Gary Ott dies after Alzheimer’s battle; former top aide blames his family

After years spent suffering from a progressive neurodegenerative disease, mostly hidden from public view, former longtime Salt Lake County Recorder Gary Ott died Thursday morning in hospice care in St. George.

He was 66.

Ott’s death followed a four-year struggle with Alzheimer’s disease. The details of his diagnosis were first made public last week in a court battle between Ott’s siblings and his former fiancee and assistant, Karmen Sanone.

A judge has yet to rule on who would become Ott’s guardian and conservator, which includes the power to preside over Ott’s estate. It’s not clear how his death will affect the court case. Third District Judge Bruce Lubeck said he planned to rule within days or weeks.

Martin Ott, Gary Ott’s brother, said his family spent several days at his side after being told Ott’s death was near. They were with him when he died, Martin Ott said.

“Believe me, the man was suffering. Every breath,” Martin Ott said.

Hours before his death, Sanone visited Ott’s facility and attempted to see him. The family and facility called St. George police and reported she was trespassing, according to a report read to The Tribune by Capt. Mike Giles.

“Family that were present as well as the facility had requested that she leave,” Giles said. “Our officers provided a trespass notice that if she returned charges could be filed or an arrest could be made.”

Attorneys in the case said they didn’t know what would happen moving forward with Ott’s estate, including a Salt Lake City home and banking and retirement accounts, along with immediate arrangements, such as services and interment.

Ott had been living with Sanone at her Weber County farm for years while maintaining legal residency in Salt Lake County.

The two acted like husband and wife, describing themselves as such to various doctors in recent years. They had exchanged rings and were once engaged, but never married.

After struggles with his speech, Ott saw a doctor in 2013 who said he believed the symptoms may indicate a form of dementia. Subsequent visits with neurologists confirmed Ott likely had Alzheimer’s. As of last week, Ott had advanced Alzheimer’s disease, attorneys said.

The diagnosis came two years after friends and former employees say they began seeing possible signs of the disease.

His decline would perplex friends, family and employees for years as they knew something was wrong with Ott but were powerless to remove him from office or otherwise intervene in his life.

His employees, meanwhile, attributed various symptoms emerging in public to a severe case of shingles and the medication he took for years to treat it. Two of his staffers, Sanone and former Chief Deputy Recorder Julie Dole, had access to his email account.

They said they never wrote anything purporting to be from Ott without his actually knowing and signing off on the correspondence. Sanone said she was writing his emails because a debilitating hand injury left him unable to write for himself. In one email, Sanone fretted over how to make an email appear as though it was coming from the elected recorder.

In another, sent May 5, 2016, between her public and private email addresses, Sanone sent a document called “Gary Ott Trust Outline,” a record obtained by The Tribune this week shows. The outline sought to give Sanone control over Ott’s trust.

“I want the trust designed such that all assets will remain in my control until such time as I become incapacitated or otherwise unable to make my own decisions,” the outline said. “At this time, the co-trustee will assume control of the trust and my assets.

“Karmen Sanone is to be named as Co-trustee.”

It’s not clear whether the outline, which sought to give Sanone control over all of Ott’s stocks and investments, powers of attorney, farm equipment and other assets, was ever signed.

In January 2015, the same day Ott was sworn into his final years in office, he purportedly signed an advance health care directive, a document nominating Sanone as his medical guardian should he need one in the future. Dole, who filled out much of the document, was also the legal witness.

He then walked into the county clerk’s office and stumbled over the oath of office, including repeating his own name.

After months of news reports that began to shed light on the apparent struggles of the county recorder, Ott’s family, living in southern Utah, asked the 3rd District Court to give them the power to make his medical and financial decisions.

After Sanone found out the siblings were going to court, she visited one of Ott’s financial planners and became the death beneficiary on one of his retirement accounts, according to court testimony.

Dole and Sanone have been accused of knowingly propping Ott up in the office for years while he suffered from his terminal condition, even going back to his 2014 re-election.

During that time, police were contacted about Ott at least three times, including one winter night in Tooele last year, when Ott ran out of gas and was wandering disoriented. Police, who described him as incoherent, took him to the emergency room.

His friends and family described a sense of relief on Thursday as Ott’s suffering came to an end, about 4 a.m. in hospice. Caretakers warned the family days ago that Ott was near death, and they spent several days with him.

“We’re religious people. We think that there’s a hereafter,” Martin Ott said. “Gary was crossing the line and would be joining with loved ones from long ago.”

