Former Okla. DHS worker charged with wire fraud

 

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — A former Oklahoma Department of Human Services worker faces federal wire fraud charges after allegedly bilking a Bethany nursing home resident out of more than $27,000 in disability payments.

 

Katharine A. Daugherty, a former DHS adult protective services specialist, has agreed to a plea deal with federal prosecutors in which she will plead guilty to the charges and make restitution payments, her attorney Irven Box said.

 

"She has accepted responsibility for what she did and acknowledged that what she did was wrong," Box said.

 

Daugherty is expected to enter a guilty plea at a hearing Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. She will also forfeit her state pension as part of the guilty plea.

 

According to the charges, Daugherty had guardianship over a man identified only as "L.J.A." in court documents. The man was a former Federal Aviation Administration employee who received monthly disability payments from the U.S. Department for Labor for an on-the-job injury sustained in 1976.

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Former Okla. DHS worker charged with wire fraud

See Also:
Former Oklahoma DHS Worker Charged With Mail Fraud

Quincy lawyer Cashman disbarred by Illinois Supreme Court

A Quincy lawyer has been disbarred by the Illinois Supreme Court as a result of a complaint to the Illinois Attorney Registration and Discipline Commission.

Devin Cashman, 53, was disbarred on consent. Cashman had been licensed to practice in Illinois since November 1984 and is a partner in his own firm in Quincy.
 

According to a report posted on the ARDC website, Cashman "misappropriated funds from three clients, including the executors of two probate estates. He also presented a report to a count in one of the probate manners where he falsely stated that estate assets had been distributed to persons entitled to receive them under the decendent's (sic) will."

 

Peter Roskoff, chief of litigation for the ARDC, said Cashman will not be allowed to practice law in Illinois for at least three years from his disbarment date, which was Sept. 17.

 

"Reinstatement is not automatic," Roskoff said. "Most people who are disbarred are never reinstated."
 

The initial complaint against Cashman alleged that he took nearly $200,000 from a client trust bank account without authorization for personal ad business uses and that he didn't show up at a hearing concerning the allegations to make a sworn statement.

 

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Quincy lawyer Cashman disbarred by Illinois Supreme Court

Witnesses' tales reveal flaws in TN's conservatorship law

Several witnesses who said their rights and property were wrongly taken away in court proceedings joined a retired Wilson County judge on Thursday in calling for changes in the way conservatorships are granted and monitored in Tennessee.

Retired General Sessions Judge Haywood Barry told a Tennessee Bar Association panel that more monitoring is needed for those involved in conservatorships.

“You need some sort of training,” he said, referring to lawyers appointed by the courts to act as fact finders in conservatorship cases.

“The law is in pretty good shape. It’s a matter of getting the judges to go along,” Barry said, adding that monitoring needs to be independent. “You need someone from outside the system,” he said, “then I think they’ll pay attention.”

Thursday’s hearing was the first of four to be held across the state by a bar association panel that plans to make recommendations to the General Assembly, which is considering a series of reforms proposed by state Rep. Gary Odom, a Nashville Democrat.

Tennessee law allows a judge to appoint a conservator to have control over another person’s health care or finances when that person is judged to be incapable of making decisions for him- or herself.

Barry’s testimony followed that of several witnesses, including Jewell Tinnon of Nashville and songwriter Danny Tate, who testified that conservatorships had wrongly stripped them of all their possessions. Both were released from conservatorships after they obtained medical exams to prove their mental capacity.

