Guardianship company closed, U.S. Marshals Service says

The U.S. Marshals Service announced the closure of Ayudando Guardians Inc. offices on Thursday, noting that the company had about 1,400 clients when a federal grand jury indicted its two principals and the company on charges of embezzling client funds in July.

Previous reports estimated the number of guardianship or conservator clients in New Mexico at less than 200, but it wasn’t known how many others were receiving representative payee services in which Ayudando handled monthly or regular client benefits from agencies such as the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the U.S. Social Security Administration.

Those representative payee agreements don’t have to be approved by a court.

The Marshals Service has been under federal court order to oversee operations of the company since the July 11 federal indictment of Ayudando president Susan Harris and chief financial officer Sharon Moore. The two were charged with 28 counts of conspiracy, fraud, theft and money laundering charges arising out of an alleged scheme to embezzle funds from client trust accounts. They have pleaded not guilty.

The two women are alleged to have siphoned more than $4 million from clients’ representative payee accounts and savings or money market accounts to support lavish lifestyles for themselves and family members. The company served hundreds of clients with special needs or who are disabled.

The Marshals Service, meanwhile, has been transferring Ayudando clients to new agencies, with the help of state district court judges.

But earlier this month, the transfer process was described by one private agency professional as a “nightmare.”

One of Ayudando’s former clients was profiled by the Journal Aug. 10 because of his living conditions and his inability to find out the status of his guardianship case by trying to telephone the Marshals Service.

Peter Grotte-Higley, 81, is a Holocaust-era survivor whose living arrangements were controlled by Ayudando, which also handled his monthly pension check and finances as his court-appointed conservator. He had complained that the debit card Ayudando provided for his incidental expenses had a zero balance in recent months.

Grotte-Higley wanted to go in person to the Ayudando offices at 1400 Central SE, and he accepted an offer from two Journal reporters to drive him there on Aug. 8. But at the last minute, a manager at his Northeast Heights boarding home intervened and asked a Journal reporter to leave.

Grotte-Higley now has an Oct. 2 hearing set in his guardian/conservator case in state district court in Albuquerque, according to a court docket sheet, the only public record available by law in guardian/conservator cases.

The docket sheet shows that two new attorneys have entered appearances in his case before Judge Denise Barela-Shepherd, but there’s no indication of a new temporary guardian. Grotte-Higley, who has been an Ayudando client since January 2016, is still living in the same home.

Meanwhile, a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Mexico on Thursday provided new details about the Marshals Service’s role in winding down Ayudando operations.

The Marshals Service was appointed to operate the business “to ensure that its assets were not improperly spent or removed, and that the interests of Ayudando clients were protected as the prosecution of the criminal case moves forward.” That court order also required the Marshals Service to submit under seal to the court a report on its findings within 45 days.

The vast majority of Ayudando’s clients have been transferred to new temporary guardians, other service providers and/or new representative payees, the release says. And those still awaiting transfers will receive temporary services from other providers.

Three New Mexico guardianship companies under contract with the New Mexico Office of Guardianship – including CNRAG, Inc., Tierra Alta Guardianship Services LLC and Quality of Life Guardians LLC – will provide temporary or interim services to some former Ayudando clients.

Private clients for whom Ayudando maintained guardianship, medical power of attorney accounts, private trust accounts or conservator services will receive services from Ascending Hope LLC for guardianship services. Bridge to Success Inc. will provide financial services until the courts can appoint new guardians, if required, the press release says.

Although Ayudando’s offices are closed and transfers of clients have been processed, the Marshals Service “remains responsible for managing Ayudando’s business affairs under the magistrate’s order” and “remains committed to ensuring continuity of service for Ayudando clients,” according to the release.

Ayudando, which also had offices in Mesa, Ariz., was created in 2004.

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Guardianship company closed, U.S. Marshals Service says

TRUTH ABOUT NURSING HOMES!!

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TRUTH ABOUT NURSING HOMES!!

Feds Clarify New Rule For Special Needs Trusts

Special needs trusts have a new level of flexibility and federal officials are working to ensure that state Medicaid directors understand the implications.

Under a law passed late last year, individuals with disabilities can for the first time establish special needs trusts for themselves.

The shift, designed to make saving money easier for those with disabilities, is significant. Previously, trusts had to be created by a third party.

