Dying woman recovers, says relatives "robbed me blind"

[stevedeshazer]

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/elderly_woman_says_her_relativ.html

<snip>

by Maxine Bernstein, The Oregonian

Evelyn Roth says the only personal item she still has in her possession is the 25th anniversary diamond ring her late husband gave her. She says her relatives couldn't get the ring off her finger when she went into the care center. "I could sit around and sulk and feel bad, but what good would it do?" she says.



Shortly after two women gained power of attorney from a dying 83-year-old relative, they took all of her possessions and sold her house of 56 years, police said.

The pair pocketed the $235,000 from the house sale and cleaned out the elderly woman's bank accounts and savings, sharing the money among themselves and family members, police and prosecutors say. They also arranged and pre-paid for her funeral.

However, Evelyn Roth made an amazing recovery and had no idea what her relatives were up to.

Now the two suspects, Roth's cousin Virginia Ann Kuehn, 66, and her niece Kathleen Sue Jingling, 53, face a 35-count felony indictment charging them with first-degree criminal mistreatment, aggravated theft and first-degree theft. They've pleaded not guilty. </snip>

Much more at link: http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/elderly_woman_says_her_relativ.html

----

This happens all too often, and these 'relatives' ought to spend some time in the pokey.

[ZombieHorde]

1. Even vultures wait until you are dead. nt

[grasswire]

3. well, my own aunt....

....was considered dying about 18 months ago, in her retirement community's health center. She was very frail and ill. She was on hospice care, and her children released her apartment in the center and gave everything away. About a year later, she began to improve. Now, she's up with a walker, in the dining room every night, chipper and bossy old self. She took an apartment again. Oops -- all her old stuff is gone. This is both good and bad. She's the only person ever to come OFF hospice care at this retirement home.

[stevedeshazer]

5. Yeah, but this old lady had her entire house ripped off.

But, good for your aunt.

:)

[grasswire]

7. I know.

I'm just noting that sometimes people DO appear to be nearly dead and then recover!

So take note, all those who would abuse their weakened elders.

[ejpoeta]

10. but why wait when they could take it all while she was in the hospital...

after she is gone they couldn't just wipe out her accounts.... then there would be probate i guess. Maybe I am wrong. This is why I believe that everyone gets theirs in the end... I have to. people who would do that to someone deserve whatever karma gives them!!

[uncle ray]

24. they had to get her stuff before the "other" greedy siblings got their hands on it.

[roguevalley]

38. what evil bastards.

[Lorien]

2. The inhumanity that's sweeping this Nation is sickening beyond belief

Eight years of Bush? 29 years of Reaganism? The loss of the Fairness Doctrine leading to an MSM filled with hate speech 24/7? What's the deal, people?

[WolverineDG]

4. Please, this kind of thing has been going on for eons nt

[stevedeshazer]

6. That doesn't make it OK, though.

[gateley]

8. Agree. nt

[Kahuna]

17. Yep. And it happens everyday. nt

[loudsue]

18. Maybe isolated incidences, but I agree w/ the previous poster. It's gotten SO much worse

since rightwing radio took over....which is about the time that Ayn Rand became so popular and widespread.

Wingnuts have polluted the waters of humanity to the point that it's palpable everywhere.

[Lorien]

26. It's been going on for eons but it was never ACCEPTABLE, it was always

a bit shocking in the past. Now I suspect that you could post this story on a Yahoo or AOL message board and half the comments would be in support of the criminals. People have gradually been accepting greed and ruthlessness as "virtues". That is new.

[Deja Q]

33. So what have you done to change it?

Or is pawning it off as "Oh, that's always happened therefore it's no big deal" just good enough?

[Enthusiast]

14. We are trying to emulate

the cruelty of Nazi Germany. Seriously. And we are doing well.

[Darth_Kitten]

27. People have been greedy,selfish bastards since the beginning of time....

n/t :(

[Lorien]

30. Sure, but society on the whole didn't accept such behavior as "normal"

and now it's becoming the new "normal"; not only unsurprising, but in many cases accepted.

[marions ghost]

40. I agree--this is becoming accepted because it's so widespread

and often friends and relatives just look the other way as this goes on....

