimore City has been indicted on
charges including extortion, felony theft scheme, stalking, misconduct
in office and other offenses. Prosecutors said he used his office to
extort money on behalf of a friend and got private phone records of his
former romantic partners in part so he could stalk them.
Adam Lane Chaudry was indicted by a grand jury on 88 charges, officials said Tuesday.
Chaudry has been an assistant state's attorney for Baltimore City since 2009, according to the indictment.
He faces 48 counts of
misconduct in office for subpoenaing telephone records from of people
who were not involved in any investigations or prosecutions through the
Baltimore City State's Attorney's Office, the indictment says. The
charges stem from subpoenas he issued from 2019 to 2021, according to
the indictment.
Chaudry was also charged with stalking, harassment
and extortion. In the extortion case, the indictment states he wrote a
letter in 2018 on behalf of a personal acquaintance who believed she had
loaned $10,000 to her ex-boyfriend and acted as though a criminal
investigation was underway. The letter was from State's Attorney Marilyn
Mosby and signed by Chaudry; however, the indictment says there was
never any investigation into the allegations related to the matter.
"Our justice system, particularly the significant role and power of the
grand jury, relies on the integrity of law enforcement
officials—especially prosecutors," Maryland State Prosecutor Charlton T.
Howard III said in a statement. "Our office will work to ensure public
officials who abuse positions of trust and authority are investigated
and, where appropriate, prosecuted."
More than 20 years ago, Mike Moffitt started getting a lot of calls from a Florida phone number.
The
older woman on the other end of the line was trying to reach her
daughter, who lives in Maryland. But she kept dialing area code 401,
instead of 410 — and getting Moffitt instead.
Finally, "I said, 'Hey, what's your name?'" Moffitt told The Providence Journal last week. "And we started hitting it off."
The
woman's name was Gladys, and as time went on, she became a steady
fixture in Moffitt's life. But the two had never met — until recently,
when Moffitt showed up to surprise her with flowers on the day before
Thanksgiving.
"Mike from Rhode Island" and "Gladys from Florida" meet for the first time.
"I just said, 'Hey, I'm Mike from Rhode Island,'" Moffitt said. "Her eyes lit up."
Moffitt,
46, is the owner of Dennis Moffitt Painting in Wakefield. After their
first real conversation, he said, Gladys started calling him to ask how
his family was doing, or what the weather in Rhode Island was like.
"I started doing the same," he said.
Their
conversations never got too deep, and usually only lasted a few
minutes. But every so often, either "Mike from Rhode Island" or "Gladys
from Florida" would call to check in with the other.
"It just kind of brightens your day," Moffitt said.
The two are separated by about 30 years and thousands of miles. Gladys is Black, and Moffitt is white.
But they've struck a bond despite those differences. When Gladys' husband died, her son called Moffitt to let him know.
"She told him, 'Call Mike from Rhode Island,'" Moffitt said.
He sent flowers — and realized that their friendship had gotten serious.
Like many Rhode Islanders, Moffitt and his family periodically go
down to Florida to escape the winter weather. At one point, he realized
that the place where they usually stay was about 45 minutes from Gladys'
home in Delray Beach.
But the moment for a visit never seemed to
be quite right — with a family of five, Moffitt had a hard time getting
away, and he didn't want to impose on a woman he'd never met.
The timing was finally right
This
year, the family decided to spend Thanksgiving in Florida while looking
at colleges for Moffitt's eldest daughter. While driving around on
Wednesday, he realized that he was only 2.3 miles from Gladys' house.
"I just literally knocked on the door," he said.
Moffitt
hadn't warned anyone that he was coming, not wanting Gladys to feel
that she had to get the house ready for a visitor. When he walked
through the door with a bouquet of flowers and explained who he was, he
said, the first words out of her mouth were, "I'm blessed."
Thanksgiving visit in Florida
The
visit didn't last long — Gladys was getting ready for Thanksgiving, and
Moffitt didn't want to be in the way — but they shared a hug and
Moffitt got to briefly meet Gladys' family.
They also took a selfie, which Moffitt posted on Facebook. "There are incredible people in this World that are a wrong number phone call away," he wrote, explaining the story.
The
photo soon had hundreds of comments and likes, and Moffitt began
getting calls from people he knew but hadn't spoken to in years, telling
him that he was the talk of their Thanksgiving table.
Now that
they've met in person, Moffitt hopes to continue to get to know Gladys
better, and play an even bigger role in her life.
Larry Eber’s life was derailed when middlemen pledged to help him
get supplemental benefits. Similar tales of alleged manipulation are
playing out for thousands of former service members and their families.
By Nick Leiber
During his second inaugural address, President
Abraham Lincoln proclaimed that America should serve its soldiers long
after they were done serving it. Coming just weeks before final
victory in a gruesome civil war that killed at least 750,000, his words would become the motto for the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Today,
a metal plaque marking the entrance to the agency’s
headquarters recites the VA’s duty to U.S. soldiers. Its mission—as
Lincoln said in 1865—is to “care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan.”
Larry Eber was one of those soldiers. But today’s VA is having a hard time protecting veterans like him.
Larry Eber, center, with two unidentified U.S. Army buddies, circa 1969.
Photographer: Courtesy of Rick Eber
After
serving in Vietnam, Eber returned home in 1970 to California. At first
he found work stocking supermarket shelves and servicing swimming pools.
But re-acclimating was difficult. He developed a drinking problem and
began to suffer from schizophrenia. Sometimes he would find himself
homeless.
