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| Nancy Scott is very concerned about her mother’s well-being, and now she cannot even talk to her. |
Just as Child Protective Services and a judge have almost omnipotent,
unchecked power to decide unilaterally that the relationship between a
parent and a young child is not worthy of being preserved, Adult
Protective Services and a probate judge have the same power to sever the
relationship between an adult child and their elderly parent.
Sometimes the relationship has endured for longer than the judge and
social worker combined have been alive, yet with the stroke of a pen, a
senior citizen can be completely torn away from their own children.
The wishes of the elder can be completely ignored, and documents
assigning power of attorney to a trusted adult child can become
meaningless. Medical and financial decisions are placed into the hands
of a court-appointed guardian who is often a stranger to everyone in the
family.
Nancy Scott, a retired English teacher from south Alabama, wrote to
Health Impact News describing
the medical kidnapping of her 102-year-old mother, who is also a
beloved retired schoolteacher known to her former students as “Ms.
Gregory.”
St. Vincent’s Hospital and the Alabama Department of Human Resources
(DHR) seized custody of Marian (Gregory) Leonard in February 2018. She
is being held against her will, forced by a Jefferson County, Alabama,
court into Hospice care, even though she has no terminal illness or
disease. She is elderly, but her mind is sound.
Nancy has always enjoyed a close relationship with her mother, but
she has not seen her since midsummer. At that time, Ms. Gregory begged
to go home. She told Nancy:
If you don’t get me out of here, they’re going to kill me, and they’re going to kill you.
She is being drugged against her will and has told her daughter that
she doesn’t want the drugs. There have been times that medical staff
have said that Ms. Gregory had dementia, but Nancy says that this is
because of the unnecessary psychotropic drugs that doctors put her on.
When she was under care of doctors who removed the medications, her
mental state drastically improved.
Ms. Gregory’s Story as Told by her Daughter
Here is their story in Nancy Scott’s words, written just before her visits were stopped:
My mother, a 102 year- old retired English teacher from south Alabama, wakes up every morning and asks, “When can we go home?”
And I tell her every day, “I’m working on getting us home.”
Home is south Alabama, known as the “Wiregrass.” My mother has been
in the custody of the Alabama Department of Human Resources since
February 1, 2018. I now have a very good attorney, but the first
attorneys I had, did absolutely nothing except take my money and never
filed an appearance. I just hope it’s not too late.
Medical kidnapping usually involves a child or children, but in my
situation, my elder mother—was kidnapped by the Alabama DHR. She was in
St. Vincent’s Hospital for what would have been a 3-4 day stay because
of a UTI and a mild case of the flu.
DHR issued a court order for “protective custody” on February 1,
2018, and stated in the order that she could not leave the hospital
without a court order. I was not allowed to know what I was accused of
because DHR sealed the records. One attorney I hired was also not
allowed access to the records. The first GAL leaked some of the
information to me along with other “grapevine” news.
I finally learned that I was accused by DHR of taking my mother from a
facility against medical advice. However, I provided a report from a
physician at a local hospital who had given me full permission—and his
blessings—to take her out of the facility on the day she and I left.
[Note: documentation of this has been provided to
Health Impact News.]
No allegations of abuse or neglect can be found in the (almost) five
years I’ve been taking care of my mother. A couple of phone calls by DHR
could have proven that I did not take my mother anywhere against
medical advice (and never have). However, DHR jumped into the case. Now
after spending several thousand dollars of the tax payers’ money, this
organization is still trying to find something to justify the hasty,
costly decision to take charge of my mother.
Since she has been in “protective custody,” my mother has gone from
getting up every day, eating a regular diet, and sitting in a recliner,
to being bedridden. She has asked to get up, but Hospice has said, “No.”
She left St. Vincent’s with bedsores.
St. Vincent’s Hospital, Birmingham, Alabama. Photo
source.
After the medication overdoses at this hospital, it’s a miracle she
is alive. The doctors at St. Vincent’s assured me they were not giving
her any medication—-she refused to eat or drink for one month and slept
most of the time. After a family friend (another physician) came to the
hospital to check on her, I learned what she had been given.
The hospitalists in charge of my mother’s care at St. Vincent’s had
been giving her Scopolamine, the “date rape” drug, and then proceeded to
label her as “demented.” They also gave her Haldol and Ativan (against
my written request not to do so).
These doctors also gave her a cough medicine that she could not
metabolize. The guidelines for avoiding such medications were in her
hospital records, and I reminded them to check this medication against
her medical allergies.
She almost died from the medicine mistake, and one hospitalist, Dr.
Wheeler, refused to consult with an anesthesiologist regarding the best
treatment for her to help her get over the mistake with the medicine.
Dr. Wheeler told me, “No, because of her age.”
Probate Judge Alan King (Jefferson County, AL) appointed a
conservator and a guardian (GAL) for my mother even though I provided
documentation that I had not done anything against medical advice.
When Judge King issued an order after a March 20, 2018, hearing,
neither my attorney nor I were allowed to receive a copy of the order
for several weeks. The clerk at the probate judicial office told me that
until the court costs were paid, we were not allowed a copy of the
judge’s order. DHR was responsible for the bill, so getting a copy of
the order was delayed almost a month while everyone waited for DHR to
pay the bill.
Judge King also insisted that my mother leave the hospital under
hospice care although she has no diagnosis of any terminal illness.
Prior to the hospitalization, she ate a regular diet, got out of bed
every day (with the help of regular caregivers), and enjoyed having her
hair done.
The Director of Nursing at the current facility told me that she had
tried to get Hospice to agree to add a low dose of Zoloft for my mother
at bedtime. Hospice told me that they were under strict court orders not
to discuss any medication issues with me and refused to add the Zoloft
even though she had been taking this medication for over 30 years.
Early on, my brother called the former GAL and told her that no one
was able to look after the best interests of my mother any better than I
because I knew all of her medical allergies and was extremely careful
with her care.
In addition, the court-appointed Jefferson County conservator and St.
Vincent’s social workers selected a facility in Jefferson County, a
three-star facility, that always seems to be short on staff. The court
refused to allow my mother to leave Jefferson County (Birmingham area).
The facility in Troy, Alabama, which I presented to hospital social
workers as an option, much closer to her home and friends, has a
five-star (Medicare rating) and is almost $2000/month less expensive.
Why all this taxpayer money to hold an old woman in “protective
custody” and deny her God given rights to choose where she will spend
her last days?
Bottom line—we have been through all this before……could
some of the problem possibly be the 300 wooded acres in Henry County,
Alabama, that my mother inherited from her grandfather during the
depression?
Full Article & Source:
Alabama Senior Citizen Medically Kidnapped and Forced onto Drugs Against Family Wishes