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Witnesses' tales reveal flaws in TN's conservatorship law

VILLA FONTANA RETIREMENT COMMUNITY SAN JOSE CALIFORNIA ELDER ABUSE 1

Signing a mandatory arbitration agreement with a nursing home can be troublesome

When Paul Ormond signed John Mitchell into a nursing home in Dennis, Mass., in June, he was handed a few dozen pages of admission papers. Ormond, Mitchell’s legal guardian and an old friend, signed wherever the director of admissions told him to. He didn’t realize that one of those documents was an agreement that required Mitchell and his family to take disputes to a professional arbitrator rather than to court. Mitchell had been institutionalized since suffering a stroke in 1999. During a hospital stay early this summer, Mitchell, then 69, had received a tracheotomy and needed to switch to a nursing home that could accommodate him. A few weeks after Mitchell arrived at the new nursing home, staff members dropped him while using a lift device. An ambulance was called and then canceled as his vital signs stabilized. Later that night Ormond, 63, got a call from the nursing home that Mitchell was unresponsive. Mitchell was rushed to the hospital, and doctors found that the fall had caused extensive bleeding on his brain. He died a few days later. Mitchell’s sons hired a lawyer to look into the circumstances surrounding their father’s death. That was when Ormond learned that amid all the admissions papers he had signed was an arbitration agreement. “I thought it was deceptive, and I was pretty angry that I’d been tricked into signing something that I didn’t know what it was,” says Ormond.

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Signing a mandatory arbitration agreement with a nursing home can be troublesome

Bettendorf couple face financial exploitation counts of an elderly person

A Bettendorf couple faces one count each of financial exploitation of an elderly person after the two allegedly deceived an older woman out of more than $50,000 of her own money.

Dennis C. Stoffel, 57, and Laura L. Stoffel, 57, both of 3135 Central Ave., are accused of seizing the funds sometime between Oct. 22, 2010, and March 24, 2011, according to records.

A plea of innocent was filed on Sept. 10, in the Rock Island County Circuit Court on on behalf of the couple, and the two are scheduled to make an initial court appearance on Sept. 17.

Full Article and Source: Bettendorf couple face financial exploitation counts of an elderly person

Public Hearing on Conservatorship Draws 70 in Nashville, TN

A public hearing to gather information about how current conservatorship law is working or could be improved drew about 70 people to the Tennessee Bar Center today (Sept. 20), including more than a dozen who spoke of problems they or their family members have had with conservatorships.

 The hearing was the first of four scheduled across Tennessee to provide an opportunity for lawyers, community leaders and citizens to discuss what works with the present conservatorship law and how practice and procedure could be improved. You can see video from today's hearing or additional hearings held across the state.

Source:
Conservatorship Hearing Draws 70 in Nashville

TN: Conservatorship Reform Hearing Slated Today!

Prompted by recent action in the General Assembly, the Tennessee Bar Association is set to begin a statewide series of hearings on possible reforms to the two-decades-old law governing conservatorships.

Association President Jacqueline Dixon said the goal is to get a wide variety of opinions from the public.

“And not just lawyers. We hope to get some good evidence,” she said.

Among the items most likely to be addressed are measures to ensure that those placed in a conservatorship retain as many of their rights as possible.

In a conservatorship, a person’s right to control everything from his or her health care to finances is turned over to a court-appointed person.

The initial hearings are set for Thursday in Nashville, with other sessions set for Memphis, Chattanooga and a fourth site yet to be determined in the eastern part of the state.

The bar association’s efforts were prompted by state Rep. Gary Odom, who proposed a series of reforms after hearing of the case of Jewell Tinnon, the Nashville woman who lost her house, car and personal possessions during a conservatorship that was later dissolved. Tinnon filed suit against the agency that oversaw her conservatorship, but the suit was dropped after a dispute between Tinnon and her attorneys, including Rachel Odom, the legislator’s spouse.

Probate Judge David “Randy” Kennedy, whose court handles conservatorship cases in Davidson County, said in an email that he was “delighted” the bar association was holding the hearings.

“Because statutory law cannot remain static and must evolve to meet the needs of a changing society I anticipate that the task force will make specific recommendations to the legislature on matters that will aid the courts in enhancing the services that we are obligated to provide to all of our elderly and disabled citizens,” Kennedy wrote.

Earlier this year Kennedy announced he had instituted new procedures in his court requiring conservators to file notice in the event a person’s condition improved and a conservator was no longer required.

Full Article and Source:
Conservatorship Reform Hearing Slated

Nursing home worker indicted on gross sexual imposition charges

CINCINNATI, OH (FOX19)- A former nursing home worker has been indicted on two counts of gross sexual imposition.