For decades, Eber existed on society’s periphery. But at
the age of 73, with his health deteriorating, he decided to make one
last try for a better life. With the help of his younger brother Rick,
Eber turned to the VA.
In 2016, the agency placed Larry in recovery and found him temporary housing. A staff member suggested he apply for “aid and assistance” benefits—a monthly payment for qualifying veterans in need of help with personal care and chores. To sign up, Larry was instructed to fill out forms that he later learned were from Veterans
Care Coordination, a private company based outside St. Louis, Missouri,
that touts itself as a go-between that helps veterans access benefits.
That’s when Larry’s plan to fix his life went sideways.
According to his brother, Larry was inundated with a flurry of
documents to sign and fine print he didn’t understand. What he didn’t
realize at the time was that the money would ultimately be spent on help
he didn’t need, and fees for VCC. Even worse, the new benefits would
eventually have dire implications for Larry’s existing government
aid—leaving him worse off than when he started.
Eber’s story isn’t unique. A small but growing industry has arisen between the VA and elderly veterans—a Wild West
of individuals and businesses that take an outsized cut of benefits
paid to people like Larry. Initially, one major scam involved persuading
veterans who exceeded the benefit’s financial threshold to manipulate
their assets. Today, because of a look-back rule the VA implemented in
2018, it has evolved to focus on low-income veterans with promises to
assist them with applications and then coordinate their care.
The
VA said in a statement that it “actively works to prevent and identify
individuals and businesses who take advantage of elderly veterans and
their family members.” But when veterans are ensnared in the care
coordination industry by operators which advocates label as “pension poachers,” the VA puts the onus on the veterans who signed the agreements.
The key issue raised by the VA, as well as defendants and legal experts, is the concept of undue influence—the
idea of whether a company had a fiduciary relationship with an elderly
veteran, what the veteran’s mental capacity was when they signed up, and
whether they can prove they were manipulated.
Scripps
College Psychology Professor Stacey Wood serves as a forensic
neuropsychology expert, evaluating capacity and allegations of undue
influence in elder abuse cases in California. She’s interviewed more
than 600 victims of elder financial exploitation, including dozens
of veterans.
Wood said she finds perpetrators tend to target veterans and their
families in times of extreme stress. In one case, she said an elderly
widow was approached in a hospital. “Someone somehow got in there to
pitch one of these veteran schemes,” Wood said. Indeed, in many
circumstances the victim isn’t the veteran, but family members they
leave behind.
“Pension poaching” is yet another dimly lit corner of a multibillion-dollar industry built on separating America’s most vulnerable citizens
from their money. A U.S. Government Accountability Office report
released earlier this year shows elder financial exploitation costs run
in the billions of dollars, highlighting studies from New York,
Pennsylvania and Virginia that tally the abuse at $1 billion or more in
each state alone. And the GAO warns the problem is only growing as the
U.S. population ages.
“So much of the abuse happens in the
shadows,” said Kathy Larin, director of the GAO’s education,
workforce and income security team, which produced the report. “It’s
extremely difficult to get victims to report or admit that they have
been exploited.”
The oldest of America’s 19 million
veterans are especially at risk. Those who never knew they could obtain
aid and assistance benefits on their own end up convinced the only way
to get them is by paying a middleman. In a 2019 report,
the GAO said older veterans are “among the most vulnerable.” Last year,
more than 190,000 veterans and their survivors were paid a total of
$2.8 billion in aid and assistance benefits.The GAO has urged the VA to do more, but the agency has said that
“as long as beneficiaries are competent, they can spend their benefits
as they see fit, including on products or services that may not be in
their best interests.”
Typically, the trouble begins when veterans using so-called care
coordinators are required to provide direct access to their bank
account, enabling the company to bypass them when the monthly deposit
arrives. The company is supposed to only withdraw what’s needed to pay
for necessary home help, and a reasonable fee for its services.
In the case of VCC—which said on its website that it’s “serviced” more than 795,000 hours of home care—Larry
Eber was required to sign a one-year contract that would automatically
renew until terminated, according to a copy of the document reviewed by
Bloomberg. After Eber signed it, VCC applied to the VA for
benefits on his behalf. According to court papers, the VA approved Eber
for $1,794 per month. On the day his first payment was deposited, VCC
allegedly removed all but $10.
When Larry first filled out the
paperwork, the brothers said they believed he was applying to qualify
for cleaning and care services covered by the VA. Rick alleged that his
brother was pressured to sign blank application and bank authorization
forms. They didn’t understand until much later, he said, that the VA was
going to send Larry money he could use at his discretion. “We both
thought the care was paid for by the VA, not us,” Rick said, explaining
that no one told them otherwise.
Larry’s care provider billed for 70 hours of work per month—an
average of 18 hours a week—even though Larry didn’t need that much
assistance, Rick said. Larry lived in a small room without a bathroom or
kitchen, so there wasn’t much to be done.
Soon after the
aid and assistance funds began flowing to his account, the payments
triggered cuts to other government benefits Larry was receiving—the ones
he relied on to survive. He lost all of his California healthcare
coverage and supplemental Social Security disability benefits. His
monthly U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development housing voucher
dropped from $940 to $636, and his monthly Social Security check
dropped from $703 to $523, court papers show.
When Rick Eber, now 76, learned what was going on, he tried to
end the contract. By that time, Eber had switched from VCC to another
middleman firm, American Veterans Care Connection.
Rick, a
former National Football League player turned business consultant, said
he spent years visiting and calling every government agency he could
think of to get help. “I couldn’t get anybody to acknowledge what we
were experiencing,” said Eber, now retired and living in Laguna Niguel,
California. “I remember feeling so stranded.”