Now, federal Medicaid officials are offering guidance on what the change means for state programs.

“A trust established on or after December 13, 2016, by an individual with a disability under age 65 for his or her own benefit can qualify as a special needs trust, conferring the same benefits as a special needs trust set up by a parent, grandparent, legal guardian or court,” wrote Brian Neale, director of the Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services in a letter to state Medicaid directors this month. “The other defining features of a special needs trust remain unchanged.”

To qualify as a special needs trust, Neale said that a trust must contain the assets of an individual with a disability who’s under age 65, be created for that person’s benefit and include a provision that any remaining assets be repaid to the state at the time of that person’s death up to the value that the state provided in medical assistance.

In many cases individuals with disabilities face a cap on the assets they can have in their name in order to qualify for Medicaid and other government programs. Special needs trusts are one of a few ways that individuals with disabilities can accrue more assets without losing eligibility.

Allowing individuals to form trusts for themselves “supports the independence of individuals with disabilities,” Neale noted in the guidance.

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Feds Clarify New Rule For Special Needs Trusts

Who guards the guardians?: Judge vows to fight for clients who lost trust funds

The civil case of Ayudando Guardians Inc. v. Desert State Life Management involves two companies accused of siphoning client accounts for personal gain.

With their owners absent for an initial hearing in the lawsuit Wednesday, a state district judge heard from those who are picking up the pieces after the shocking collapse this summer of the two New Mexico nonprofit companies that for more than a decade specialized in serving developmentally disabled, elderly and otherwise vulnerable clients.

In the audience were lawyers from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, which is prosecuting Ayudando Guardians and its two principals on criminal charges of embezzling at least $4 million in client funds; and Liane Kerr, whose former husband Paul Donisthorpe has been accused by state and federal authorities of embezzling $4 million from his clients’ accounts at Desert State. He hasn’t been criminally charged.

At issue Wednesday was how to proceed with the lawsuit filed by Ayudando Guardians on June 6 seeking damages from Desert State on behalf of seven clients. Those clients entrusted their funds for Desert State to manage, the lawsuit states.

That case was filed a month before Ayudando’s two principals, Susan Harris and Sharon Moore, and the company itself, were indicted July 11 by a federal grand jury for embezzling more than $4 million from their clients. The U.S. Marshals office has been running Ayudando since then, with the prospect of a shutdown of the company imminent. Harris and Moore have pleaded not guilty.

Donisthorpe didn’t attend Wednesday’s hearing. He hasn’t responded to requests for comment and is reportedly brain damaged from a botched suicide attempt.

His wife of 31 years, Kerr, filed for divorce in March after state financial examiners began to look into Desert State’s books. She appeared in court with her attorney Wednesday, but didn’t comment. In court records, Kerr has denied any involvement in the alleged embezzlement scheme or the trust company business.

Both companies are being dismantled by government agencies in light of the fraud and embezzlement allegations.

Judge Alan Malott on Wednesday denied a motion to dismiss Ayudando’s claims against Desert State, vowing to make sure the seven Ayudando clients who may have lost trust funds at Desert State “don’t fall through the cracks” because their guardian is under federal indictment.

“There may be nothing left, but I’m going to try to get as close to the penny as I can get,”said Malott.

Desert State in early August was placed into the receivership of the state Financial Institutions Division.

An estimated 70 people who were clients of Desert State have lost some or all of their trust money, state officials say. Malott, during the hearing, said state district judges are in “crisis management” mode trying to find replacement guardians for Ayudando’s clients.

State FID attorney Kevin Graham told Malott that families and individuals, some with “limited” ability to understand “what’s going on in the case,” have contacted the state to find lawyers to help recover their missing trust funds.

Meanwhile, the state Public Accountancy Board last week revoked Donisthorpe’s CPA license.

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Who guards the guardians?: Judge vows to fight for clients who lost trust funds

Commission suspends Goodsprings judge for year without pay

Peace Dawn Haviland

A longtime Goodsprings judge has been suspended for a year without pay following a series of ethics charges, according to a ruling made this week by the Nevada Commission on Judicial Discipline.

The punishment is based on Justice of the Peace Dawn Haviland’s “repeated failure over several years to follow the law, her proclivity towards following her own moral compass in administering her version of justice irrespective of the law, and her lack of remorse and admission of wrongdoing for the same,” the ruling states.