In a written response, Dole said she was “deeply saddened” by the news. She said she learned of Ott’s condition in court last week and called accusations that she knew of his condition long ago “absurd.” She also blamed Ott’s siblings for his death.

“I believe from all reports that Gary met an untimely death due to his siblings‘ decisions, which I do not believe took any consideration of what Gary wanted, nor his quality of life,” Dole said. “He should have been allowed to spend his last days with his last days with his pets and life partner on the farm, not locked in a confined space.”

Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill’s office has talked about an investigation related to the recorder’s office but has released no details of the matter.

Martin Ott said the family wants justice.

His friends and family described a sense of relief on Thursday as Ott’s suffering came to an end, about 4 a.m. in hospice. Caretakers warned the family days ago that Ott was near death, and they spent several days with him.

“We’re religious people. We think that there’s a hereafter,” Martin Ott said. “Gary was crossing the line and would be joining with loved ones from long ago.”

In a written response, Dole said she was “deeply saddened” by the news. She said she learned of Ott’s condition in court last week and called accusations that she knew of his condition long ago “absurd.” She also blamed Ott’s siblings for his death.

“I believe from all reports that Gary met an untimely death due to his siblings‘ decisions, which I do not believe took any consideration of what Gary wanted, nor his quality of life,” Dole said. “He should have been allowed to spend his last days with his pets and life partner on the farm, not locked in a confined space.”

Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill’s office has talked about an investigation related to the recorder’s office but has released no details of the matter.

Martin Ott said the family wants justice.

“All of us, in the family, are very interested not in revenge here, there’s no [point] there. It’s a place for the cynical,” he said. “What we are interested in is justice. We’re hopeful that the folks that perpetrated what appear to us to be criminal acts are brought to justice.”

Full Article & Source:
Gary Ott dies after Alzheimer’s battle; former top aide blames his family

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Testimony: Gary Ott had dementia long before 2014 campaign

Testimony: Gary Ott had dementia long before 2014 campaign

WEST JORDAN — Though questions have swirled for nearly two years about Gary Ott's declining health, exactly what ailment the former Salt Lake County recorder has suffered, and when it all started, have remained unclear.

That is, until now.

Two of his former top staff members, who have been accused of attempting to hide Ott's health issues to keep their jobs, often attributed his struggles to shingles or an old hand injury, while also insisting he was still in charge of his office, but just wasn't a "detail leader."

But during court testimony Thursday, it was revealed that Ott has been diagnosed with "not just Alzheimer's, but stage 4 Alzheimer's," said Mary Corporon, an attorney representing Ott's siblings in a legal battle with the former recorder's girlfriend and former employee, Karmen Sanone.

There are seven stages of Alzheimer's, with patients in stage 7 "nearing death," according to alzheimers.net.

Additionally, Ott was showing signs of mental impairment as early as 2012, long before his last re-election campaign in 2014, according to sworn testimony Thursday from friends and medical experts.

Sanone and Julie Dole, Ott's former chief deputy recorder, ran Ott's 2014 campaign and spoke on his behalf during campaign events.

A key issue in the legal fight between Ott's siblings and Sanone, who has been identified as Ott's girlfriend, fiancee or caretaker, is whether Ott was competent when he signed an advance health care directive in January 2015 nominating Sanone to make medical decisions for him.

Sanone and her attorney, Aaron Bergman, argue she should be his guardian because she has been the one caring for him over the past several years, not his family.

But witnesses called by Corporon Thursday testified Ott had already declined beyond being able to make decisions for himself when he signed that document.

"He would sign whatever you told him to sign" in 2013, testified Tonya Keller, who was Ott's longtime chief deputy before Dole.

The new details of the turmoil surrounding Ott came to light for the first time publicly on Thursday during the legal battle between Ott's family and Sanone, shortly after 3rd District Judge Bruce Lubeck decided the case would be open to the public.

Lubeck's order — in favor of a motion filed by the Deseret News, Salt Lake Tribune, KTVX Ch. 4 and the Utah Headliners Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists — paves the way for an expected two days of under-oath testimony from multiple county employees and elected officials subpoenaed in the case.

Ott's Alzheimer's diagnosis was the reason he was excused from court Thursday, even though Lubeck said last month that he wanted to hear from Ott before proceeding.

A 'puppet'

Neurologist Trevor Squire said he had determined Ott had some form of progressive dementia back in October 2013.