In
2019 the brothers decided to sue in California Superior Court in Los
Angeles, naming VCC, AVCC and the home-care providers they paid with
Larry’s benefit money as defendants. The two men alleged VCC took
advantage of Larry, abusing his “trust and confidence” by having him
sign blank documents that were filled in later. They also claimed it
breached a fiduciary duty to Larry, who was “particularly vulnerable due
to his physical and mental conditions.”
“It’s
important to understand though that this ‘care coordination service’ is
completely unnecessary,” said Jim Morgan, the attorney for the
brothers. “The vet does not need anyone to ‘coordinate’ his ‘care.’ The
vet can call any caregiver he wants and hire them.”
Originally
set for last summer, the trial—in which the plaintiffs seek unspecified
damages for fraud, conspiracy to defraud, breach of fiduciary duty and
financial elder abuse—was delayed until April 2022 due to a backlog of
cases related to the pandemic.
Attorneys for VCC President Kyle Laramie didn’t return several requests for comment and AVCC owner Jeanne Mers-Asher declined to comment. The defendants all denied the allegations in court filings, with VCC contending that Larry Eber “was aware of the services and costs at issue.”
Not long after learning the consequences of his original agreement
with VCC, Larry began to despair, Rick said. At one point, he tried to
kill himself. “My brother didn’t understand the concept of what he had signed up for at all,” Rick said. “Larry was trying to turn his life around.”
On March 31, 2020, Larry Eber died of pancreatic cancer. He was 77.
Care
coordination is a fast-growing, largely unregulated arena where anyone
can call themselves a coordinator, said Prescott Cole, an attorney
formerly with the nonprofit California Advocates for Nursing Home
Reform. He and other advocates contend many businesses that charge
veterans to access VA benefits are engaged in predatory behavior.
Some within the industry acknowledge there are “bad actors”
among them, but contend most provide a necessary function in a
confusing environment where senior citizens don’t know who to trust.
Elder law attorney Victoria Collier, co-owner of Hendersonville,Tennessee-basedPatriot
Angels, said her business assesses veteran eligibility for benefits,
but doesn’t coordinate care. She charges roughly $800 for what Collier
describes as a “pre-filing consultation” and assessment of benefits and
care options. “There wouldn’t be a need for private companies like ours
if veterans felt that they could get adequate services elsewhere,” she
said.
Patriot Angels cites on its website an endorsement by
Mike Huckabee, the right-wing cable TV personality and former
Republican governor of Arkansas. “It’s like having treasure buried in
your own yard but being unaware it’s there,” Huckabee says. “Patriot
Angels does the digging; the veteran does the living.”
Collier said Patriot Angels is “legal and ethical,” but
concedes some companies do exploit veterans by charging for help with
applications when they shouldn’t, offering home-help that costs more
than that for non-veterans—and adding themselves to bank accounts.
“I think that’s elder abuse,” said Collier, who
noted she is accredited by the VA. Separate from care coordination,
there’s also a “huge practice” of financial advisers and lawyers who
sometimes work together to transfer older veterans’ assets into
annuities that can harm them if they later need to access the principal,
she said.
St. Louis-basedVeterans Home Care,
which describes itself as a national leader in securing aid and
attendance benefits, also condemned predatory behavior within the
industry. “We find it deplorable that there are bad actors cold-calling
and preying on elderly veterans,” VHC founder Bonnie Laiderman said in a
statement. Her business, which says it provides free help with
applications and zero-interest loans until benefits arrive, makes money
by charging clients what it describes as a market rate for in-home care,
adult daycare or medical alert systems.
Chantelle Smith, an Iowa assistant
attorney general in Des Moines, said it is true that many veterans
don’t know they’re entitled to certain benefits. What they often don’t
realize is there are free alternatives for help with paperwork,
including organizations with no financial stake in the outcome—such as
nonprofit veterans service organizations and state and local agencies.
But beyond New York State and Washington, few states have laws
explicitly aimed at combating veteran elder fraud. Another eight—Alaska,
California, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada and
Utah—require companies disclose the VA’s rules for assisting veterans
with benefit applications, but not much more.
The VA accredits
individuals who work for care coordinators, but critics have labeled the
certification system as easily manipulated.
Recently, the agency posted a notification on its website
about “the large number of complaints that the VA accreditation program
is receiving that do not fall succinctly within our jurisdiction to
investigate.” Only VA-accredited attorneys and claims agents may charge
claimants fees for their services, the agency said, and then only if the
claimants are seeking further review or an appeal of a VA claim
decision.
It recommends victims submit complaints about
individuals or organizations assisting with VA pension benefits through
the Federal Trade Commission’s “complaint assistant.”
Some of these firms get around regulations, however, by mischaracterizing their services. Anyone
is allowed to provide veterans with general information about benefits,
and some businesses dodge the rule about charging for more by simply
omitting themselves from VA paperwork. Morgan, the Ebers’ lawyer,
alleged that imposing fees for handling certain paperwork is illegal, a
claim he included in his lawsuit.
The VA said in its defense that it plans to begin a “pension
poaching” prevention outreach program “targeted for full implementation
by end of calendar year 2021.”
But the goalposts have been moving,
and the new targets of “pension poaching” are the most vulnerable of
all, according to Neil Granger, chairman of California’s Department of
Insurance Curriculum Board and a co-founder of the San Francisco Veterans Benefits Protection Project, which educates the public and assists in elder fraud cases.
