Former Mrs. Florida headed to prison for stealing elderly mom’s SSI checks

Mrs. Florida Karyn Turk 2016.

By Jane Musgrave

The conservative media darling is also ordered to spend 100 hours of community service at a nursing home to remind her of the time she never spent with her mother.

A conservative media commentator who was crowned Mrs. Florida 2016 is headed to prison after a federal judge on Thursday said he wanted to send a message that if you steal from the U.S. government, you’re going to jail.

Unless Karyn Turk can convince an appeals court that she doesn’t deserve to spend a month behind bars for stealing her elderly mother’s Social Security checks instead of using the money to pay for nursing home care, the Highland Beach resident must report to prison on March 2.

Turk’s looming jail sentence — to be followed by five months of house arrest — was ordered by U.S. Magistrate Bruce Reinhart after a contentious hearing.

He also ordered Turk to perform 100 hours of community service at a nursing home — a reminder of the time she never spent with her own mother who spent three years in a Lake Worth facility, ravaged by Alzheimer’s disease.

While Turk didn’t show any reaction to Reinhart’s decision, she and her lawyers sought to convince him that she has suffered enough and didn’t deserve house arrest, much less prison time.

Since pleading guilty in September to a misdemeanor charge of Social Security fraud, she has been attacked on social media, said her attorney David Tarras.

Turk, who last year was named champion of the year by Best Buddies, a teen mentoring group, has lost her position on various philanthropic groups, he said.

The damage to her reputation and her status in political, business and social circles has been enormous, he said.

Without the ability to hob-nob in the community, travel to interview celebrities for YouTube broadcasts and to host fundraisers, like those she held for now convicted political operative Roger Stone, her career is dead, he said.

“Her livelihood is based on networking and being a social media commentator,” Tarras said.

Besides, he argued, she came to court with a check for $46,000 to reimburse the government for the money she stole. That, he said, should be enough.

Reinhart disagreed. While noting that Turk had lived an otherwise law-abiding life and done good works, he said her crime was a serious one. She shouldn’t be able to “buy her way out of jail” by simply writing a check, he said.

“Choices in life have consequences, I’m sorry to tell you,” Reinhart said. “If you steal from the government, you’re not going to have a reputation as an honest person.”

As a social media commentator with a large following, he said she was well-placed to send an important message to others who might follow in her footsteps.

“The message I’m sending is: You can’t steal from the government and not go to jail,” Reinhart said.

His decision was welcomed by roughly a half-dozen employees of the Finnish American Rest Home who cared for Turk’s elderly mother until she died in July at age 83. While they said nothing during the hearing, outside the courtroom, they said they were relieved.

“Resident exploitation is a serious crime and I’m glad he recognized that,” said Daniel Benson, executive director of the 45-bed nursing home.

Instead of using her mother’s Social Security, Veterans Administration and pension checks to cover $219,000 in nursing home bills, Turk used the money to pay for shopping sprees, dinners out and for a nanny to watch her children, according to Palm Beach County sheriff’s Detective Vaughn Mitchell.

The loss over three years hurt, Benson said. “We rely on the money for staff raises, to update equipment, for our operations,” he said. “It’s a significant amount for a small nonprofit.”

Some of her mother’s expenses would have been covered by Medicare if Turk had filled out the necessary paperwork. But, despite constant requests, Turk refused, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Adrienne Rabinowitz.

The nursing home even went to court to try to force Turk to pay up. While a Palm Beach County circuit judge in August 2018 ordered Turk to pay $250 a month to defray the mounting bill, Turk still didn’t do it, Rabinowitz said.

Sadly, she said, the circuit judge also ordered Turk to buy clothes for her mother instead of leaving it to the nursing home.

“I think it says a lot about who this person is when you have to be ordered to buy your mother clothes,” Rabinowitz said.

Attorney Guy Fronstin, who also represents Turk, said he plans to appeal. He said he will ask that she not be required to report to prison until the appeal is decided.

While Turk faced a maximum year-long sentence, he questioned whether Reinhart could send Turk to prison for a month to “send a message.”

Reinhart said one of the biggest mysteries is why Turk, who is married to an attorney and touts an upscale lifestyle, stole the money.

Tarras said Turk couldn’t explain her actions because of ongoing litigation with the nursing home and her legal battle to retain control of her mother’s estate.