At the time, Squire said Ott scored a 7 out of 30 in a cognitive test. A score under 26 is typically considered "possibly abnormal" and the lower the score the more likely there is "cognitive impairment."

Ott, a Republican who now resides at an unspecified medical facility, last campaigned for office in 2014 and was elected that November to serve a six-year term beginning in January 2015.

Ott's family's attorney alleged that hundreds of documents — including three boxes of mail and old unpaid bills since 2013 — show a "consistent pattern of financial neglect of Mr Ott" by Sanone who "claimed" she was taking care of Ott.

Sanone's attorney argued those documents don't prove Sanone neglected Ott and that Sanone "vehemently denies" those accusations.

Corporon argued the unpaid bills, combined with witness testimony and police reports detailing welfare checks on Ott in Weber County showing Ott "wandering," "unattended" and "disoriented" while he was apparently in Sanone's care calls into question whether Sanone is "fit" to be his guardian.

Even further, Corporon said testimony shows Ott was "essentially a puppet" in the 2014 campaign so Dole and Sanone could keep him in office and thus keep their jobs.

"That's a degree of manipulation of this person that's extraordinary, you're honor," Corporon said. "It's material from which this court could infer deliberate elder abuse of this individual."

Dole and Sanone have been accused of taking advantage of Ott to stay in their high-paying, appointed positions in the county recorder's office. Both women have denied those accusations.

Salt Lake District Attorney Sim Gill has said his office is continuing to investigate such accusations.

For nearly two years, questions about Ott's health have played out publicly after a Deseret News investigation into a bizarre incident in January 2016, when Ott was found stranded and wandering alone on a rural Tooele County road. Still, he remained in his elected office.

County officials grappled with how to address the situation because state law provides no mechanism to remove an elected official unless he or she commits certain crimes.

Last year, Ott collected nearly $190,000 in taxpayer-paid salary and benefits.

Ott eventually resigned in August after his family sought temporary emergency guardianship of him and struck a deal with Salt Lake County leaders that was later approved by Lubeck.

Testimony

Squire's diagnosis in 2013 backed the suspicion that another doctor, Charles Richardson, Ott's physician, had earlier that year — that Ott was probably experiencing a form of progressing dementia after he complained of headaches and trouble concentrating.

Before Ott was sworn into office for a fifth time in 2015, Richardson said Ott likely couldn't read "complex documents" and had difficulty remembering words. And when Ott visited Richardson about a dozen times between August 2013 to January 2016, he said he would often be accompanied by Sanone.

Before his family was granted temporary guardianship of him, Ott was living with Sanone on her rural property in Weber County, according to testimony from Tonya Keller and her husband, Eric Keller.

The Kellers — who called themselves longtime friends of Ott — said they noted hints of Ott's decline as early as 2011, before Ott announced he would run for Salt Lake County mayor in 2012.

"I could tell he was deteriorating," Eric Keller said. "No question in my mind."

The Kellers told of how Ott began having trouble in his daily life and in his office. They told of how, even though he had been to their house "hundreds of times," he eventually couldn't remember how to get there. Ott even started having trouble reading and went from being a "micromanager' in his office to uninvolved.

"He couldn't drive, he couldn't read, he couldn't find his way home some days," Tonya Keller testified.

She said she was fired soon after she became "very vocal" about her intentions not to help him run for another term and after she made multiple suggestions to Ott that perhaps he should retire.

Eric Keller recounted a day in September 2014 when he ran into Ott at a restaurant, where Ott was with Sanone and Dole, who were at the time running his re-election campaign.

He said Sanone, when she saw him approach Ott, "grabbed (Ott) by the arm and pulled him away."

Ott's sister, Kristine Williams, said she was aware Ott lived with Sanone and that they were a couple for several years, but in 2016 she started getting phone calls that suggested Ott didn't want to be with Sanone anymore.

"He began calling us ... upset that Karmen was being mean to him, that he needed to get out of there, would we please help him," she said.

Ott's nephew, Jonathon Williams, also testified his uncle didn't recognize him when he saw him in 2012 during a caucus night, when Ott was running for county mayor.

"I told him who I was, but he still didn't recognize me. He shook my hand and asked for my vote," Jonathon Williams said.

Then in 2015, Jonathon Williams recalled how his mother called him asking if he would go help Ott because he was "upset and disoriented" at his house.

