Britney Spears Hearing Scheduled for Oct. 14

Britney Spears' conservatorship order is to come to an end within three months.

the 28-year-old pop star is expected to reclaim control of her life after meeting with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Reva Goetz last week so he could assess her general wellbeing.

A source told RadarOnline.com: "Britney has made tremendous progress in the past three to four months. She seems to be firmly in control again.

"Judge Goetz needed to meet with Britney and talk to her face-to-face, to see how she was doing. It's one thing to read medical reports about her, but the in-person meeting was very important.

"Britney's court-appointed attorney, Sam Imgham, was the only other person in the judge's chambers during the 35-minute meeting.

"Judge Goetz also met with Britney's father, Jamie separately, as well as with Britney's therapist."

The final decision will be made by Judge Goetz, and if he decides Spears no longer needs conservators she will be in charge of her affairs within 12 weeks.

The next conservatorship hearing is scheduled for October 14.

Full Article and Source:
Britney Spears Set to Take Back Control

See Also:
Britney Spears Remains Conserved

Lawsuit Not Connected to Banker's Disappearance

A lawsuit against missing banker David Widlak alleging he mismanaged an elderly Windsor woman's estate has no bearing on the police investigation into his disappearance, Macomb County Sheriff Mark Hackel said.

"Any connection with someone who wanted to harm David based upon the lawsuit has not been brought to our attention, nor do we believe any reason for his disappearance is connected to it," Hackel said.

The suit against Widlak was filed in Macomb County Circuit Court last October on behalf of Elizabeth Mary Cerget, 69, who died in 2008. Her daughter and legal representative, Jennifer Rubli of Windsor, filed the suit.

The lawyer representing Cerget's estate also said today that he doesn't think the case has anything to do with Widlak's disappearance.

"If we win everything, he may be liable for $200,000," said Troy-based attorney Andrew Mayoras. "That's not enough to disappear over."

Because Widlak is missing, the lawsuit is up in the air, the attorney says. "I don't know what's going to end up happening at this point," Mayoras said.

Hackel said the department's detectives were aware of the suit, checked into and determined that it wasn't connected to Widlak's disappearance.

Full Article and Source:
Hackel: Lawsuit Against Missing Banker Not Related to His Disappearance

If You Ask Me...

Guardian. Someone who protects.

Children need permission from a parent or guardian, to take part in field trips or other activities. Health care providers need the authorization of a parent or guardian in order to treat a patient who is a minor.

Those are situations that come to mind when we think of guardians. But there are guardians of adults, too. And sometimes there are children who are guardians of parents.

I don’t mean that minors can be guardians of parents, only that “adult children” can encounter situations in which their elderly or inform parents are in need of that kind of help. It’s a role reversal that is becoming more common than it used to be, what with life spans being greater.

“We need a guardianship bill!” was a mantra I heard at gatherings of the New York State Association for Retarded Children, Inc., decades ago. When first I heard that statement I didn’t know what it was about. But soon someone explained it to me.

NYSARC included numerous people who were highly qualified to explain guardianship and other legal issues. The one who laid it out for me was Augustus M. Jacobs, a courtly gentleman indeed. His specific court was the New York State Supreme Court, First District (Manhattan). He was one of the founders, in 1949, of the first organization of its kind, the Association for the Help of Retarded Children. I have his AHRC lapel pin.

The guardianships NYSARC was talking about were those in which persons with mental retardation would reach the age of majority but would not be able to handle all the responsibilities that come with adulthood. Their parents wanted to be able to continue to protect and guide them—to act as their guardians.

Most such parents expected that they would predecease their offspring. Some conditions causing mental retardation also included other health challenges which tended to shorten life spans, but even so, parents realized there probably would come a time when they would not be around, or able, to carry out their guardianship functions.

Often standby guardians were named. For mentally retarded adults, usually a parent or parents were named guardian/s, and often a sibling was appointed standby guardian. There could be other standby or contingency arrangements made, too. A local chapter of NYSARC would be one possible choice. The reasoning was that such an entity would have a longer “lifetime” than an individual. Chapters and NYSARC itself had guardianship committees; I served on several.

Then there are the guardian arrangements in which adult children assume responsibility for parents. Most of us know some of those guardians and their parents.

This isn’t the same as being “attorney-in-fact” or having the responsibility of power of attorney. That role is one in which the grantor voluntarily and knowingly gives the POA that authority, so that the POA can act for the grantor as needed, or maybe regularly. Typical duties and powers would be handling money and other assets, paying bills, selling property and making living arrangements.

Ordinarily the grantor can revoke or change power of attorney arrangements at will. Also, the grantor is still free to make decisions too, to pay bills and sign checks and buy things.

Guardianship arrangements may not always be voluntary on the part of the person being “guarded.” Sometimes that individual is too impaired in mental function to participate in the decision. Courts grant those non-voluntary guardianship arrangements based on a showing that the individual is incompetent. The court must find the proposed guardian to be suitable. Usually the person petitioning the court to appoint a guardian for someone is also proposing to be that guardian; but sometimes the petition asks the court to appoint another person or entity.