According to a host of allegations made public earlier this year, Haviland sealed her then-son-in-law’s criminal records, ordered staff to run background checks on her friend’s boyfriend, and bullied employees.

Haviland has served as the small town’s sole justice of the peace since 1999. She was suspended with pay in December.

In her absence, three temporary justices of the peace will rotate to cover her calendars, Clark County spokesman Erik Pappa said. The arrangement has been in place since her initial suspension.

“We’re going to honor the decision, and we will continue to operate as we have these past seven months,” Pappa said.

Haviland is expected to return to the bench next year.

As justice of the peace, Haviland receives a taxpayer-funded salary of more than $70,000 a year. She does not have a law degree, which is not a requirement for justices of the peace in rural communities. Goodsprings is about 40 miles southwest of Las Vegas.

Though Haviland could not be reached for comment late Wednesday, the judge responded to her charges in March in the form of a 14-page formal statement. She contended that all claims made against her were fabricated by resentful employees.

“I do not believe that I have committed any ethical violations,” she wrote at the time. “I have at all times during my 20-year career attempted to administer justice fairly and within the confines of the law.”

She also addressed specific allegations:

— In response to an accusation that she sealed her former son-in-law’s criminal records, Haviland said an employee handed her a stack of orders to be signed. “I do not recall specifically signing this order.” The records were in a domestic case involving Haviland’s daughter, and both parties agreed to the seal, said Haviland, who recused herself from the case.

— In response to an allegation that Haviland instructed her staff to conduct a criminal background investigation on her friend’s boyfriend, the judge said she simply ran a basic public records search on behalf of a woman who lost $65,000 in a previous relationship. “This was a small favor for me and my staff to do for this woman, and my advice may have saved her tens of thousands of dollars and considerable grief and heartache,” she said.

— In response to a charge about an improper sentence she later modified, Haviland said, “It is surprising to me that I am being charged with an ethics violation based on a simple mistake.”

Haviland’s lawyer, Al Marquis, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Wednesday that both he and his client were “very disappointed in the decision.”

“We really thought that we had clearly established that she had not violated the code of ethics,” he said Wednesday. “But when three employees decide to gang together to bring down their boss, it’s hard to fight that.”

The commission’s ruling instead commended the employees who came forward.

“If they had not done so, these disturbing matters would not have come to light and, quite probably, would have continued far into the future,” the ruling states.  (Click to Continue)

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Commission suspends Goodsprings judge for year without pay

Elder Justice Initiative Webinar

Hosted by Julie Childs, J.D., Consultant, Elder Justice Initiative, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, and featuring Brenda Uekert, Ph.D., Principal Court Research Consultant, National Center for State Courts, Williamsburg, VA.

Date & Time:
Wednesday, September 6, 2017 -
2:00pm to 3:00pm ET

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Financial Exploitation in the Context of Guardianships and Other Legal Arrangements

For Vulnerable Older Adults, a Harrowing Sense of Being Trapped

Laila Mina is rescued by members of the nonprofit organization Team Rubicon

HOUSTON — A Holocaust survivor waded waist-deep in flood water. Dozens of people were trapped in a 14-story residence for seniors. A disabled man sat alone at home, without the aide who usually helps him, watching the water rise and unsure if anyone would come.

Harvey was terrifying for millions of people along the Gulf Coast. But it was particularly difficult for the region’s seniors and disabled, many of whom struggled to escape as the water rose. Now, some wait in shelters for chemotherapy, dialysis, pain medication, a pillow. Rescue teams are still evacuating people from their homes.

Inside her apartment in a Houston Housing Authority senior residence on Friday, Ida Szydlik insisted that she hadn’t been scared as the water rushed into her building over the weekend, filling the first floor. “We were just frightened for the other people,” said Ms. Szydlik, 97, as she began to cry. “I was in prayer, but I wasn’t scared, I was too busy praying that this would all go away.”

It is impossible to be sure how many older people have been affected by the storm, and many experts say it is too early to know how nursing homes are dealing with the impact.

Still, throughout the region, there have been reports of nursing homes thrown into chaos by floods. In one assisted living facility in Dickinson, Tex., residents sat in murky water that reached well above their waists while they awaited rescue. Residents in another Houston senior home in Houston were trapped in dark rooms, with water covering their feet.

