Costs Often Shock the Elderly, Their Families

The mission of Arizona Adult Protective Services is to help adults who are victims of physical abuse and neglect, or schemes to steal their money. A call to that agency can save a life.

But intervention by the agency can also lead to ailing adults being referred to private, for-profit fiduciaries they can't afford and whose fees can wipe out their life savings.

Agency officials acknowledge the potential but say they often have no other choice when there are no friends or family available to take over an incapacitated person's health and finances. Last year, Adult Protective Services investigated 4,325 requests for help in Maricopa County.

When help is needed, the agency "then will refer to those services based on need and acceptance," said agency administrator Faustina Dannenfelser. "The client has to be willing to accept the services."

If a client is indigent or has only Social Security income and a small pension, the social-service group will call a public fiduciary to manage the finances and care. Otherwise, it contacts a private fiduciary. There is no fixed level of wealth that the agency uses to make that decision; case workers and supervisors make the call.

"That is the last resort," Dannenfelser said.

Dannenfelser estimated the number of cases referred to private fiduciaries at fewer than 50 a year. The agency keeps no record of how often such referrals are made or which private fiduciaries get the business.

In March 2007, an agency investigator monitoring Lester and Elizabeth Drake decided the Glendale couple's self-neglect was endangering their health, according to court records . The investigator called a private, for-profit fiduciary to assist. The couple's assets were estimated at about $900,000, according to Maricopa County Probate Court records.

Over the next month, the private fiduciary, Managed Protective Services of Youngtown, made routine visits trying to clean the house, bring the couple groceries and medication, and take them to doctor's appointments.

According to court records, the Drakes would offer to pay for groceries, but Jane Anne Geisler, owner of the fiduciary firm, told them they'd be billed later. Geisler told them not to worry about the cost of her services.

Geisler said she feared they would stop the care they desperately needed if she told them about the fees.

In June, at the couple's request, a judge appointed the Maricopa County Public Fiduciary which limits fiduciary fees and attorney fees in its cases, to take charge of their health and finances.

Managed Protective Services had not been appointed by a judge, yet it went to court seeking $15,194 in fees and attorney costs for the three months work.

The judge reduced the fees to $4,052. Geisler threatened to appeal until the Drakes paid her business and her attorney $2,000 each.

Probate lawyer Jon Kitchel said government agencies should not be steering cases to private fiduciaries at all. If an individual needs help, the public fiduciary should be the first call, Kitchel said.

"I don't believe APS should be nominating private businesses," he said. "It is a shame."

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Costs Often Shock the Elderly, Their Families