Police charged Cassimer Brian, 27, with sexual assaults on two people who were mentally or physically unable to consent or resist in a nursing home in Lebanon. The nursing home and authorities investigated the offense after another employee said they witnessed inappropriate behavior.


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Nursing home worker indicted on gross sexual imposition charges

Danny Tate's Home Auctioned Off --- to his Former Lawyer!

A Nashville songwriter who fought to free himself from a court-ordered conservatorship has now lost his house.

Danny Tate's home in Belle Meade was auctioned to the highest bidder Tuesday morning to pay more than $150,000 in legal fees.

The legal fees accumulated during a contentious court fight in Davidson County Probate Court that lasted more than two years.

Tate's brother said he was a drug addict and needed a conservator, which is similar to a guardian, to safeguard his wealth.

Eventually, Tate won his freedom from the conservatorship, but it came at a high price. Tate was ordered to pay both his own legal bills, and the bills for his brother's lawyer, Paul Housch.

"This is the way the law acts. You have to pay your debts," Housch told Channel 4.

The two lawyers who were owed money were the only serious buyers at the auction.

Tate's own attorney, Michael Hoskins, was the highest bidder. He bought his former client's house for $120,000, about one-third of its value on tax records.

Danny Tate says when the conservatorship process began, he was a millionaire. At the end, he was broke.

"Now they've rendered me homeless," Danny Tate said.

"As a child I believed that truth and justice prevailed in our American legal system. I no longer hold to that ideal," he said.

Hoskins told Channel 4 that if Tate would pay his legal fees, he would get his house back.

Source:
Songwriter's Home Auctioned for Legal Fees



Michael G. Hoskins







Paul T. Housch








Judge David Randy Kennedy





See Also:
Auctioning Danny Tate's Home to Pay his Court-Appointed "Protectors"

Sign the petition seeking impeachment of Judge Randy Kennedy

Former Oklahoma DHS Worker Charged With Mail Fraud

A DHS worker kept hidden from the federal government that a disabled adult had died so she could get his monthly benefits checks and use the funds “for her personal benefit,” prosecutors allege.

Katharine A. Daugherty, 57, of Bethany, is charged in Oklahoma City federal court with wire fraud.

Because of the scheme, the U.S. Labor Department was cheated out of more than $27,000, prosecutors allege.

Daugherty retired from the Oklahoma Department of Human Services in August 2011 after learning she was under investigation. She was an adult protective services specialist IV.

Her attorney, Irven Box, said she has accepted responsibility for her actions and intends to plead guilty to the felony charge. A hearing is set for Wednesday.

Full Article and Source:
Former Oklahoma DHS worker charged with wire fraud

Auctioning Danny Tate's Home to Pay His Court-Appointed "Protectors"

Judge Randy Kennedy has ordered the sale of Danny Tate’s home in an ongoing conservatorship that was allegedly terminated May 24, 2010, nunc pro tunc. The auction is set for Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2012, at 10 a.m. on the courthouse steps. Ain’t nothing like a Kennedy Conservatorship. He’ll conserve you right into bankruptcy, homelessness and indigence.

Conservatorship is meant to protect, but in Tennessee, it destroys.






Paul Housch entered the Motion for Order of Sale…,








and was joined by Michael G. Hoskins…,



…both probate practitioners who created the debt, along with unpaid taxes to the IRS by the fiduciary/conservator, David E. Tate. The entire debt falls at the feet of this court and its officers.

Attorneys who practice in Kennedy’s court are all in on the swindle. You don’t practice in Kennedy’s court unless you have agreed, in privy, to abide by his errant and corrupt proceedings that are in violation of the Conservator Code as well as that long forgotten document known as the Constitution.

Now read the article from USA Today Hoskins’ Quote (annotated) and you will find Michael Hoskins claiming he would fight to save Danny Tate’s home. Hoskins made similar false proclamations in the Jewell Tinnon case and in violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct was quoted in the Tennessean in the link below.