Low-income
veterans and their families have become the focus of unscrupulous
individuals and companies since 2018, Granger said, when the VA made it
harder for them to target wealthier veterans under the guise of helping
them obtain aid and assistance benefits.
This is now happening “to tens of thousands of people” in more precarious financial situations, he said.
Granger, who
consults for investigators, prosecutors and attorneys general in
different states, said predators who target older veterans often act
impervious to prosecution. “The people who are enforcing these laws, who
are trying to bring these people to justice, don't understand the
mechanism of the scam well enough,” he said.
Pat
Pardue is still dealing with the aftermath of an experience with a
veterans’ benefit middleman that she says resulted in her losing about
$12,000.
Photographer: Lauren Grabelle for Bloomberg
Pat Pardue is the 90-year-old widow of Jim Pardue, a World War II veteran. Living on her own in Columbia Falls, Montana, a small town near the Canadian border, she’s still dealing with the aftermath of an experience with VCC that she said cost her $12,000 in benefits.
The Pardues were married for 54 years, until Jim died in 2003 at the age of 74. In
2016, Pardue was starting to have trouble doing everyday chores on her
own. A friend told her she was eligible for aid and assistance benefits
and suggested she use VCC for help applying.
The VA approved
Pardue for a $1,175 a month in December 2016. After she gave VCC access
to her bank account, it allegedly withdrew the entire amount each month.
At the time, Pardue didn’t realize she could have received all of the
money directly and coordinated the care herself, according to Bryan
Zipp, the western section chief at the Montana Veteran Affairs Division
office in Kalispell. Pardue had sought Zipp’s help with the matter.
“They’re
basically saying, ‘you pay us to get you the benefits and then you’re
going to pay us monthly to maintain the benefits,’” said Zipp, who
served in the Army for more than two decades. After about a year, Pardue
said she called VCC seeking to end the agreement. When her bank cut off
VCC, she started getting “mean, almost hostile” calls from the care
agency, VCC and a threatening letter from its law firm, according to
Zipp.
But then the VA, having been contacted by her former home-help
providers, decided Pardue shouldn’t have been paid so much in the first
place. The agency stopped paying her the benefit and demanded she return
$12,000.
“Now I can’t afford care because I don’t have the money
for it,” she said. Pardue estimates she has about $600 to live on after
paying bills every month. VCC didn’t return requests for comment on her
claims and the VA declined to comment.
Pat Pardue was married to Jim Pardue, a World War II veteran, for more than a half century.
Photographer: Lauren Grabelle for Bloomberg
Since
his brother died, Rick Eber has been reaching out to other veterans,
explaining how aid and assistance benefits and care coordinators can
spell disaster for other, crucial benefits. He’s spoken to more than a
dozen so far, he said, but all were reluctant to discuss it at
length. Eber said he believes it’s because they fear the repercussions.
His
lawyer, Jim Morgan, is cynical about the chances that anything will
ever change. The businesses “don’t care what happens to the veterans,”
Morgan said. “They just care that they signed another person up and are
going to be taking money every month—for doing nothing.”
Federal prosecutors are asking that a
former lawyer with the now-defunct law firm of LeClairRyan, who
misappropriated $4 million, be sentenced to nearly four years in prison
and fined $250,000 for obstructing an official proceeding.
In
papers filed Monday, lawyers for Bruce H. Matson, a once high-profile
bankruptcy lawyer, are asking for a term of slightly more than three
years, citing Matson’s lack of a prior record, his repayment of the
money, his work as a law school professor and Sunday school teacher,
community service and other mitigating factors.
Matson,
64, pleaded guilty to the charge in July and is set to be sentenced
Nov. 22 by U.S. District Judge John A. Gibney Jr. He faces a maximum of
five years in prison. However, federal sentencing guidelines — not
binding on Gibney — call for a term of 37 to 46 months.
While
recognizing that Matson has repaid the money, a sentencing memorandum
filed by the U.S. attorney’s office asks Gibney to impose a term at the
top end of the guidelines.
Prosecutors
wrote that the crime “stemmed from the defendant’s furious but
ultimately unsuccessful attempts to conceal a course of criminal conduct
that spanned from 2015 to 2019, during which time the defendant used
his position as a court-appointed fiduciary to embezzle, misappropriate,
and dissipate more than $4,000,000 from the bankruptcy trust he had
been entrusted with.”
Matson’s lawyers conceded that his
conduct “was and is inexcusable. Nothing he has done or will do going
forward can ever change that fact, and we do not endeavor to suggest
otherwise.”
But,
they added, “Mr. Matson took immediate steps to atone for his
misconduct. He voluntarily resigned from the bar ... he directed [his
lawyers] to disclose critical information about his conduct that was not
then known to the government, to cooperate fully, and eventually to
negotiate a resolution with the Office of the U.S. Attorney. During that
process, and beginning prior to pleading guilty, Mr. Matson worked with
the government to make certain that all restitution was made.”
“While
his extraordinary efforts to pay restitution do not excuse his conduct
or lessen the seriousness of the offense, they present a substantial
mitigating factor that the Court should consider,” his lawyers wrote.
Court
records show that in 2019, Matson made false statements concerning
allegations that he misappropriated funds as a court-appointed trustee
in the bankruptcy of LandAmerica Financial Group. A federal
investigation found instances of Matson’s embezzlement from the
LandAmerica Trust between 2015 and 2018, totaling approximately $800,000
in misappropriated funds, prosecutors said.
