First of all, I want to say this forum is a life saver! I have been reading posts that helps me stay focus and have so much respect and empathy for all those who use this forum! It has helped me when I felt alone.
I am lucky. We have a team of 24/7 caregivers that have helped our family take care of our mother so she can live in her rented condo. Her wish is to die in her home.
I am able to take care of my mom 3 days a week, and be assistance to our other caregivers as needed. We work well as a team to ensure mom has 24/7 care.
There are 5 children in our family. My brother us the DPOA for financial and medical. In the beginning, 4 siblings worked together to oversee the care. My brother handled finances, I handled all care. The four of us meet monthly to discuss how our mothet is doing medically. If there are other tasks I need help with, ie finalizing funeral, my other siblings step up and help out. We have one sibling that refused to help in any way once my mom became sick.
Last year, one of our siblings passed suddenly. But since her passing, the 3 of us continued to meet and discuss our mother.
Recently, ( just 3 weeks ago) our brother informed us that our moms funds are almost gone. She will be broke by December 1st. My brother wanted to meet, we asked him for availability, he never responded. We set a meet date on Oct 20th, he never showed. 2 days after the meeting date, he apologized and said he could meet, but will be unavailable starting Oct 29 to Nov 4th. To be honest, my sister and I were angry. We made every effort to meet to review financials. He has never given us any accounting or reports on our mother's finances. We have been requesting this since 2017, when we began this journey. He kept telling us our mother is fine financially. We tried to talk to our mothers finacial planner in 2018, but he wouldn't meet with us or share information since we were not POA.
My sister and I pressured him to share her financials with us. He finally sent a copy last Wed, via email. After researching and teying to decipher all the transactions, he used our mothers Trust fund as a checking account. He comingled his personal funds with our mothers. He drew checks off this account which created shortages and penalties. Stocks had to be sold to cover the shortages. He withdrew cash to himself and his girlfriend. When we questioned this, he became nasty and stated he could prove he deserved the money. When we asked for proof, he threatened us. It's now very ugly. My sister and I reviewed all the finances that we know of, and devised a budget to keep our mother in her home with a live in caregiver and myself for the next 6 to 10 months. This would not drain our mother's Trust, but give us time to figure out next steps if she lives till June 2020. My brother has rejected all plans submitted to him. He has now illicited the help of the sibling who hasn't been around.
My sister and I want to file a petition to make our brother accountable to the court on how he is spending the trust. My mom's DPOA lists her children in specific order if our brother is incapable of being POA and lists him and myself as dual guardians if it came to that.
We are worried he will take the remaining funds and place our mom in a nursing home.
We dont want to fight. We just want to honor our mothers wishes as long as we can, and make him accountable. If its not to us as a family, then an external oversight.
Any suggestions?
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Is there an addiction or gambling issue?
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BTW, I am next in succession for DPOA medical and financial. I am dual guardian with my brother if needed. We just want someone outside our family to look at yhe finances and halt him from draining whats left.
Appreciate all the advice with one common answer...lawyer
If you need help locating some in your area, post back. I would normally check the State and County Bar Associations categorical lists, then review each potential firm candidate's website to detect the firms diversity, different practice areas, blend of senior, experienced attorneys as well as younger attorneys, etc.
You'll get a better chance of experience and youth in a firm that's well established. Their practice areas complement each other. I've never worked for a single or small firm that I would consider recommending; they just don't have the breadth of experience that larger firms do. But that's my opinion.
Another good sign is if the firm holds seminars for its clients on topics relating to the firm's practice. E.g., a firm with a labor law practice (along with other practices) might hold a seminar for clients on new labor laws, or a major interpretation of existing labor laws.
So called "seminars" at restaurants, designed to rope in potential clients, don't fall into this category.
The firm I've worked for and had handle my father's and sister's estate planning sends out letters to clients on critical IRS updates, and other relevant issues. It also has an e-newsletter, which I subscribe to. There are several people in the Estate Planning group, focusing on different aspects of relevant laws and activities. Their specialties complement each other.
It's why I've continued to use this firm as opposed to one which specializes only in elder law. I've also discussed issues with more upscale firms, but their approaches really weren't for working class people; nor were their rates.
Contact the candidate attorneys and be specific about inquiring into their experience with contested issues, and be specific in terms of actions, but you don't have to go into how much , where, why and when.
You want someone who knows what to anticipate and how to handle it, especially since your brother is apparently becoming more defensive if not unwilling to cooperate.
Focus on the overall breach of fiduciary duties by your brother and ask how many similar cases these attorneys have handled, what difficulties/challenges could potentially arise, how they would/could be handled, etc. I.e., scope out the whole process of what could happen if you have to file suit to stop your brother's financial abuse.
I don't see any other way to redress the grievances, even if it's not possible to recover the funds he spent. But a halt does need to be put to his actions.
An experienced and competent attorney might ask the court for a TRO, a Temporary Restraining Order, to prevent your brother from taking any further actions at all, to sequester your mother's funds and rescind any authority he has to use them, all while pending a more detailed hearing and likely an accounting by an independent party to be appointed by the court.
Whether or not the POA would be followed in terms of succession would likely be up to the court, but it's still possible that you and your siblings might share the roles jointly, with accountings to the court.
Find a NAELA or CELA certified eldercare attorney and take all the documents that you have with you to the appointment.
I'm so sorry for how this has turned out when you as a family had been working so well together. You must feel sick with worry and disappointment.
And the sibling who didn't want to know? - any input from that quarter?
You may not have considered this, but your mother will probably not be eligible for Medicaid in light of the money taken by your brother. Medicaid looks back to expenditures within the last 5 years, and they don't want to see any "gifts" or money spent for other than your mother's needs. If I were you, I would consult an experienced lawyer, right now!