Orange County Judge Faulted for Handling of Guardianship Case

By Jordan Cuddemi
Valley News Staff Writer

Newbury, Vt. — An investigator for the Judicial Conduct Board has found that an Orange County probate judge failed to act “impartially and diligently” in a long-running guardianship dispute involving the adult children of a 94-year-old Newbury, Vt., woman.

Judge Bernard Lewis violated Vermont’s Code of Judicial Conduct in the guardianship case that has pitted siblings Elizabeth Guest and Bruce and Bryce Thomas against their brother Paul Thomas, according to the Jan. 7 formal complaint filed by John Kennelly, a Rutland, Vt., attorney acting as investigative counsel in the case for the Judicial Conduct Board. The three petitioners say their brother overpaid himself and mishandled assets belonging to their mother, Miriam Thomas, while serving as her legal guardian from 2010-18.

“The court (Lewis) repeatedly noted its frustration with the pace of proceedings and the guardian’s failure to comply with the orders of the court, but did nothing to require that its orders be followed and that the guardian follow the law,” Kennelly wrote in his complaint.

“The judge did not do everything a judge should and could have done to dispose of the matters before the court promptly, efficiently, and fairly. The guardian paid himself enormous amounts of money during the seven and a half years he was in control of the estate. Those payments were obviously of little benefit to the ward.”

Kennelly’s complaint asserts that Lewis violated two provisions of a judicial canon that states “a judge shall perform the duties of judicial office impartially and diligently.”

Lewis, who has served as a probate court judge since 2002 and is retiring, has 21 days to respond to the allegations. He is being represented by Burlington-based attorney Christopher Davis, the former chairman of the Judicial Conduct Board.

Davis declined to comment on the matter.

Lewis also practices law in Randolph and previously worked for Vermont’s Department of Banking, Insurance and Securities as a market conduct chief examiner, according to his law firm’s website.

The current chairman of the Judicial Conduct Board, Rutland-based attorney Andrew Maass, said that after Lewis responds to the complaint, a public hearing would be held to determine whether a finding of judicial misconduct is merited. If the board finds misconduct, the penalty could lead to a reprimand or other sanction, said Maass, who noted that such hearings are rare in the state.

Asked whether Lewis’ pending retirement — he did not run again in November for the part-time probate judgeship, which in Orange County pays about $51,000, and his term expires at the end of this month — would have an impact on the case, Maass said, “the jurisdiction of the board remains the same whether a judge remains in office.”

The investigation into Lewis’ actions took place after three of Paul Thomas’ siblings filed a complaint to the conduct board in January 2018, alleging Lewis engaged in a “pattern of inaction” that undermined Vermont laws, prevented a disposition in the case and wasted tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees, among several other things, according to Bruce Thomas.

Miriam Thomas, who has dementia, has lived in the memory care area of Valley Terrace since 2009. The three siblings filed a guardianship petition late that year, but Paul Thomas and another sister, Mary Thomas, filed a counterpetition seeking to appoint Paul as the guardian. Lewis subsequently appointed him as financial and medical guardian in 2010.

The sibling trio objected every year to accounting reports Paul Thomas filed late, saying he had paid himself prior to filing the report without seeking court approval for the payments, a violation of state law, Kennelly wrote.

Over the years, the siblings brought forward other alleged flaws in how the guardian handled aspects of his mother’s $2.4 million estate, including an incident where Paul Thomas followed an improper process to sell property, Kennelly wrote.

Miriam Thomas and her late husband, Fredrick Bryce Thomas, owned several pieces of real estate, including a tree farm. Together they ran their 21-room Pulaski Street home as the Newbury Inn.

Lewis advised Paul Thomas of problems with his actions as guardian and expressed concerns and “displeasure” with his ability to comply with court orders, Kennelly wrote. However, Lewis didn’t issue an order to remove Paul Thomas as financial guardian until last March; the probate court judge has since recused himself from the case.

By the time Paul Thomas, 61, was removed, he had paid himself more than $250,000 from his mother’s assets for serving as guardian, according to Kennelly’s filing.

Bruce Thomas has long campaigned to strengthen Vermont’s guardianship laws, saying the state doesn’t do enough to hold guardians accountable.

“Sadly, it is hard to feel very good about any of this,” he said this week. “We commend John Kennelly’s professionalism and integrity, but this case is far from over and it is unlikely that Judge Lewis will suffer any serious sanction, especially in light of the serious harm that his judicial inaction has caused our mother and our family in general.”

Some of his proposed changes to state law would give interested parties the right to view an estate’s financial records in a timely fashion; mandate that the records be kept for a certain length of time and, if they aren’t, order the guardian be replaced; and instruct judges to approve a guardian’s annual accounting within one year of the filing date, or remove the guardian.