Jonathon Williams said when he arrived, he found Ott "shaky and crying," his kitchen in disarray with tools scattered all over the counter, and his house devoid of food. When he took his uncle to a restaurant, he said Ott was "ravenous."

Most of Thursday's court hearing was consumed by witnesses called by Ott's family attorney. Sanone's attorney is expected to call more witnesses during Friday's proceeding, after which Lubeck will determine who will be Ott's permanent guardian.

Full Article & Source:
Testimony: Gary Ott had dementia long before 2014 campaign

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Sister, brother file for legal guardianship of embattled county recorder

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Without Gary Ott to speak for himself, judge delays decision on future of former county recorder

County Recorder Gary Ott

West Jordan • A decision about who will be the permanent legal guardian of enfeebled former Salt Lake County Recorder Gary Ott has been delayed a month, along with a ruling over whether the news media will be allowed in court to observe the proceedings.

Because Ott is in an undisclosed hospital and did not attend a Wednesday court hearing, 3rd District Judge Bruce Lubeck said he felt uncomfortable making a decision that would impact the rest of Ott’s life without seeing him in person and evaluating whether his widely publicized mental decline rendered him unfit to have any say over the outcome.

“The statute says he has an absolute right to be here,” Lubeck said, even though there was a verbal consensus among Ott attorney Dara Cohen and lawyers for both Ott’s siblings and their adversary in the guardianship case, Ott girlfriend Karmen Sanone, that the former recorder’s presence was not necessary, given his diminished mental state.

“I have to choose whether there’s a guardian and who it ought to be. I can ask him that. He may tell me,” the judge said. “Until I get him here, I may not know. [Having him here] informs me on all sorts of levels about what I ought to do.”

Ott resigned Aug. 1 after Lubeck’s initial guardianship decision in favor of the recorder’s siblings. The family then negotiated an agreement for Ott to step aside after a year of fruitless entreaties for him to resign from Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams and the County Council. The county agreed to pay 12 weeks salary — $35,000 — into a trust to be used for his ongoing care.

Lubeck learned only Tuesday afternoon that Ott would not attend the hearing, in part because of the earlier ruling making Ott’s brother and two sisters his temporary guardians and putting them in charge of his financial matters. But Lubeck had left Sanone in charge of Ott’s medical care.

That split authority prevented Ott’s siblings from checking him out of the hospital — where he has been since being forced to leave a long-term care facility after he smashed a television set and tried to put a nurse into a headlock. Only Sanone, as his court-appointed medical surrogate, had authority to move him.

Sanone maintained the hospital would not release Ott unless he had another facility to go to. She blamed his siblings’ tight financial controls with making it difficult to find a suitable place, a charge they denied.

 

Seeing the bind he had created, Lubeck reversed his earlier decision and put the siblings in charge of Ott’s overall medical care until the delayed hearing, now set for Oct. 12-13. Sanone believes she has that authority, due to an advanced medical directive that Ott signed before his mental-health problems became apparent, said her attorney, Aaron Bergman.

Lubeck also denied a request by Cohen to allow Ott’s guardians to sell his Salt Lake County home and to use the money to cover his future medical care. Again, the judge said he wanted to wait until hearing what Ott himself wants to do.

Cohen surprised Lubeck early in Wednesday’s proceedings when she withdrew a motion to close the guardianship hearing to reporters. She acknowledged her request probably would lose out to counterarguments by The Salt Lake Tribune, Deseret News, KTVX Good 4Utah News and The Utah Headliners Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists and felt it was more important to spend time on the issue of Ott’s care.

Ott no longer watches television news or reads newspapers, Cohen noted, so the media’s coverage would not impact him.

Lubeck was not convinced, saying multiple times that he believes Ott’s right to privacy would be undermined if the hearing was open. “It seems that may cause him some damage even if he’s unaware of it,” he said, inviting all of the attorneys to opine on whether a judge can close the proceeding “even if everyone else wants it open.”

After initially saying he had no objections to opening the hearing, Bergman later changed positions after Sanone objected that some of her financial information could be disclosed in the hearing.

Nearly two dozen witnesses currently are scheduled to testify, although Lubeck pleaded with the attorneys to try to minimize the number.

Full Article & Source:
Without Gary Ott to speak for himself, judge delays decision on future of former county recorder

See Also:
Sister, brother file for legal guardianship of embattled county recorder

Jay Evensen: What is the solution for an incapacitated politician?

Lawmakers continue conversation about bill to remove incapacitated elected officials