LandAmerica,
a Henrico County-based title insurance company that was one of the
largest in the U.S., filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2008.
In 2009, Matson was appointed the liquidation trustee by the U.S.
Bankruptcy Court for the LandAmerica Financial Group Liquidation Trust.
Then in 2015, Matson was appointed to serve as the fiduciary of the
wind-down funds.
His
law license was revoked by the Virginia State Bar last year after he
admitted disbursing more than $2.8 million in wind-down money in 2019 to
himself and another lawyer that was not to be disbursed until this
year.
Aware
that scrutiny would expose his criminal conduct, prosecutors said,
Matson engaged in obstructive conduct to conceal his misdeeds that
included: “filing letters with the Bankruptcy Court that contained
deliberate misrepresentations; attempting to mislead and/or pressure
other individuals; making misrepresentations to the U.S. Trustee’s
Office; and appearing before the Bankruptcy Court to personally deliver
additional misrepresentations to the Court.”
They
complained to Gibney that, “Over the course of a four-year period, the
defendant designed and executed a multi-step and multifaceted scheme to
defraud the LFG Liquidation Trust of as much money as possible ...
diverting the bulk of those siphoned-off or embezzled funds into bank
accounts that he controlled; transferring some to his associates; and
directing the remainder to his law firm to settle a personal debt.
“The
defendant used different methods to complete his draining of the Trust
account — embezzling some funds by re-directing checks intended for the
Trust, drawing duplicative payments from the Trust, and depleting the
Trust’s wind down budget with payments to himself and others,” the U.S.
attorney’s office wrote.
Investigation also uncovered an
unrelated case of Matson embezzling $23,000 in 2016 from the estate of
Forefront Capital, a defunct futures broker for which he served as
receiver and debtor-designee, the government said.
Matson’s
lawyers said that from 2015 to 2019, when LeClairRyan failed, Matson’s
life was under a great deal of personal and professional turmoil and
that he acknowledges and accepts responsibility for all he has done.
“Despite
significant wrongdoing, Mr. Matson did not use the money to fund a
lavish lifestyle. He promptly repaid the bulk of the funds and has since
worked with the government and the successor trustee to ensure full
payment of all remaining restitution,” they wrote.
In
asking for a 37-month sentence, his lawyers told Gibney that Matson
“has had a tremendous fall from grace. He was once a successful, widely
respected bankruptcy attorney of more than 30 years. He was an elder and
leader of his church and was deeply involved in the community.
“At
the age of 64, this matter represents his first and only contact with
the criminal justice system and he has led an otherwise law-abiding
life. He has been disbarred and has tarnished his once-stellar
reputation in the community,” they said. “He stands before the Court not
only humiliated and ashamed but with steadfast contrition.”
We
represent professional guardians in the Florida State Guardianship
Association, and the case of Britney Spears has raised a fitting
opportunity to explain what a voluntary guardianship means in the state
of Florida. Voluntary guardianships in Florida are guardianships of
property only. No rights of the person are delegated to the guardian, so
that medical treatment, choosing a residence, choosing to work or
socialize are all left to the discretion and decision-making of the
individual.
What
the person under guardianship relinquishes is the financial aspect. The
professional guardian pays bills, manages debts and handles physical
property like arranging for pest control or contracting renovations.
Under voluntary guardianship, the person under guardianship must have
capacity documented by his or her physician and fully understand that
the guardian will serve as fiduciary. Both parties can back out at any
time. If Ms. Spears’ guardianship was indeed voluntary, had it been a
Florida matter, she could have left her guardianship freely.
Carlos McDonald, president, and Pam Wiener, board member, of the Florida State Guardianship Association
Photo snippets from John Maurer’s life — from childhood to adulthood.
(Los Angeles Times photo illustration. Photos by MaryRose Courtney, Annelle Maurer, Elaine Conrad, Sarah Dusseault.)
By Doug Smith
The reunion was a replay of so many painful encounters that she could no longer keep them straight in her thoughts.
She
had rushed from a lunch engagement still wearing a silky flowered
dress. She sat on a curb beside her 45-year-old brother in the trash
area of a Pasadena strip mall. She made small talk, easing into the big
question: Would he let her take him back to his home?
If he didn’t go, he would soon be picked up on a warrant. He was AWOL from his court-supervised diversion program.
Sympathetic
social workers had helped Sarah Dusseault find her brother after he
left his residential care facility in South Los Angeles and walked back
to old haunts in Pasadena. Dusseault, who is a prominent figure in local
government efforts to help the homeless, had pleaded with them to
commit him on a 72-hour psychiatric hold under the standard of grave
disability.
They said they were hamstrung because he appeared well clothed and fed.
“The whole thing drips with irony,” Dusseault said. “I just went out
there and gave him clean clothes and gave him lunch. Are you saying I
should make sure I don’t give him anything? Is that the better plan?”
She
lined up a shelter and came back a couple of days later to pick him up.
But he wasn’t cooperating. He ignored the question and talked about his
fantasy of working with Antonio Banderas. Then his voice stopped while
his lips continued to shape words.
“Are you talking to Ben?” she asked.
A minute later he was on his feet, marching in a circle while ranting out loud to, or about, his younger brother Ben.
She had failed.
Between jail stints, John Maurer camped in this alcove behind a Pasadena strip mall.
(Sarah Dusseault)
By keeping tabs on the sheriff’s inmate locator website, she
learned two days later that her brother was back in the mental ward at
L.A. County’s Twin Towers jail. His next home would likely be state
prison where, as a registered sex offender, his safety would be in
jeopardy.