Officials from this state’s Health and Human Services Commission said that about 4,500 residents have been evacuated from more than 130 Texas nursing homes and assisted living facilities. The storm has killed at least 46 people; at least 9 of them were 65 years or older. The eldest was 89.

And in the aftermath of Harvey, the challenges of keeping older and disabled people healthy have been enormous.

More than 100 dialysis centers in the regions are closed, and in some cases patients have not been able to get transportation to the few that are open. Patients are separated from caregivers by flooded highways. And at the downtown convention center here that shelters thousands of people, a crew of volunteer doctors has been treating evacuees around the clock.

But people have been showing up with waterlogged pills that have turned to a sludgy mix, if they have them at all.

Dr. Shital Patel, a professor at Baylor College of Medicine who helped in the medical clinic at the convention center, said that many of the patients she saw had spent four or five days without taking medication or checking their insulin.

A Houston Housing Authority residence for older adults, where the water rose nearly five feet. Credit Julie Turkewitz/The New York Times

On Thursday, Danny Graves, 62, shuffled across the center in a yellow T-shirt that read: Built For It. He spoke low and slow and said he was bipolar and schizophrenic and normally has a caretaker who cooks and helps him shower. But she left before the storm.

When the water came in, it rose to Mr. Graves’s knees, he recalled, and he sat alone for hours after calling 911. He said he did not think he would make it out alive; he has trouble walking. “Rough,” was he how described it.

Finally, a neighbor arrived and helped him out. “I ain’t doing too good,” Mr. Graves said, standing amid thousands of people under florescent lights. “I ain’t used to this. First time I’ve ever been a storm.”

During Hurricane Katrina in 2005, more than half of the 1,800 people who died were people older than 65, and the depth of the tragedy set off a conversation about disaster preparedness in hospitals and senior care facilities across the country. During that hurricane, about 3,800 residents were evacuated from 53 nursing homes.

Since then, Texas has put in place many more safety requirements for elderly care providers, including rules requiring written evacuation plans and the designation of specific workers to deal with local emergency agencies.

On Friday, at a senior living center owned by the city a mile from the downtown convention center, residents described being trapped inside the building as the storm hit.

Water had poured into the glass-walled first floor — home to the dining area, the gym and the mail room, but no resident apartments — filling it like a fishbowl and blocking all exits.

Then the freshwater cut out. Ms. Szydlik, one of the residents, said her blood pressure spiked and she spent the next few days in her third-floor apartment eating canned tuna and being very careful not to flood the now unflushable toilets.

Once the floodwaters subsided, an army of volunteers, as well as building management staff, came to help residents, carrying water and food up 14 flights of stairs in buckets.

On Friday, Monique Ritter, 80, a Holocaust survivor, described how she had made it through Harvey.

As water gushed into her dining room and kitchen, friends came over and lifted her on to the kitchen island, where she waited — and fell, becoming soaked — until a rescue team came and pulled her onto a boat. Her granddaughter found a hotel room for her and her husband.

When the storm had finally passed, she returned home to find drawers full of water and photographs that belonged to her grandmother, now destroyed.

“We’re tired,” she said, speaking on the telephone from a hotel. “We’re exhausted, mentally and physically. I cannot tell you how I feel. I am really numb. We just got here and we need to rest. My husband is sleeping in his chair. We really need a break.”

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For Vulnerable Older Adults, a Harrowing Sense of Being Trapped

'Always grasp the opportunity': confronting ageism creatively

Eileen Kramer, 102-year-old dancer and artist

Eileen Kramer is reinventing ageing. The 102-year-old dancer and artist is working on a new ballet and plans to perform it in November – with a walking stick, if necessary. “I aim to be walking properly because there is nothing wrong with me except my balance,” she says.

If she needs her cane, she will ask her dancing partner to use one too. “We can do a cane dance,” she says, miming the actions from her seat.

Kramer is one of a growing number of older Australians who have decided to do ageing differently, busting through the stereotypes that say that people retire, apply for a pension, downsize to an apartment, then move to a retirement village to play cards, and then shuffle off to a nursing home to quietly die.

