Wednesday, October 1, 2014

MN Woman Accused of Financial Exploitation

A Webster woman is slated to be in Olmsted County Court Oct. 9 to face two counts of financial exploitation of a vulnerable adult (VA) and one count of theft by swindle.

According to the criminal complaint filed against her, Debra Lynn Hitchcock-Gale, 54, allegedly made $226,000 worth of illegal transactions involving VA’s financial resources. Hitchcock-Gale is a family member of VA’s and served as his power of attorney.

VA, a resident in Webster, was diagnosed with dementia in 2001, bought a town house in Pine Island, Minn. in 2010, moved there in 2011 and resided there until he was placed in an adult foster care facility in July 2014.
 
Hitchcock-Gale, from September 2011 to July 2014, allegedly made transactions on VA’s account of roughly $47,000, including debit card cash withdrawals from ATMs at the St. Croix Casino in Danbury, casino’s in Las Vegas as well as debit card purchases at locations VA did not frequent.
 
In addition, Hitchcock-Gale, a realtor in the area, sold VA’s Webster residence in 2013 for $185,000.

Proceeds from the sale were used to pay off VA’s town home in Pine Island, Minn. The defendant also wrote herself a $41,000 check and a $13,000 check to her husband’s business from the proceeds.

Full Article and Source:
Webster Woman Accused of Financial Exploitation

4 comments:

Thelma said...

At the present time, the only way to pick up on family crimes is if the banks and other facilities spot it and report it.

Finny said...

Families who have elderly with dementia need to really watch out. It only takes a second for something like this to destroy everything.

Anonymous said...

This lady is still practicing real estate at the Coldwell banker office in Siren, WI, how does she still have a license (I looked it up on WI's site and she is a licensed Real Estate broker through 2016) and who will stop her from taking advantage or stealing from the next person?

Anonymous said...

Still to this day she's in real estate AND now a broker! Not to mention this ISNT the only case against her for do this exact same thing! She's got away with it for the most part twice! Never sat a day in jail for it either!