[SmileyRose]

36. Inhumanity is not sweeping this nation.

Consider the fact some kid Roth taught in Sunday school decades ago now a clearly wonderful woman, and that woman's husband has taken Roth under their wing. You'll also notice her neighbors came to the nursing home to see her because they cared about her - they were also concerned about what was happening in her house while she was sick. Looks to me like a lot of good people were not able to stop 2 very horrible people fast enough.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

9. Couldn't wait for her to die, eh?

Even vultures wait until their prey croaks.

Hard to imagine some people are worse than vultures, isn't it? Devouring the dying.

This one deserves serious pokey time, and more than restitution.

But, you know, some possessions, small things, are so valuable to old people. That's ugly, really, really ugly.

No matter how scummy people are, there is always a newer, more disgusting iteration waiting in the wings....................

[stevedeshazer]

11. Right. That's the thing about this that really bugs me.

The only thing they (the 'relatives') cared about was the money. They cashed out everything she had, even her freakin' house.

[exboyfil]

12. What happens when someone goes onto Medicaid is that

they are only able to keep $2,000 in assets. In this particular case obviously the family are vultures and, in addition to violating theft and fraud laws, are also in trouble with DHS if the woman was on Medicaid while in assisted care.

Prepaying for funeral expenses is a reasonable approach allowed for under the Medicaid laws. Two years ago I became responsible for my grandmother and her finances. She went from a family members care to a nursing home. At the time she had approximateily $10,000 in a bank account. I funded funeral expenses at about $6,000, repaid a relative for the transport costs related to bringing my grandmother to my location along with drugs purchased for my grandmother $2,000, and retained the other $2,000 in a bank account for her.

The alternative would have been Medicaid getting the $8,000, and no money would be available to deal with my grandmother's funeral expenses.

The whole experience has softened my feelings regarding universal health care and welfare. Without Medicaid I don't know where the money to take care of my grandmother would come from. She is a two person operation for going to the bathroom now, has a huge number of different drugs which she takes (I could never figure them out), has a special diet, and has medical issues which come up all the time. Between the home, the drugs, and doctors the state/federal government pays over $120,000/yr for her care. She gets about $15,000/yr in pension/Social Security benefits and all but $50/mo goes to pay for the nursing home care and her Medicare insurance. When you extrapolate the experiences of my grandmother across society as a whole, you see we have a major problem. If the responsibility gets pushed onto the family (me for example), it would mean that my family would slide from middle class to outright poverty.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

28. But there's no indication

that she was on Medicaid.

So, theft is theft, and heartbreak is heartbreak.

That transfer would not have been permitted under Medicaid rules, that's right.

I don't understand the point of your post, unless you just wanted to pontificate about Medicaid, which is fine.............

[hedgehog]

31. Your story is an excellent example of why we need to expand Medicare to cover

extended care in a nursing home if needed. most people prefer to be at home, but sometimes it just can't be done, even with respite aid.

I can see using income such as social security to pay for part of the care. Some money should be left for clothes and small purchases, maybe trips to the park or whatever
I can't see stripping away a lifetime of assets.

[bettyellen]

21. did you know that the Zoroastrian community in India is looking into a breeding program for vultures

since they are close to extinction there- they can't leave the bodies out on towers to be devoured, as was their tradition. apparently, it used to take just a day for the vututures to dispose of the bodies.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

29. The Towers of Death,

or Towers of Blood, as they were called. I first saw them in Pakistan, back in the sixties. Jesus, the smell, and how the sky was black with birds as we approached. My hosts didn't tell me where we were until we got there.

It was one of the freakiest experiences of my young life.

But, you must admit, remarkably ecologically sound. The ultimate recycling.............................

[bettyellen]

34. back then the vultures could polish you off in a day! but alas, the vultures are now few...

in India, they were called towers of silence. a bit more poetic.

[quiet.american]

22. That's some toon. :) nt

[SoCalDem]

13. This is a reminder to choose carefully, the people you give power of attorney to.

The sad part is that at her age, they would not have had to "wait" all that long.