Instead, we are seeing more older people switch to new careers in their 60s, become entrepreneurs, throw themselves into creative endeavours, chase adventure in travel and investigate new forms of communal living, where they remain in charge and avoid the humiliation of the institutional 5.30 pm dinners of soft foods and cordial.

Kramer is the ambassador for the non-profit Arts Health Institute and has a 75-year international career that, most recently, included a role in the Belvoir production of the Wizard of Oz; appearances in music videos and a collaboration on a fashion project. “Always make the opportunity for yourself or else grasp the opportunity,” Kramer said at a recent forum in Sydney on confronting ageism.

When asked if she believes herself to be old, Kramer replied: “I don’t use the word ‘old’. I say I have been on the planet a long time.

“If you are doing creative work, you are absolutely ageless. There is no such thing as age in creativity. It is always something new.”

Chief executive of the Arts Health Institute, Dr Maggie Haertsch, says creativity has beneficial effects on health and quality of life in older people.

“Arts play a really significant role in building a person’s quality of life. I think that ability to keep learning and learning something new should never be underestimated, no matter what your capability is,” she said at the ageing forum.

A study of 60,000 older people by National Taiwan University finds that those who took part in a creative (performance and art) program had lower rates of loneliness and depression, higher morale and improved hand dexterity.

There are now 3.57 million people aged 65 and over in Australia and, by 2056, they may comprise around a quarter of the Australian population.

While those numbers create a powerful bloc, that has not yet resulted in an opening up of the employment market for mature-aged workers or the retreat of ageism.

It takes an average of 68 weeks for someone aged over 55 to get a job. The lack of employment options could be one reason that 34% of young firms in Australia are led by senior entrepreneurs (55-64 years), which is a higher activity rate than average.

Co-founders of the profit-for-purpose consultancy The Ageing Revolution, Leonie Sanderson and Simon Lowe, have found that it is not only young people who hold unhelpful and untrue views about their elders.

The couple took a three-month fact-finding trip last year, interviewing “grey nomads” and mature-aged people around Australia and discovered that many people were discriminating against their own age group.

“We are all hopefully going to grow old so why are we prejudicing our future lives?” asks Sanderson.

“The negative beliefs about ageing are all around us. Even things like birthday cards have terms like ‘over the hill’, ‘one foot in the grave’ or ‘God’s waiting room’.

“There are even beauty regimens to combat ageing from when you are in your twenties, hair dye to cover up your grey hair. It is like we are trying to erase any talk or discussion of ageing in our society at all, instead of focusing on the opportunities that come with growing older.

“The discrepancy between these beliefs and how older people actually are is the most amazing thing.”

On their road trip, Sanderson and Lowe had no shortage of grey nomads to interview. There are around 80,000 on the roads in Australia at any one time.

Lowe says The Ageing Revolution aims to work with companies and startups to co-design and develop ideas and products, such as an app to help carers.

Haertsch says the process of internalising ageism starts before people even hit middle age. “There comes a point in your life where you are somewhat ashamed, or embarrassed, or insecure about talking about your age. I hazard a guess it might be around the age of 30.

“What happens is this internalised ageism is incredibly serious because it also plays out in areas where we do our work – which is in aged care and, particularly, residential aged care.

“We find that some of the self-limiting age beliefs actually stop people flourishing. People don’t realise that they keep learning. Even if you have some form of cognitive impairment such as dementia, you can keep learning.”

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'Always grasp the opportunity': confronting ageism creatively

Songs about Alzheimer’s | Ed Sheeran

I was driving the other day past the church where my dad walked my sister down to aisle when Ed Sheeran’s “Afire Love” came on. She was only 23, wanting to have our father walk down the aisle before he really started losing his memory and cognitive abilities. He had early onset Alzheimer’s and was only 60 at the time.

I’ve heard the song plenty of times before on the radio, but never really listened to the lyrics. A wave of familiarity washed over me when my ears focused on the opening lyrics:

It took me second to realize this was indeed another one of the singer’s tunes about love, but he was singing about the love of that for his grandfather, who suffered from Alzheimer’s for two decades.

Noticing this, I paid attention to the lyrics more. If you love or care for someone with Alzheimer’s, I trust you’ll find comfort in this song’s lyrical narrative of the disease.



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Songs about Alzheimer’s | Ed Sheeran