Making the changes would provide increased oversight and help prevent abuse of the system and the estate, he said.

“The state has good guardianship laws, but without having any ability for oversight or challenges, they are all sort of nullified,” Bruce Thomas said. “And it’s sad. Our mother can’t speak for herself.”

Attempts to reach Paul Thomas were unsuccessful. His former attorney, Norwich-based Frank Olmstead, has since retired, his law firm said this week. It wasn’t immediately clear if Paul Thomas had new representation in the matter.

The three siblings opposed to Paul Thomas’ guardianship actions have spent about $100,000 in attorneys’ fees in the case, while he has spent about $60,000, according to Kennelly’s complaint.

There is no timeline for when Lewis’ hearing before the Judicial Conduct Board will take place.

Jordan Cuddemi can be reached at jcuddemi@vnews.com or 603-727-3248.

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Orange County Judge Faulted for Handling of Guardianship Case

Sam Huff needs help making life decisions; there is a fight over who should do it

On March 31, just four days after Easter, Catherine Huff visited Huff Farm, the sprawling Middleburg estate with fields fit for horses, rooms filled with football memorabilia and home to one of the most famous men to ever play for the Washington Redskins. She picked up her father, Sam Huff, the Hall of Fame linebacker, to take him to a dentist appointment. Nothing seemed amiss to Carol Holden, Huff’s live-in domestic and business partner of nearly three decades.

“Ms. Holden had no idea that [Huff’s daughter] had no plans of bringing Mr. Huff back to Middleburg or returning him to Huff Farm,” according to court records.

Five months later, Huff still has not returned. The 81-year-old member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame suffers from dementia, according to court papers, related to either Alzheimer’s or chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disease researchers link to playing football. He now finds himself caught in the middle of a family dispute over who should be making medical and financial decisions on his behalf.

Holden filed a petition in May for Huff to be returned to her care, asking the court to grant an emergency appeal and appoint her as Huff’s guardian.

“It appears that [Huff’s daughter] is not concerned at all with Mr. Huff’s best interests,” Holden alleged in one court filing, “but rather in advancing her own needs and interests over those of her father or exacting revenge against Ms. Holden.”

There is a hearing on Holden’s emergency motion scheduled for Sept. 16 in Loudoun County Circuit Court. Catherine Huff has recently changed lawyers, and her new attorney, Eric Schell, said he’ll be seeking to postpone that date. He would not comment further on the case and said his client was unavailable to comment.

In Catherine Huff’s filings, she said her father was evaluated in July and “is incapacitated and is unable to make his own medical and financial decisions.” She alleged that under Holden’s care, her father was “seen wearing the same clothes day to day,” would walk outside in the winter without appropriate attire and was allowed to drive his car on the road, putting himself and others at risk.
Holden’s attorney, Kimberley Murphy, declined to comment.

Huff was known as his generation’s most bruising, hard-nosed player, personifying toughness in a hard-scrabble era of football. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1982 after 13 seasons, eight with the New York Giants and his last five in Washington.

He began broadcasting Redskins’ games in 1975 and stayed behind the mike until finally stepping away in 2013. For most of that time, he offered color commentary alongside his friend and former teammate Sonny Jurgensen, their folksy banter helping to draw together a region of football fans every fall.

When Huff left Middleburg in March, his daughter did not take any of his medications, clothing or belongings with her, according to Holden’s petition. He apparently has been living in Alexandria with Catherine Huff and has had little contact with friends, neighbors and associates he’d known for years in Middleburg.

Holden and Huff never married. In court filings, Holden describes herself as Huff’s “life partner “of nearly 29 years, a characterization that Huff’s daughter calls inaccurate in her legal response.

The dispute does not appear to be a matter of money but rather a disagreement over who can make decisions on Huff’s behalf. Both sides agree that the former football great is in no condition to do so on his own.

Holden explained that Huff first had a diagnosis of dementia in 2013 and is partially incapacitated.

“While Mr. Huff can dress and undress himself and eat without assistance, he requires assistance with certain personal affairs and management of his financial affairs,” Holden stated.

While Holden has requested an emergency change of guardianship, Huff’s current condition is not clear. According to his daughter’s filings, Huff is receiving care from a “geriatric care manager” and could soon relocate to West Virginia, where Huff was born, raised and became a college football star. The court appointed a guardian ad litem in May to represent Huff’s interests.

His absence around the Redskins and Middleburg has not gone without notice. For several years, longtime friend Franklin Payne met Huff for breakfast at the Red Fox Inn in Middleburg. Eight o’clock, every single morning.