I wonder if she had a will that they "disposed" of too:(

[Lerkfish]

15. reminds me of when my grammie died, her stepkids, who never visited her

had her locks changed (illegally, I might add, since there was no will). My sister, who had been caring for her in her home for two years before she passed, came back from the hospital (not even the funeral, the HOSPITAL hours after she passed) to find all the locks changed. My grammie always said she didn't believe in banks, so the stepkids tore the old house apart, thinking she had hidden treasure somewhere in the house.
Little did they know she DID believe in banks (and we didn't know this) had set up accounts in our names, so there was no money in the house, the house wasn't worth anything, and the stepkids families (who were downright cruel to her in her life after her husband died). Got nothing, not even the house they tore up,


Death brings out the worst side of the worst side of every family.

[Liberal_in_LA]

20. glad the stepkids didn't profit from their greed

[Kahuna]

16. That almost happened to my father. His "favorite" brother who was

the executor of his estate took a fake living will to the hospital so that they could take him off a respirator. In the meantime, him and my father's young girlfriend cleaned out his safe deposit box, holding THOUSANDS of dollars. The thing is, while the hospital and my father's brother thought my father had a stroke or a heart attack, me and my sister knew that he had simply overdosed his oxygen and would soon come out of it on his own. Which he did. We kept 24 hour guard on him to protect him from the hospital and the brother. LOL! You should have seen the look on everybody's face when after three days, my father sat up, perfectly normal, perfectly charming and back to flirting with the nurses. The brother and girlfriend put back some of the money, but they didn't put it all back. This also goes to show you how clueless doctors can be. Think about THAT! They really did believe my father had a stroke.

[Liberal_in_LA]

19. Years ago there was news story about a man who recovered and returned to an empty house

His daughters had divided up his possessions. Only thing left in the house was his piano which had a yellow sticky attached claiming it for one of the daughters. A neighbor loaned the man a bed to sleep in.

The guy wasn't that old from what I remember...maybe in his 50s or 60s. He had an illness that wasn't THAT life threatening. The daughters didn't have power of attorney. He wasn't dead. but while he was in the hospital they cleaned him out. At the time of the news story, the daughters hadn't contacted him... too embarrassed probably.

Vultures!

[Odin2005]

23. My got, I don't understand how people could be so cruel.

:cry:

[Raine]

25. My mother's sister and her family did that

when my grandmother died. They cleaned out everything, my mother didn't even get a picture or anything from her own childhood.

[hedgehog]

32. It's amazing how often that happened. Years ago my grandmother

helped a friend with drives to the store etc and helped her when she became ill. The woman's only daughter was a catholic sister. When the funeral was over, the sister asked my grandmother to come back to the house so she could give her a memento. When they got there, a cousin was busy stripping the place because of course, since Sister had taken a vow of poverty, she wouldn't want anything from the house!

[SmileyRose]

37. My parents learned the hard way and have already done what needs to be done

My parents both suffered a horrible fight with siblings when it came time for the last of the parent to die. On my fathers side, his freeloading brothers wife pretty much cleaned out the house and when busted told everyone it was one of the grown grandchildren who happened to have a house key. The really painful part was that the rest of the family believed her and it caused incredible additional paid to the poor grandson and his family.

On Mom's side there was a fist fight at the funeral between a brother and a sister's husband. The sister was grandma's favorite who could do no wrong and the other 5 were miserable failures in grandma's eyes (It pains me to say it, but my grandma was an evil fucking bitch who turned my mother into an evil fucking bitch).


My father passed away in 2005 after a very long illness, which he knew would be fatal. As soon as he got the diagnosis he started making sure each of us kids and each of his grandkids got whatever small inheritance he could give. -- Grandpa's pocket knife - grandma's iron skillet - his class ring. Dad sat while he was sick and made picture books for each of us, wrote us all letters filled with his remembrances of loving times. Fuck cancer - but at the same time I'm glad we had a warning. To many do not.

This is a long post - if you've read this far - I don't care if you are 20 or 90. You do not know what tomorrow brings. If you have kids, make sure if you disappeared tomorrow they would have something of you - they will need it.

[tsuki]

35. I wish I could be on that jury. nt

[Skittles]

39. when my single brother passed away

the lawyer for his estate said my family was the ONLY family he'd ever dealt with that did not bicker at all about the distribution of his stuff - the sad thing was he found our civility AMAZING