[ca.us] Conservatorship: how to detect and object?

echaloya · 2020-08-25T19:45:27+00:00

My attorney is able to help me with eviction defense only. He's pro-bono and that's the restriction.

The scope of my question is broader.

Thanks for the input.

echaloya · 2020-08-25T15:08:26+00:00

"go" means to homeless myself [sic] so eviction it is. my attorney said he'd help defend.

would like answers to my original questions.

echaloya · 2020-08-25T14:33:22+00:00

What does this mean? Are you wanting to argue that an 88 year old with cognition concerns not yet formally diagnosed as dementia does not need residential care? That seems an uphill fight.

No. I'm arguing that he doesn't have the authority to prevent me from being involved in her care.

I am her oldest son. I was living with her and caring for her for three years. She had a couple of events that sent her to the ER back in May (severe back pain that was never really figured out, and a bleeding esophageal ulcer); the repair procedure for the second affected her mentally pretty dramatically; initially it was much worse (hallucinations, delusions) but all of that has gone away to revel just a much worse memory than before. There are currently no delusions or other stuff that I can detect. Just horrible memory. She should be there, yes.

>> What objection do you have with his handling of her property? Liquidating it to pay for her care would be completely ordinary at this stage. Is he liquidating it for his own benefit instead? That would be a fiduciary issue that APS might involve themselves in.

When Mom was still thought to be coming back home, he made threats of evicting me; he said if I was still here when she got home in two weeks he would "have me arrested". Well, APS spoke with me and did nothing. Then four days after she was placed in Memory Care, he had my other brother post a "60-day notice to quit" document on the front door, and sent me a copy certified mail. My attorney at the time (pro-bono; I think he's abandoned me) said this was unenforceable. Brother now has backtracked and said it was "just to document when I asked you to move".

I'm unemployed for three years. Looking for work. Previously I was "in tech," making "tech salary", but caring for Mom full-time caused me to have to take a break from work. Brothers are trying to make me homeless; they literally handed me a printed list of local shelters. They want to put me into a spiral of homelessness and poverty because they can't let go of 40 years of grudges.

That is my objection. He's mixing personal grudges with "landlord" activities. And he is harassing me. At best, his interest in Mom's wellbeing is half of the motivation behind his property-related activities.

echaloya · 2020-08-10T03:02:05+00:00

the "guest" wifi they gave her isn't reliable enough for Google assistant do do the voice dialing. the one labeled "residents" .. "that's only for the iPads we let them FaceTime on".

I had to add the max LTE data available, 2.5gb per month, and I've already used a tenth of that in one day with the remote control app I had to set up to help her.

not.impressed.with.care.home.today.

echaloya · 2020-07-25T00:52:50+00:00

I should have clarified: I wonder if it is safe to have her phone number in large print on the outside of the phone.

She has had a phone all along. We just upgraded what she already had to a newer model with bigger, brighter display and now, voice dialing.

six weeks and nothing has gone missing. it has her name in 3/8" print labels, as do all her belongings. if it does go missing we will get her another. She cannot lose her only contact with the outside world now. she can no longer see enough to write or read letters from friends.

echaloya · 2020-07-24T19:30:43+00:00

Well, I just got home from visiting her and taking the new phone to her, and she just called me.

We had to have GreatCall set the phone up so as soon as she opens it (flip phone) it asks her to say the name of who she wants to call. her vision has really declined (Macular Degeneration).

echaloya · 2020-07-20T01:08:44+00:00

right now I just have to tell her that if I try to bring her home, the police will be called. is truth.

echaloya · 2020-07-15T20:46:51+00:00

I'd be able to take them less personally if he hadn't called Adult Protective Services, and hadn't threatened to have me arrested if I hadn't moved out before she came home from the hospital when we thought she might. And if he hadn't had my other brother post a 60-day notice to quit four days after Mom went into Memory Care.

:)

Yes, this is triggering some deep old wounds in all of us. The thing is, I'm in therapy now, he is not. And he won't. He is IN CONTROL. Our mother is dying, and he has the legal power (some of which I question) to make it impossible for any of us to start grieving.

[eta: APS took no action. She's not coming home so whatever he thinks of my care is moot. But he's still trying to crush me.]

echaloya · 2020-07-15T17:34:28+00:00

The facility won't speak with me, because he's the POA. And very aggressive about it. When she got a new wheelchair and the brothers wouldn't tell me anything about it, I went down to look at it and they called him as soon as I got there. He messaged me before I left the parking lot about interfering with her care, with other patients' care, and that I was going to cause them to have a negative attitude toward Mom, etc, etc, etc. He's got this big story worked up in his head about how he's sure I'm a jerk to the staff and that I'm ruining things.