“If he goes to prison, he’ll die,” Dusseault said. She knew she had to do everything possible to prevent that.
::
John Samuel Maurer, 10th of 11 brothers and sisters, was an
intelligent, charming and handsome college student when the first cracks
in his winning personality began to show. While his sister Sarah was
rising to prominence in Los Angeles political circles and brother Steve
was advancing in the medical ranks at Patton State Hospital, John was
descending into a vortex of mental illness, caroming from one placement
to another, slipping through virtually every institution in a safety net
so tattered that not even his accomplished siblings could make it work.
And if they couldn’t help, what chance is there for people whose relatives lack such connections?
There are thousands of others like John Maurer, whose mental illness, compounded by drug use, keeps them in a cycle of homelessness, hospitalization and jail.
A recent academic study found
that at least 1 in 5 people engaged by outreach workers in L.A. County —
about 7,000 — had a diagnosis of serious mental illness.
The
nexus between mental illness and low-level crime means that L.A. County
Jail is the treatment option of last resort. On a typical day, almost
40% of the jail population —about 5,000 inmates — are in need of mental health treatment, many waiting for months to regain competence to stand trial.
In
L.A. County’s mental health system there are only about 1,700 beds in
what are called sub-acute facilities, where patients can stay for a few
days or months with psychiatric care. That’s about a third of the
estimated number needed, which means there are roughly three mentally
ill people in jail and four on the streets for every one receiving
extended clinical care.
Because those beds are always full,
hospitals that receive patients committed on psychiatric holds have few
options for follow-up care, distorting the entire system. Clinicians are
reluctant to take people off the street, knowing they will likely only
be released after the 72-hour limit. Patients released without treatment
are often picked up again and again on new psychiatric holds.
“The
state is using lots of involuntary holds that seem to add up to nothing
more than more involuntary holds,” wrote researcher Alex Barnard of the
New York University Department of Sociology in an upcoming report on California’s conservatorship practices.
Top: Camping in Arkansas with elder
brother Steve Maurer, a psychiatrist who is now medical director at
Patton State Hospital. Bottom: In his early 20s, John Maurer aimed for a
career in modeling.
(Annelle Maurer; Elaine Conrad)
Any treatment Maurer has received is hidden behind a shield of
privacy laws. While his criminal cases are recorded in electronic files
for anyone to see, not even Maurer’s family members know definitively
how many times he’s been checked into hospitals on psychiatric holds.
By
piecing together what they know, however, they’ve drawn a sad parallel.
John’s hospital stays most likely outnumber his trips to jail but were
far shorter in duration and just as likely to end badly.
When John
was convicted of his first criminal offense in Los Angeles County — an
August 2000 charge of disorderly conduct — he was 24 and had emerging
indications of his schizophrenia. But it would take another 14 years,
probably more than a dozen psychiatric holds and at least 10 more
criminal convictions in L.A., San Bernardino and Riverside counties
before the court system would commit him to a conservatorship, its most
powerful tool to help repeat offenders whose crimes result from mental
illness. And then things only got worse.
John had spent those
years in the homes of his parents in Arizona, a sister in Sierra Madre
or a brother in Yucaipa, eventually wearing all of them out by stealing
money, disappearing on cross-city walks or acting so bizarrely that they
would have to check him into a hospital.
“We’ve taken him to so many hospitals, they’re all jumbled together,” his brother Steve said in an interview.
For a time he lived in Steve’s guest house and was taking medication.
“He was doing better,” Steve said. “Helped us build a deck. I paid him.”
Then
he found a source for drugs. He started poking holes in the wall with a
pool cue and urinating on the furniture. Steve took him to a treatment
center in Cabazon, but he would not go in. He crouched outside all
night, then disappeared. Steve spotted him months later at a gas
station.
“He looked outlandish,” Steve recalled. “Heavy coat on a
hot day, shorts, red burnt skin. He had been wandering in the desert
near Cabazon and Beaumont.”
It was a bright red flag that the
system missed. Steve isn’t clear what happened after that. The episode
blended into all the others. Maybe that was the time he took John to a
Moreno Valley hospital. The hospital admitted him but called Steve a few
days later to pick him up.
“How is he?” Steve asked. The nurse on the phone said HIPAA, the federal patient privacy law, prohibited her from saying.
“That’s fine, you keep him,” Steve said in frustration.
A
charge nurse came on the phone and explained that John had already been
released with a bottle of medication but would not leave the patio
area.
“We went and picked him up,” Steve said.
Court records show that John was arrested in 2007 for being drunk in
public. After he broke into an abandoned house in 2008, he was
determined to be mentally incompetent to stand trial and was sent to
Patton State Hospital for the mentally ill near San Bernardino. Steve,
then chief of staff there, had him transferred to Metropolitan State
Hospital in Norwalk to avoid a conflict. John was declared to have
regained his competency, returned to the trial court for conviction and
released.
Then he ended up at Community Hospital of San
Bernardino, where a doctor who knew Steve proposed filing a petition to
place John under a conservatorship, a procedure under state law that
would give a public guardian almost total control over John’s life, with
the power to place him in a locked facility and force him to take
medication.
As a protection for those whose rights it abridges,
the conservatorship law, known as Lanterman-Petris-Short after its
authors, requires the court to find evidence of grave disability meeting
the criminal standard of proof — beyond a reasonable doubt. The court
rejected the petition.
“I gathered it was financial,” Steve said. “The county has to pay. That’s why they do not want to do it.”