She is suing the nursing home, claiming its negligence led to her mother’s death. It is suing her and her mother’s estate to recover the money it claims it is owed.

Meanwhile, a judge last week gave her late mother’s court-appointed guardian the go-ahead to try and remove Turk as personal representative of the estate. Turk’s criminal conviction figured prominently in that decision.

While emphasizing that a circuit judge should decide if Turk retains control of her mother’s estate, Reinhart barred her from having control over anyone’s money.

For her part, Turk initially tried to downplay her misdeeds. Later, she acknowledged that she broke the law.

“I’m doing everything I can to redeem myself and move forward as a good citizen,” she said.

This story originally published to palmbeachpost.com, and was shared to other Florida newspapers in the new Gannett Media network.

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Former Mrs. Florida headed to prison for stealing elderly mom’s SSI checks

Daughter sentenced in elder-abuse case

A woman was sentenced to two years in prison, plus five years’ post-prison supervision, for what the prosecution described as depleting her mother’s account “into oblivion,” leaving her unable to pay her debts.

Barbara Osterud was accused of financially exploiting her mother, Mary K Child. Between 2009 and 2012, she received $3 million from her mother.

During sentencing, the defense argued that this money was given freely by Child, who is now 89. The prosecution said Osterud isolated her mother from people who would have realized what was going on and that she unduly influenced Child to give her the money.

In January 2015, Osterud was charged with eight counts of first-degree aggravated theft and eight counts of criminal mistreatment, commonly referred to as elder abuse.

In October, Osterud agreed to stipulated facts at a trial before Judge Courtland Geyer. She was convicted of five counts of aggravated theft and two counts of criminal mistreatment. The sentencing hearing took place Thursday and Nov. 2, 2015.

Throughout the investigation, and at least twice before the court, Child said that she herself decided to give the money to Osterud.

“I did it because I wanted to,” Child said. “She did not ask me for anything. She’s a wonderful daughter.”

Child painted herself as a victim of the court’s actions in both this criminal case and a civil case related to the matter.

“I think it’s very cruel I cannot have contact with (Osterud),” Child said. “I have done nothing to deserve the kind of treatment this court has given me.”

Prosecutor Douglas Prince described what happened to Child as a con, wherein the victim never knows she’s been conned. She gave up the money because she believed she wanted to. The act of influencing Child to get her to that point is part of the crime, he said.

Rene Sutton, Child’s older daughter, received $250,000 during the same period Osterud received $3 million. Sutton was also written out of a will when previous versions had the sisters equally splitting the inheritance.

Prince denied that Sutton was providing motivation behind the case.

“We are not here because of a document disinheriting Rene Sutton,” Prince said.

Judge Thomas Hart said cases involving siblings fighting over mom and dad’s money are some of the hardest he hears. Siblings have had a hard time since Cain and Abel, he said.

Osterud said her sister has embarked on a “campaign of hate” against her.

“I’ve been forced to accept my sister has become a cold, heartless liar,” Sutton said.

Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office Detective Jay Pentheny’s criminal investigation began in August 2012, when he received a referral from a senior fraud investigator at Wells Fargo. Since Child lives in Aurora, the case was transferred from Multnomah County to Marion County. Pentheny is part of an unit that investigates elder abuse allegations throughout the state.

The civil case began independent of the criminal case. In January 2013, Judge Dennis Graves appointed lawyer Robert Dorszynski as a conservator of her trust. The civil case has been settled. Osterud and her husband are required to repay $3 million. They have since declared bankruptcy.

During her statement before the court, Osterud did not admit to doing anything criminal. She denied blocking Sutton’s access to her mother, isolating her, inflicting emotional or physical abuse, and trying to steal from her.

“I was wrong to accept the generosity of my mother,” she said.

She said she agreed to stipulated facts because was afraid of the toll a trial would have on her mother and didn’t trust that an untrained jury would understand the case. She said she thought most juries would be prejudiced about the amount of money involved.

The only error she admitted to making was continuing to accept gifts from her mother although her mother’s lawyer said that needed to stop. She said she accepted them because her mother is stubborn.

Hart said Osterud’s admitting she had done something she was told not to do by her mother’s lawyer is “sufficient to establish guilt.”

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Daughter sentenced in elder-abuse case