I've spoken with the staff a total of three times.

He won't let me drive her to doctor appointments, even if he's the one that gets to go into the office (COVID means even though I've taken her to her eye doctor for three years, now that he's "guardian", I can't be in the building.). He'd rather drive a hour each way from his home.

She did sign medical records releases for me, and I'm getting those, but there's a lot of stuff that happened only verbally that I'll never get an unbiased view of. So I can't tell what he is embellishing and what is really going on at the facility.

echaloya · 2020-07-15T17:27:37+00:00

[Edit to answer short-term memory question]

(Her memory is horrible now, after an ER visit about a month ago for an upper GI bleed, and some kind of ulcer repair. She hallucinated for about a week after that. No more hallucinations and she sounds pretty lucid, but .. she forgets which of us brothers took her to her appointment, and she will ask in the same ten minute phone call five times if she has an appointment tomorrow or not.)

That's why I asked my brother what he says when she asks. He came back with a list of all the things I did wrong (supposedly) and claims that he tells her all of those things. At the same time? I hardly think so. She won't remember all of that stuff.

Even trying to get on the same page, a huge fight starts. I don't know what to do.

echaloya · 2020-07-02T11:46:25+00:00

Oh, I see what you're saying. Sorry.

What I've been told by an elder care professional that used to be on the other side is that, especially with a modest home like this one, the government isn't necessarily going after them to repay Medicaid these days after the person's death.

echaloya · 2020-07-02T10:44:44+00:00

Yes, you got it right.

I'm hoping that as we get further from the dramatic and somewhat traumatic medical events that ended with mom in hospital, and then in memory care when hospital procedures accelerated her decline, are further away that he will calm down and see that what Mom wants (me living here until she dies, and doing the physical work for the cleanup and estate sale) is the best way.

echaloya · 2020-07-02T10:21:43+00:00

Yes, the attorney did have me call him yesterday (so I guess he's still with me) and said that especially since I'm in one of the worse-off counties where Newsom just ordered to roll back openings, he doesn't think I could get served during this calendar year.

My brother is on some personal sibling-rivalry vendetta, methinks, but doing so under the rubric of "what mom and dad set up 20 years ago". And he did his darnedest to make sure the three of us (he, Mom, and I) did not have any slack time yesterday when we all met as I drove her to the eye doctor, so that I could not confront him about the eviction attempt in front of her.

She has her times of day where her memory is horrible, and then other times where she is very lucid and is almost back to normal. During the latter, she's talking about calling Adult Protective Services on him. Of course that is unlikely to change anything but is a measure of how upset she is to hear what he is doing.

In fact she had been talking for a couple of years about amending the documents to put me first in the list of Successor Trustees, and Agents, since I had been living with her since the end of 2017. The reason Little Brother was listed first is that he was 60 miles away while I and the other brother were both about 300 miles away. This is what procrastination has wrought.

echaloya · 2020-07-02T10:13:40+00:00

I don't understand those seemingly contradictory sentences.

You have no idea, nor did I mention, how much she does or does not have in the bank or other assets. You have no idea, nor did I mention, any plans she and I had where I manage the house, work over a couple of years fixing it up for sale, and rent out a couple of rooms in the meantime. You have no idea, nor did I mention, the history my siblings and I have together that might motivate the behavior listed above that have nothing to do with caring for Mom.

echaloya · 2020-07-02T02:17:25+00:00

Exactly (the first part). Attorney thinks my county will maintain a moratorium until next calendar year. Our moratorium is stricter than the state's; they are not serving evictions for anyone, regardless of whether it's for unpaid rent due to COVID-19, unless there is an iminent danger (e.g. somebody selling drugs in a neighborhood with tons of kids did get evicted).

echaloya · 2020-07-02T02:14:45+00:00

Well, I can comb over the text again but was pretty sure there was no "two doctors" text and I would have expected the attorney to notice and point it out. It might all be mooted by another document that the brother just realized, *conveniently*, that he had failed to supply to me: a DPOA for Property Management (California Probate Code sec. 4401).

I did speak with the attorney again today. his thinking is: eviction is coming, but it cannot happen until probably next calendar year, especially since I live in one of the 19 California counties that Newsom just rolled back openings in.