Through
much of that turmoil, John pined for a normal life — marriage, home and
family. But by 2014, his sister Sarah Dusseault saw that John’s hopes
for a regular life had died and along with it any value in keeping it
within the family.
Sisters Sarah Dusseault and MaryRose Courtney in court with John in 2014, when he agreed to go into a conservatorship.
(Sarah Dusseault)
Dusseault, who had been L.A. Mayor James Hahn’s homelessness
and housing deputy and was soon to be appointed by Supervisor Hilda
Solis to the governing commission of the Los Angeles Homeless Services
Authority, bared her personal anguish in an op-ed published by The Times early in 2014.
“In
my professional life, I have worked to build housing and create
programs to end homelessness,” she wrote. “But the system is broken,
especially for homeless people with severe mental illness, like my
brother. My family and I just keep hitting dead ends trying to get him
help.”
Two days after publication, John was arrested in West Covina for vandalism and trespass.
Dusseault
hired an attorney and filed a petition to have John placed under a
conservatorship. In February of 2014, a judge in L.A. County’s mental
health court found John gravely disabled and placed him in the care of
the public guardian.
The conservatorship — one of many interventions that John’s family
hoped would be his salvation — either came too late, ended too early or
was predetermined to fail because of the inadequacy of the treatment
options for someone like him.
“It’s a godsend because it’s a
placement,” Dusseault thought when John’s public guardian had him
transferred from jail to a locked residential program in Pico Rivera.
“Initially John was enthusiastic,” Dusseault said. “‘I’m going to stay clean. This is so fun.’”
His brothers and sisters could visit and even take him on weekend furloughs.
But
problems became apparent. The severe shortage of beds in locked,
long-term institutions for the mentally disabled meant that John’s home
would be out of the way for both his siblings whose high-pressure
careers made visits difficult to schedule.
“The placements are
not about where this person grew up or family is,” Dusseault said. “If
he isn’t in regular contact with me or one of the other siblings he
starts to deteriorate. He needs that family support.”
It also turned out that a drug dealer was working right outside its doors.
“He eventually started taking meth there,” Dusseault said.
He got into a fight and was sent to jail. After that she heard through
the grapevine that he was hospitalized again, probably more than once.
But she did not know where or for how long.
Two years later, John’s conservatorship was summarily ended without
any of John’s siblings being notified or even knowing at the time where
he was.
The conservatorship law has an automatic sunset after one
year unless evidence is presented that the person is still gravely
disabled. In practice, that evidence comes from a private psychiatrist
who must spend a day in court waiting for a hearing that is often
scheduled hours before it actually occurs. As often happens, John’s
psychiatrist did not show up, leaving the court no choice but to end his
conservatorship.
It was a turning point of sorts. John’s deterioration quickened.
“He
was released too soon after that from conservatorship,” Steve Maurer
said, faulting an adversarial court process that too narrowly frames
conservatorship as a form of incarceration.
“God bless them, those
public defenders, they do good things,” he said. “But their goal in
life is to win their cases, get everybody off conservatorship because
that’s a terrible thing to be on. It’s completely broken. I think they
should say if you’ve been hospitalized X number of times or have medical
problems as a result of grave disability, the bar is going to be much
higher to have you released from conservatorship.”
Three months after his release, in May of 2016, John was arrested for public drinking in Downey.
About
a year later, another sister, MaryRose, found John outside a Starbucks
in Hastings Ranch and flagged down a police officer who helped talk John
into going with him to Las Encinas Hospital, a sprawling psychiatric
care campus in Pasadena.
John had been there before and checked
out without any family members being notified. This time Dusseault
waited 72 hours — the maximum involuntary hold unless the hospital
accepts him as a long-term patient — and stood out front with a peer
counselor from a nonprofit agency who accompanied her as a friend.
“We had a whole plan of housing,” Dusseault said. “I was going to pay for it. We were all set to go.”
She had found a vacancy in a board and care home. Generally in
rambling houses or converted apartment buildings where residents share
bedrooms, these homes are the backbone of long-term care for those whose
mental illness is stabilized.
They provide 24-hour supervision and care that includes meals, housekeeping and managing residents’ medication. But an antiquated, and inadequate,
reimbursement scheme based on disability income is forcing many to
close. The Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health reported in
July of 2020 that 51 board and care homes had closed over the previous
four years, eliminating 1,338 beds.
With openings hard to come by,
Dusseault found a bed in one of the unknown number of unlicensed homes
that provide whatever services they believe their residents need and
charge what the market will bear. John had once thrived in an unlicensed
board and care, until the owners walked away, leaving their residents
to be evicted.
Dusseault was willing to give it another try. John wasn’t. As she waited in front, he ran out the back.
He had been released without a plan. She had seen it so many times before.
“Sometimes
he’s released with a discharge paper saying he should take medication,”
she said. “Sometimes with a bottle of medication, sometimes nothing.”
There’s
no accounting for the cost in dollars of John’s untreated mental
illness. Based on Medicare’s reimbursement rate for acute psychiatric
hospitalization, a stay at Las Encinas would come at a cost of more than $1,000 a day in today’s dollars. A county study earlier this year
reported that the county spends about $654 a day on high-need inmates
like John in the mental ward of L.A. County Jail. The more than 400 days
he has spent there over the last 26 months have thus come to more than
$250,000, enough for almost four years in community-based treatment
that, unlike jail, can be reimbursed by Medicare.
Including emergency room charges, paramedics and court costs, the
total over the decades would amount to well more than a million dollars.
Because of his multiple disabilities, John would have priority
for permanent supportive housing, a subsidized apartment of his own with
a case manager checking in on him occasionally.