Ms. Tinnon now refers to Hoskins as “that dirty bastard”. We concur. Hoskins has always been in on the swindle. The lawsuit v. Karl Warden, which Hoskins reported was Kennedy’s brother-in-law, was withdrawn. Hoskins pulled the same bait and switch in the Danny Tate conservatorship claiming he would pursue all legal recourse, yet filing only a failed appeal.

With a Motion for Recusal (the second one filed) before him, Kennedy entered the Order for Sale of Home in violation of procedure, without any written explanation of why he should not recuse himself.

Full Article and Source:
Pauper v Probate: Order for Sale of Home

Hoskins' Motion for Order of Sale

USA Today: Hoskins Quote Annotated

Jewell Tinnon's Conservatorship Lawsuit Dismissed

Questions: Who will be the new owner of Danny Tate's home - the home in which he raised his two daughters, the home he planned to leave to them - and at what cost?

Will the proceeds from the sale satify the hunger of the Tate's ravenous court-appointed protectors or will they want more, and more, and more....?

Stealing David

David Fettgather is a young man with Down Syndrome. He was stolen from his family and put in board and care in 2005 by corrupt Alta Regional Center. They profit from taxpayer money by holding him captive. Family hired a Guardian to intervene for David. But the Guardian who also profits from David's captivity, colluded with Alta. David Circle of Support was founded to help David and other victims of Regional Center and Guardianship abuse.

Source:
YouTube: Stealing David

See Also:
FriendsOfDavidFettgather

Listen to David's father, Dr. Robert Fettgather, discussing David's situtation on "T.S. Radio" with Marti Oakley and her co-host, Linda Kincaid. David has been isolated from his family and friends for more than seven years with no real and plausible reason given as to why.

Listen to internet radio with Marti Oakley on Blog Talk Radio

Source:
The Truth Squad: Vulnerable Adults Targeted by Predatory Guardians

"Another Victim of Franchina and Giordano, PC"

It seems that my Mom, Dorothy Wilson, was not the only one kidnapped by Mary Giordano, of the law firm of Franchina and Giordano in Garden City, NY!! AND Judge Joel Asarch was the judge in this case as well, along with Anne Recht as the geriatric “care” manager! How many other victims are out there?

This is what I was told by Kevin, Richard Maas’s grandson:

Kevin told me that he was living with his grandfather in his grandfather’s house, but once Mary Giordano took over as guardian, he was forced to move out. He told me his grandfather made sure that he would always have enough money to live in his own home for the rest of his life and NOT in a nursing home. Once Mary and Anne got involved, an aide was placed in there 24/7. One day, Kevin called his grandfather and the aide answered the phone. He told the aide he was coming over to visit his grandfather and received SHOCKING NEWS. She told him that Mary Giordano was at the house moving his grandfather into a nursing home!! Mary Giordano NEVER notified any family member that she was doing this.

Full Article and Source:
Judicial Destruction of Dorothy Wilson: Breaking News: Another Victim of Franchina and Giordano, PC

See Also:



Save Dorothy Wilson, Legally Kidnapped

NASGA: Dorothy Wilson, New York Victim

Feeding Tube Mishap at Nursing Home

Each elderly resident in a nursing home requires different medical treatment and medications. It is important that all the aspects of their health be treated carefully and accurately. One nursing home is being sued after a resident acquired an infection from a feeding tube that was allegedly wrongly inserted, and ended up filling her abdominal cavity with liquid formula.

The victim’s daughter, who claimed that her mother had to suffer more medical ailments along with pain and suffering, filed the lawsuit. The elderly woman was hallucinating and confused at the time of the incident and pulled out a gastric feeding tube that had been directly inserted in her abdomen. A nursing home staff had tried to reinsert the tube, but instead inserted it directly in her abdomen and the staff member did not document the reinsertion into the patient’s file. Nursing staff then noted that the patient’s temperature had risen and that her abdomen was firm and had distended. The liquid nutrition was stopped and the elderly woman had to be treated at a hospital for an infection and had to also undergo a surgical procedure.

