Court Appointed Guardians ripping off Seniors, destroying Families
Dr. Sam Sugar has a pretty clear picture of how he thought life would be after he retired to Miami from Skokie, Illinois
The physician saw himself in a bathing suit, on the beach, spending time with his wife and grandchildren. He’d travel, read and have time for himself.
But after his wealthy, widowed mother-in-law became a ward of the state — her affairs controlled by a coterie of lawyers, nurses and a court-appointed guardian — Sugar channeled his anger into political activism. Now he is on the verge of a breakthrough.
With Sugar and the organization he helped found, Americans Against Abusive Probate Guardianship, leading the charge, Florida lawmakers are in the process of overhauling the state’s guardianship laws. The changes are aimed at installing some checks and balances to ensure that guardians, who have considerable power once they are appointed to a case, are qualified and that their actions can be reviewed.
“We have accomplished something monumental,” said Sugar, who has testified in Tallahassee on behalf of the overhaul.
Sugar, who lives in Aventura, spent countless hours researching the laws after he and his wife engaged with her siblings in a brutal years-long squabble over the well-being of his mother-in-law, Idelle Stern, also known by her Hebrew name Rebbetzin Chaya'le Stern.
As often happens in such situations, there were fingers pointed in multiple directions. Sugar claims the guardian and lawyers, in cahoots with the courts and his wife’s siblings, siphoned millions from Stern’s accounts while keeping her isolated from him and his wife. The siblings and the guardian claimed that the Sugars moved to South Florida with designs on Stern’s money, and that they were simply protecting Stern from exploitation.
One of the few things that is not in dispute is that the guardianship process and associated litigation cost everyone a lot of money. Stern, whose late husband was a rabbi and successful investor, died in 2013, leaving an estate partially drained and a family utterly divided.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/broward/article16018967.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