“I have not been in touch with Sam since he was kidnapped and taken away from Middleburg,” Payne said. “I would like to see Sam back here. He has so many friends here, and everybody knew him. We just don’t know how he’s doing.”

In her filings, Holden makes the argument that Huff didn’t willingly leave his home of nearly three decades — “his comfort zone, routine, friends and everything he knows and loves,” she said.

In 2011, Huff granted his daughter durable power of attorney, giving Catherine Huff control over his finances in the event he becomes incapacitated. That same day, he executed an Advance Medical Directive naming Holden his agent responsible for health care decisions, court filings show.

Five years later, on April 16, barely two weeks after Huff left Middleburg, he signed another Advance Medical Directive, this time appointing his daughter as chief agent in charge of medical decisions and naming his ex-wife as successor agent.

In a court response, Holden said that Huff was not of sound mind to make such a decision and said that Huff’s divorce was “contentious.” She said he’d never appoint his ex-wife to have any role in his affairs. Holden paints Huff’s daughter as someone unfit to properly care for him, noting an April 21 incident in which she alleges that Catherine Huff arrived at Huff Farm unannounced.

“She told Ms. Holden to pick which magazines by the kitchen table she wanted because [Huff’s daughter] was going to burn the rest,” the petition asserts.

The document claims that Catherine Huff called Loudoun County Fire and Rescue herself to warn that she was “going to start a fire” and then did just that, setting aflame two of Huff’s books, his slippers and some magazines and pictures. Photos of what Holden says are the burned items are included in the court filing as exhibits.

“During the entire incident [Huff’s daughter] was screaming incessantly, acting belligerent and accused Ms. Holden of stealing from Mr. Huff,” according to Holden’s petition.

In her response to the court, Huff denied the incident but offered no other details. A spokesman for the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office confirmed deputies responded to a call over a civil matter at Huff’s address on that date but because it was a civil matter, there was no criminal incident report.

There are no indications that either party is seeking to amend Huff’s trust or will. Holden’s petition says Huff’s estate has a value of approximately $4 million. In addition Catherine Huff, the football great has two sons, neither of whom was reachable to comment. Along with Huff’s three children, Holden stands to inherit a sizable portion of that. The former linebacker’s will stipulates that Holden and Huff must be “living together at the time of my death,” but later points out that if the two are living apart because he required health or custodial care, “we shall nevertheless, for purposes of this Restatement, be deemed to have been living together,” according to his trust agreement.

After decades in the spotlight — first as a star with the New York Giants and later as the familiar face and voice of the Redskins — Huff has spent the past couple of years in quiet retirement in Middleburg. With his memory and observation skills slipping, Huff took on a lighter broadcasting schedule in 2012 before leaving the booth entirely a year later.

Even then, he and Holden still ran the West Virginia Breeders Classics, the October thoroughbred races in Charles Town, W.Va., and broadcast their weekly horse racing radio show from the second-floor studio of their home. The two are both longtime horse connoisseurs and bought and sold many horses together over the years. They began the Trackside radio show in 1989 and broadcast their final show in January.

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Sam Huff needs help making life decisions; there is a fight over who should do it

A civil dispute over guardianship

Dorothy and Leon Bloom

In their beloved house overlooking Roberts Bay, a couple who came from Atlanta to enjoy boating, the opera, dinner parties and “30 years of play and fun” in their retirement are now struggling with the late-life health issues that afflict so many in Southwest Florida's longevity boom.

It's a challenge they had prepared for more diligently than most people, with documents that specified their wishes about medical and financial decisions.

So the last thing they expected at this point in their story was a brush with Florida's complex guardianship law.

Leon Bloom, 96, the founder of an international swimming pool chemical company, is by all accounts a sociable and generous man — the kind who inspires steadfast loyalty among his friends, his family, and the trio of caregivers who now see to his needs around the clock.

He is also the focus of an unusual elder guardianship case that pitted his longtime friend and attorney, former state Sen. Bob Johnson, against his wife of 41 years, Dorothy Bloom. 

The Blooms' friendship with the Johnsons was almost as old as their marriage. The two families celebrated holidays together, and the couples went on cruises to Alaska and the Caribbean. 

Several times, Johnson revised Leon Bloom's trust document — which leaves most of his fortune to charity on his death — and in 1998 Johnson became the successor trustee, to act in his friend's place if necessary.

On Nov. 7, 2011, Leon Bloom stumbled outside the Roberts Bay house. He fell on river rocks by the pool, says Dorothy Bloom, causing permanent injury to his head and spine. Doctors said his injuries were compounded by age-related dementia.  (Continue Reading)

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A civil dispute over guardianship