Would you be surprised if I told you some guardians of adults are untrustworthy? Probably not. There have been high profile cases in the news, where the rich and famous were victimized, usually by those close to them, through abuse of guardianship prerogatives.

There’s an organization devoted to helping those victimized by guardianship abuse, and to seeking legislation and court rulings that will help prevent such abuse. National Association to Stop Guardian Abuse has a website you can Google for.

Some of NASGA’s activists were in McKean County recently to monitor court proceedings related to the guardianship of Rita Denmark, a Bradford widow her daughter alleges to have been virtually abducted to Florida and wrongfully placed under guardianship there and then placed in a secure care facility and her assets made off with.

Sad. Worrisome. The court may rule on some aspects of that case later this week.

Source:
If You Ask Me...by Correspondent Martha "Marti" Knight

See Also:
Help Bring Rita Denmark Home

New Shelter for Elderly Victims of Abuse

Hinds County law enforcement officials are close to opening an emergency shelter for seniors that they say will help protect elderly victims of abuse or neglect statewide.

"Seniors are the largest growing population worldwide, and Mississippi is no exception," Sheriff's Department project manager Ruth Marie Stogner said. So authorities are expecting to see more crimes targeting the elderly, especially those with physical or mental ailments.

Mississippians age 65 or older number more than 364,000 and make up 12.5 percent of the population, according to 2009 Census estimates. That's an increase of 6 percent in the last decade.

The state Attorney General's Office investigates cases of abuse, neglect, fraud and exploitation of vulnerable adults. Its investigators have opened 812 new cases this year, up from 591 last year.

The emergency shelter is a renovated house in southwest Jackson that will provide temporary living quarters and care for up to eight.

"We will be able to take them out of a bad situation and give them a safe home until we can locate their Medicaid or Social Security and can put them in a place where it is stable," Stogner said.

Full Article and Source:
Shelter for Elderly to Open in Hinds

NASGA Press Release - FL: October is "Guardianship Month"

Florida Governor Charlie Crist has declared October as “Guardianship Month.”

NASGA would point Governor Crist’s attention to the fact that the original intent of guardianship/conservatorship law - “guard,” “protect” and “conserve” - is no longer being complied with in a frightening and growing number of cases involving court-appointed fiduciaries. Wards' estates, instead of being conserved, are being plundered in the guise of fiduciary fee billings for "services," either not necessary or not necessarily legal in nature, or simply through blatant overbilling. More and more fiduciaries are engaging in “protecting” their wards into indigence!

Wards’ best interests aren’t being protected either. Many wards are forced into facilities against their wishes and the wishes of their family. Often, these wards are then isolated from family and friends, believing they have been abandoned, and end up dying prematurely, alone and afraid. They are often given unnecessary and dangerous psychotropic drugs which “straightjackets” them and hastens their death after their assets are gone!

Not all guardianship is unlawful or abusive, but when it is, families and lives are destroyed. When unethical fiduciaries have bled estates dry, their wards are thrust onto the Medicaid rolls for the rest of their lives. Every citizen is then affected through increased taxation. The fiduciaries move on to greener pastures while the taxpayers are left with the Medicaid tab for the rest of the lives of the wards, still under state control.

Families fighting for release of their loved ones are damaged financially and can be driven into bankruptcy themselves, while the “fiduciaries” take their fees from the ward’s estate with the blessings of a judge who fails to comply with law. The devastation can cross generations.

It’s no longer a secret: guardianship can and often does harm the very people the laws are supposed to be protecting: the wards, their extended families, and the unwary taxpayers.

Some examples:
*In Miami-Dade, Judge Maria M. Korvick appointed an attorney known to her to be on psychiatric disability, despite the statutory requirement that a fiduciary be sui juris; i.e., competent. The ward, Estela Torrent, went blind due to neglect during court-ordered confinement in a nursing facility, where she remained against her will, at the urgings of the guardian of the property - her very own son. He also convinced the judge, through a hearsay complaint, to compel his sister to pay for a guard in order to visit her mother in the nursing home. That same sister has now been appointed by that same judge as guardian of the person of their mother, and is her present caregiver, now that her estate has been bled out and she has been filed as an indigent. What’s wrong with this picture?

*In Volusia County, Judge McFerrin Smith is determined to retain control over Rita Denmark, a nonresident of the State of Florida. Rita Denmark has lived her entire life in Pennsylvania, yet Judge Smith has refused to let her go home for three long years!

*In Pinellas County, after her guardian’s refusal to take Retta Rickow to her doctor, she landed in the ER. The guardian then secretly moved Retta to a facility 21miles across county - away from her home, family, church and her doctors of over 20 years. Family contested and a hearing was set in Judge Patrick K. Caddell’s court for the purpose of moving Retta closer to her daughter and son in compliance with her wishes and wants. At that hearing, family was blindsided by the judge who, on his own and before any of the lawyers present had submitted their fee billings, assessed family to pay the guardian and attorneys over $8,000. Retta Rickow continues to be separated from her family, her estate plundered, and Florida law ignored.