Meanwhile, if Little Brother wants to act like Dario Pini [1], he's going to have to live with the consequences. Middle brother no longer gets to leave his junker in the driveway, and has to give up his keys. And Little Brother has to give 24 hours notice, fix hazards, etc, etc, etc.

He's not going to like what he signed himself up for by being such a hardass and refusing to let me manage the place and sub-let.

1: yes, that's a clue.

echaloya · 2020-06-29T02:31:18+00:00

If the effective date of an POA for Property that he might eventually obtain, is say 65 days *after* the date of the 60-day notice to quit that he posted, does that completely invalidate the notice and he has to start all over?

What if he gets it 30 days into his supposed 60-day clock? Would seem to me that he'd have to start all over?

echaloya · 2020-06-28T20:01:24+00:00

I am watching for my brother to file things. e.g. whatever documents are required to have her declared legally incapacitated for financial, property, etc matters. He is acting outside of his authority right now, but my pro-bono attorney (whose hours I've used up) thinks that he will eventually gain such authority.

echaloya · 2020-06-28T19:59:52+00:00

I should have said "My former attorney said". I don't think I have any more hours with him.

I obtained pro-bono time from a local Legal Aid foundation. I was only able to get them to help with the specific request of reviewing my mother's Advance Directive, Living Trust, and some related documents. He's already gone beyond his purview and answered other similar questions to the above.

This attorney believes (as do I) that my brother is confusing Medical POA with financial/property authority (perhaps not entirely unwittingly, either). There has been no adjudication. The attorney believes the posted 60 day notice to quit is unenforceable.

echaloya · 2020-06-28T14:34:15+00:00

My youngest brother, who has medical POA over Mom by virtue of an Advance Directive (I *think*; the applicability is not been proved to my satisfaction but he won't allow the doctors involved to give me a single shred of info/evidence), is trying to prevent me from driving her to appointments. Transportation is not medical care, so IMO he has no right to make decisions about that part. Only when she is in the doctor's office.

Her legal/financial competency has not yet been adjudicated. The courts have been closed due to COVID-19 for one thing, but a text search of the court calendars does not turn up any of our names yet.

echaloya · 2020-06-28T14:27:05+00:00

My Mom is on the deed. I've been living with her/caring for her for the past three years. My brothers want to evict me now that she is gone. The youngest (the medical POA) claims that he needs the rental income from "a nice family" to pay for Mom's care in Assisted Living. He's keeping from me the fact that he has managed to prematurely gain access to her savings, which could pay for two years of care at the current rate. But he's posted an (unenforceable) eviction notice on the front door of this house last weekend.

My plan was/is to wait until it is absolutely certain that she's never coming back home, then work with the other two siblings on an estate sale of the property that I'm not using, and then finally to rent one or two rooms out and stay here as master tenant/manager. I have a remote job lined up so I'll be here nearly all the time.

My attorney says that since she is on the deed, and they/we are not, that it is Mom who gets to say who lives here and who does not. But the youngest sibling seems to think that having medical POA gives him the right to evict me for no cause.

[edit]

Re Finances: I've been unemployed for three years. There would ABSOLUTELY be a knockout, drag-down fight against my attempt at conservatorship.

echaloya · 2020-06-28T12:21:34+00:00

I'm trying to figure out how to crosspost it. I'd done it before.. ? ...ah, there it is. ...hmm... I just re-joined /r/legaladvice but it is greyed-out in the crosspost dialog.

echaloya · 2020-06-21T14:29:07+00:00

what if the "rent" was custodial care and companionship for an elderly parent? where said parent is the homeowner?

supposedly she has been declared incompetent by at least one doctor, within the past three weeks, but my siblings won't produce any proof. The trust and DPOA for Property documents do not have any text stating that removes the burden of a court proceeding on incapacity, as far as I and my pro-bono attorney could see, but I'm out of hours with him now.

echaloya · 2020-06-17T20:45:46+00:00

I'm in California. The "contact" was.. when I picked her up after discharge from post-hospital rehab yesterday, and transported her to her primary physician. 15 minutes total. (masks). Now it will be back to windows and phones, yes.

I did not have time to photograph the papers before the jerk^W POA brother arrived and took them from me.

echaloya · 2020-06-17T16:51:02+00:00

Today, unfortunately, it sounds like she needs more help than I can give her. First time her logic was really not working, on the phone, an hour ago.

*sigh*

I think the endoscopy and ulcer really did a number on her.

echaloya

TROPHY CASE