Interlochen man beats the odds on guardianship

By Mardi Link

INTERLOCHEN — Cruise control, 82 mph, cut to black, then a fleeting image of a good Samaritan who stopped to help and called 911.

Dwight Lewis remembers these scant details from March 2019, when he was driving on US-31 near Ludington, suffered an epileptic seizure and crashed his truck.

Twenty minutes, four broken ribs, a broken collarbone and a traumatic brain injury later, Lewis regained consciousness.

“I came to, I knew things weren’t right and I vaguely remember people coming up to my window with the Jaws of Life,” Lewis said. “Then nothing after that.”

Since the accident, Lewis has lived with his mother, Chris Lewis, in a house filled with art in the woods near Interlochen State Park.

When he smiles, the expression comes on quickly and envelopes his whole face.

A loud high-pitched “cuk-cuk-cuk” sound interrupts an interview with a reporter, Dwight stops mid-sentence, holding up an index finger.

“Pileated woodpecker,” he says, and there’s that smile.

The brain injury from the crash was actually Lewis’ second — multiple skull fractures in a 2011 skateboard accident not only caused the epilepsy, but put him into court-ordered guardianship — and working his way back to health and autonomy hasn’t been easy.

Lewis, 40, who’d trained as a chef, not only had to learn how to cook again, he had to re-learn how to drive, use a cell phone, handle his finances and get along with other people, including his mother.

“My injuries have caused me to burn some bridges between both my friends and my family,” Lewis says in a text, sent days after the interview. “My goal and mission now is to rebuild those bridges.”

Dwight moved in with Chris, and she became her son’s court-appointed guardian after the skateboard accident, but a few months after the highway crash, both agreed the arrangement was no longer working.

Traumatic brain injuries can result in something neurologists call “flooding,” in which a healing brain is overloaded by outside stimuli, making it physically impossible for a person to regulate their emotions and behavior.

“We argued a lot then,” Chris said. “He was often angry, which I understood, but it got to the point where we needed outside help.”

Court-appointed guardianships and conservatorships are a protective measure often associated with older adults, when a judge decides because of illness or memory loss, someone can no longer make their own decisions.

Younger people also can be appointed guardians by the court, often as the result of a catastrophic injury like Dwight’s.

Regardless of age or the reason for the guardianship, a review of probate court records by the Record-Eagle in more than a dozen Michigan counties shows court oversight often becomes permanent by default.

“Generally speaking, there’s an attitude that cognitive impairments don’t get better,” said Sheila Englehardt, a professional guardian in Roscommon County who is not connected to the Lewis case.

“Once someone is in the system,” Englehardt said, “it’s like this continuing rotation.”

Dwight committed himself to years of hard work — occupational, speech and ocular therapy, an in-patient stay at a neurorestorative program, months in a residential setting learning to live companionably alongside roommates, plus regular appointments with a psychiatrist.

“When he sets his mind to something, that’s it,” Chris said, “that’s Dwight.”

Earlier this month, his efforts paid off.

On Sept. 12, Dwight stepped off the “continuing rotation” of court oversight, after successfully petitioning Grand Traverse County Probate Court Judge Jennifer Whitten to terminate his guardianship.

Lee Storch of Guardian Services of Northwest Michigan, who succeeded Chris Lewis as Dwight’s guardian, told the judge she supported Dwight’s decision and helped him file the petition.

Both say Dwight’s abilities improved under guardianship.

“As skeptical as I was, it helped me and it helped my mom,” Dwight Lewis said of the time he spent as a ward of the court. “I do know that has not been everyone’s experience.”

Record-Eagle reporters in August 2021 began examining records in Michigan’s probate courts and have since reported a steady stream of worrisome accounts ranging from family isolation to outright theft.

These previous stories involved people of means and those on fixed incomes, people who live independently and those who require residential care, those with close family members and those without, but all had one thing in common: They began with a judicial decision meant to protect them by appointing a guardian or conservator.

Decades of reform attempts by governors, attorneys general and legislators have so far failed to alter the Michigan judiciary, which controls guardianship procedures and calls for probate courts to collect paperwork and keep records, but gives probate judges little enforcement power when things go awry.

Some familial and professional guardians in recent months have faced criminal charges after being accused of embezzling from clients.

In one recent case, a Macomb County woman, Lisa Ludy, was charged with nine felonies and could face up to 20 years in prison after being accused by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel of using Community Guardian Care, Inc., to conduct a criminal enterprise.

Nessel said in a press release that Ludy’s company was appointed guardian and conservator for an unnamed victim, then stole more than $100,000 from Social Security checks, an inheritance and proceeds from the sale of the victim’s home.

Thousands of guardians and conservators — acting as fiduciaries — serve in their roles without running afoul of the law. Professional guardians like Storch say it is hard to find qualified people, when guardians who serve those on Medicaid are paid less than $100 a month per client.

Storch said she is researching ways to turn her company into a nonprofit organization to seek alternative funding and have support from an advisory board.

“What we do is not all about the money,” Storch said.

Storch has more than 30 guardianship clients at any one time; she and her partner, Tracy McCain, provide limited and temporary services to as many as 50 others, she said.

Dwight is the only client she’s worked with who has “graduated” from guardianship, she said.

Once he began making — and keeping — medical appointments, working a part-time job at Oryana West, maintaining a good relationship with his mom and his girlfriend, and got his driver’s license reinstated, Storch said the court didn’t need to be involved in his life.

Dwight agreed.

“When all this started for me with the court, I had no hope,” Dwight said. “Then I began making some goals.”

Dwight said after the hearing, he and his girlfriend, Annette Abraham, went to Colorado for the weekend.

They toured Red Rocks amphitheater, where Dwight asked Annette to marry him.

She said yes.

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Interlochen man beats the odds on guardianship