*In Broward County, Judge Mel Grossman presided over the case of 95-year old Lucille Gittens, who was forced to leave the home she had lived in with her son and his family for thirty years and placed in a group facility against her wishes and the wishes of her family.

If Florida is to remain the “Sunshine State,” it must bring that sunlight into its courts and end the unlawful and abusive misuse of well-intentioned law for unjust enrichment purposes. A large percentage of the Florida elderly population is presently victimized, with the Baby Boomers coming up fast.

NASGA calls for Governor Crist and those running to replace him this election year, to stand up for the vulnerable elderly and disabled persons of Florida and work with NASGA toward reform.

See NASGA’s “An Open Letter to Congress and the White House,” available online at www.AnOpenLetterToCongress.info.

TN: Judicial Discipline Walks a Tight Line

How to make government transparent and efficient at the same time is an ongoing puzzle for those who believe, as we do, that the American system is the best in the world.

Good-government advocates struggle to establish procedures that are fair and effective and which at the same time let the people know what’s going on.

An example is the current inquiry by a legislative committee into the state’s system for discipline of judges.

That system relies on a 16-member Court of the Judiciary to review accusations of judicial misbehavior. In cases where the court finds some fault with a judge that is not severe enough to file formal charges, the usual result is a reprimand, but that action is not revealed to the public.

Some lawmakers think the people ought to be informed of these cases. “It gets back to confidence in the judiciary,” said one member of a Senate study committee, which began its work with a hearing on Monday.

The committee chairman said more disciplinary actions should be made public, or at least that the state law should be amended to more narrowly define what minor offenses may be handled privately.

But it’s not an open-and-shut matter. The presiding judge of the Court of the Judiciary said more public scrutiny would make it harder to reach agreement with accused judges on disciplinary actions. That could result in more trials, straining the state’s resources.

“A lot of times, these things are so minor that a single letter can fix it,” the judge said. He pointed out that Tennessee is one of 42 states that allow private reprimands for minor judicial offenses.

Ninety percent of the accusations reviewed by the Court of the Judiciary are dismissed, The Tennessean in Nashville reported.

Complaints of a judge’s misbehavior are like malpractice accusations against physicians. The very existence of an accusation, whether it has merit or not, can be damaging to a career.

Transparency in government is a worthy aim, but it must be pursued with care. The legislature should take a balanced view.

Source:
Judicial Discipline Walks a Tight Line

See Also:
Tennessee Lawmakers Consider Making Judicial Discipline Public

In a Family Fight, You Can Ease the Pain

Even with well-drafted trust documents, a carefully written power of attorney and prepared and competent trustees, disputes can still arise that land an adult's assets in Probate Court.

"Unfortunately, anyone can sue anyone by paying a small filing fee," said Joseph McCabe, a Phoenix estate-planning attorney.

If you get drawn into a fight over the care or money of a parent or other loved one, legal and financial experts say there are steps you can take to protect the relative, limit the costs and end the disputes. You might start with something as simple as a conversation.

• Stop, listen and compromise.

"It is all about communication," said Lisa Price, owner of a Yuma fiduciary service and past president of the Arizona Fiduciary Association. "Some people's initial reaction is to file a lawsuit instead of having a conversation."

Full Article and Source:
In a Family Fight, You Can Ease the Pain

Designate Someone To Make Decisions

Trusts usually come with powers of attorney.

These one- or two-page directives are potentially critical in determining what happens to you and your life's savings should you become incapacitated.

Legal experts recommend two types:

• Health-care power of attorney. This empowers an "agent" or "principal" to make medical decisions on your behalf if you can no longer take care of yourself. As an option, you also can designate a mental-health power of attorney, though health-care powers of attorney often mention both physical and mental incapacity.

• Financial power of attorney. This names someone to oversee your assets and finances. Often the person is also your successor trustee but could be someone else. The successor trustee takes precedence in managing the assets and cash in your trust. The person with financial power of attorney would control any assets not included in the trust.

Powers of attorney that are "durable" will stay in force as long as you're not capable of managing your own affairs. But unlike trusts, powers of attorney are limited. For one thing, they expire at your death, so they don't transfer assets or avoid probate at death.

Full Article and Source:
Maricopa County Probate Court - Step 2: Designate Someone to Make Decisions

CT Woman Charged With Trust Fund Embezzlement

A Wisconsin woman accused of embezzling $125,800 from a trust fund left by her mother for the benefit of her stepfather was ordered held on $25,000 bond.

Michelle Angst, 49, of Mukwonago, Wis., was assigned as trustee of the fund's $202,591 several years ago. Angst's stepfather, Irving, lived in New Milford from April of 2006 through July of 2010, during which time police say she withdrew funds to enrich herself. An investigation revealed that money was used to pay for hotels, groceries, retail items, gas, and to pay Moots and Pellegrini, the legal firm Angst retained after police launched an investigation. Most of it was withdrawn as cash payments.

A complaint was lodged by Angst's husband David in a Sept. 30, 2009 letter to the New Milford Probate Court. David and Michelle Angst were in the middle of a divorce.

Full Article and Source:
Woman Charged With Trust Fund Embezzlement Held on $25,OOO