That might have worked in John’s youth, when it was still reasonable
for him to imagine a normal life. But at this point, he was far too ill
to live on his own.
Looking back over the years, Dusseault finds
that John has done best in board and care homes. After another 72-hour
hold, Dusseault persuaded a doctor to release John to Sunshine Assisted
Living, a 68-bed licensed board and care home in Lynwood. It worked out
well for nine months, one of his longest stable periods. But with
reimbursement fixed at about $35 a day, even licensed homes have no
means to provide the support required by John’s complex psychiatric
disorder. Eventually he began walking around the neighborhood and got
into conflicts with neighbors. One day he didn’t come back.
Sometime in 2018, a text came from Dusseault’s nephew, a paramedic.
He
had been called to a restaurant where John was in distress. She rushed
there to find him disoriented, emaciated, limping and covered in feces.
“I beg him to get him into my car,” she said.
After his release from jail in 2019, John Maurer visits with his nephew Luke Dusseault.
(Sarah Dusseault)
He refused, and the firefighters did not think he met the standard of gravely disabled required to take him on a 72-hour hold.
“They have to let him go,” she said. “I follow him. He dives into this back alley. I lose track of him.”
From the inmate locator, she learned that he was arrested the next day.
A
flurry of arrests followed, in March for discharge of a noxious
substance — most likely feces, his sister said — and April for trespass.
His May arrest for indecent exposure put him on the sex offender
register and led to a hearing on his competency. In November, after
spending 11 months on and off in jail, he was found competent to stand
trial and released for time served.
The following January he was arrested for disorderly conduct and
public drinking and in February for battery. Another competency hearing
followed. A judge again found him competent to stand trial in May.
In November of 2019, he was arrested in Torrance, again for indecent exposure.
With
his sister pushing in the background, John was sent back to the mental
health court for a competency hearing. On Dec. 14, the judge found him
mentally incompetent to stand trial and ordered him to a state hospital
for treatment.
Since John’s earlier treatment at Metropolitan
State Hospital, a shortage of mental beds had overwhelmed the state
hospital system. In November 2019, more than 800 defendants judged
incompetent to stand trial were waiting to get into a state hospital.
John never made it to the top of the waitlist.
At Metropolitan State Hospital in 2017, John Maurer with sister Katie Fletcher and mother Suellen Maurer.
(Katie Fletcher)
Often strapped into a bulky quilted vest and chained to a metal
table during visits with his sister, John languished for 200 days in
L.A. County Jail, a common fate of hundreds of defendants judged
incompetent to stand trial, who often wait in jail far longer than the
statutory terms for their crimes.
Using the online purchasing system, Dusseault made sure he had basic toiletries.
In
February of 2020, John was ruled to have regained his competence to
stand trial. By then John’s public defender and the deputy district
attorney were willing to try something new — diversion.
Under a court order suspending his trial, John was placed in a group home in South Los Angeles operated by the county Office of Diversion and Reentry, where he would be under psychiatric supervision.
There,
a good start again turned bad. This time the catalyst may have been a
$25,000 check John received for back disability pay, the third time he
had received such a lump-sum payment. During jail stays, those benefits
are suspended, then paid in arrears when the recipient requalifies.
The community-based model followed by the diversion program seeks to
support as normal a life as possible, allowing residents to come and go
as if living independently. The money soon found its way to the street.
John resumed using meth.
Eventually he had an altercation, was arrested and transferred to a locked facility.
Dusseault
does not know how long he remained there before he went AWOL. He was
next spotted in mid-June at the Pasadena strip mall.
After he deflected her offer of shelter, it was only a few days before she saw John’s arrest pop up on the inmate locator.
An October letter from jail, in which John Maurer blames himself for the COVID-19 pandemic.
(Sarah Dusseault)
At his next court appearance in August, Dusseault waited in a
courtroom in the Airport Courthouse for a ruling. Would John be sent to
prison or given one more chance? She had spoken to his new public
defender and was hopeful that she would push for a conservatorship.
Led
into the courtroom with his hands tied to his waist in shackles, John
saw his sister and broke into a childlike smile, twisting his wrist to
wave his hand.
Her face broke into a smile when Judge William L.
Sadler ordered a psychiatric evaluation. That meant John was on the
conservator track. And it would be different this time. She would apply
to be named his conservator. She would try to find him a placement near
her home in Pasadena, where she could monitor his care and know
immediately if he goes off course.
Sarah Dusseault poses in front of the
Twin Towers jail in downtown Los Angeles, where her brother John Maurer
is being held as she tries to find a facility in which to place him.
(Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)
In October, Dusseault returned to court and, at last, became her brother’s conservator.
Imperfect as conservatorship proved in the past, she believes it’s
the best that could have happened at this stage, especially since, this
time, she will be engaged in his care.
But five weeks later, John
remains in jail. His release awaits Dusseault’s finding a residential
psychiatric facility. So far, she has found them to be either full or
unwilling to accept a new patient with John’s problematic background.
After striking out in Los Angeles County, she’s looking into one in San
Bernardino County that would be near their brother Steve.
For
Steve, John’s best hope faded long ago, when California discarded
institutions like the one in Washington state where his schizophrenic
great-uncle Leonard lived for most of his adult life — before the
invention of psychotropic drugs.
“You could argue he had somewhat
of a life,” Steve said. “He lived into his 80s. He was protected.
Nowadays, no one is committed like that unless they commit a crime. They
end up with their lifetime greatly reduced.”