Full Article and Source:
Feeding Tube Mishap at Nursing Home

A plea to live a free and independent life

At 37 years old, all Kathryn Rodwell wants is to further her independence.

Ms Rodwell has spent the past six years living in a local Abbeyfield facility, which provides assisted independent living for adults with mild intellectual disabilities. She is one of the original residents, but wants to move on. ''I'm actually going backwards here,'' she said.

''I'm not getting the independence I'm looking for. I just feel that I'm a bit under the hammer. I do want to leave.'' Ms Rodwell receives training from Advocacy for Inclusion to help her maintain an independent lifestyle, which she hopes to further by finding work and her own place.

''Then I'll change in a big way … on my own to freeze my meals, make them up when I get home - that's the experience I want.''

A budding chef, she disapproves of guardianship orders and said while her family and friends might not always agree with her choices, they were her choices to make.

''I don't need forced opinions, I make my own decisions and I stand by them,'' she said. ''I'm capable of doing my own things.''

Full Article and Source:
A plea to live a free and independent life

T.S. Radio TONIGHT!

Join us this evening as Linda Kincaid, Elder Advocate, and Dr. Robert Fettgather, discuss the use of psychotropic drugs in massive doses used to render elderly and disabled adults, chemically restrained. Many times these drugs are used simply to render the victim incompetent and unable to function.

Also joining us will be Ginny Johnson, whose father, a WW2 veteran became the victim of a predatory guardian.



5 pm Pacific
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7 pm Central
8 pm Eastern

Listen to T.S.Radio



See Also:
NASGA: Captain Hugh Johnson - NC Victim

Gina Rinehart, World's Richest Woman, Awaits Decision In Court Battle With Her Kids Over Money

Lawyers for Asia's richest woman and three of her children held preliminary arguments on Wednesday over who should control a $4 billion trust, a bitter family feud that has captivated Australia.

Justice Paul Brereton of the New South Wales Supreme Court reserved a decision on whether the case against mining magnate Gina Rinehart should be thrown out of court or argued fully. A decision is not expected for some days.

At stake is Rinehart's position as the sole trustee of the trust that holds a near-one-quarter share in Hancock Prospecting Pty Ltd, one of the world's largest privately-owned mining companies.

Lawyers for Rinehart and her daughter Ginia Rinehart, the only child to side with her mother in the feud, sought to have the suit brought by the three elder children to remove their mother as a trustee thrown out of court.

Hancock Prospecting is developing what would be Australia's fourth-largest iron ore mine and generates hundreds of millions of dollars a year in royalties from tenements secured by Gina Rinehart's father, Lang Hancock, a legendary figure in Australian mining history.


Full Article and Source:
Gina Rinehart, World's Richest Woman, Awaits Decision In Court Battle With Her Kids Over Money

Nurse accused of stealing elderly dementia patient's credit card

A home health care nurse is accused of stealing his elderly patient's credit card and racking up more than $400 worth of fraudulent purchases. According to the Hernando Sheriff's Office, the elderly woman may not be the only victim.

"We don’t stand for taking advantage of elderly people like that,” HCSO Detective Dustin Mormando said. "We definitely try to focus on putting full effort into those types of investigations."

Deputies said an 88-year-old female patient of Titus Houston, 41, suffers from dementia and Alzheimer's. He traveled from his Spring Hill home to the woman's Tampa home to take care of her, according to a report.

Mormando said the victim contacted authorities in April after discovering her credit card was used in 27 fraudulent transactions. Many of those purchases were captured on surveillance video.

But the big break in the case happened when detectives said Houston used the stolen credit card to pay for his cable bill, leading deputies straight to his home. "He admitted to being the one in the surveillance videos," Mormando said, "and he eventually wound up confessing to using the credit card and to making the transactions in question."

Houston was arrested Wednesday on one count of exploitation of an elderly disabled adult. He was released from jail on $2,000 bond.

Full Article and Source:
Nurse accused of stealing elderly dementia patient's credit card