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My elderly friend who is 89, lives alone, always pays his bills on time, is very independent, lives in a senior citizen building. His super in the building befriended him and started taking him to do his errands. Now the super for the building has POA. He transfered all my friend's money to himself  to buy a house in Florida and buy car for himself.  Then when all this was done, put him in a nursing home after taking his apartment and doing away with his stuff. My friend is crying, wants to go back to his home and I am trying to help him. They took away his phone. To talk to him, one has to go to the operator, and the person that runs the nursing home is a relative of the super. So she's keeping an eye on him. When he gets a call, she brings the phone to him and sits beside him while he talks. I need to help my friend, pleading for advice.

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Call Adult Protective Services in his area and tell them the story.
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Martinlynforsur Apr 2022
Thanks for you response ,I will do that.
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Each state has an Elder Abuse Hotline number. Find that number and call and report the abuse.
If there is a local Senior Center in your area they probably have a Social Worker that can help as well. The Social Worker would be a "mandated reporter" of any abuse so it would get reported to the proper office for the area you are in.
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Martinlynforsur Apr 2022
Thanks for your correction. I will look to locate a social worker, who is able to help him
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It's POA (Power of Attorney) not POW (Prisoner of War). Although I understand why he feels that way.
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If you know your friend's name and the name of the facility he is in, and the name of the super, then you have enough to report his circumstances to Adult Protective Services for the county where the facility is located.

Please be aware that, at 89 yrs old, it is very possible he actually needs facility care and the information he's giving you *may* not be accurate but a delusion he is suffering due to the onset of dementia. It is a very common occurrence (as you will learn if you read some of the many other posts on this forum). Demented people will accuse their own lifelong beloved spouses of outrageous things, believing these thoughts sincerely, even calling the police on them.

Think about it: how would your friend know what the super did with the money? Why would they tell him? (Delusion?) How would he know that the aid who supposedly sits in on his phone calls is a relative and "runs" the place? (Paranoia?) How did he give you the information you now know? On a phone call? If so, how was he able to tell you with that aid sitting there?

It is probably true that he did assign someone as his PoA who felt they had to act to protect him and going into a faciity was the only option. Or, the super reported him and the county is actually now his legal guardian. There are lots of possibilities. FYI no one wants to be in a nursing home, even ones who aren't "duped" into it. Crying to come home is also an extremely common behavior as seniors make this very difficult transition. If "they" took away his phone maybe it was because he is now on Medicaid and the county guardian has seen that he doesn't have enough funds to pay for a plan (been there, done that with my own relative on Medicaid who became a ward of the county). Or, he was calling 911 for no legitimate reason.

If you know what facility he's in, can you go visit him in person? You might learn a lot in that visit.

That being said -- crimes are also often committed against vulnerable seniors. So if you feel strongly confident that what he's telling you is actually true, you should report his case.
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Martinlynforsur Apr 2022
THanks for your response, I know my friend for over 40 years, all this interaction between him and the super started just as the pandemic was starting, eveytime I called him he was on the road with the super who was taking him places ,I try to tell him he should not be going out because of the Corona virus he would not listen, this was how it started. Next thing he was admitted to the hospital with bowel obstruction almost died , the super sign these documents ,he started to trust him ,they live in the same building. The super did not tell him about buying the house in Florida or the car or transferred money or giving up his apartment it's the other seniors who live in the building , call him and tell him what they know and that's when he got mad, The person who gave him the phone call is not an aid but is a relative of the super one who runs the nursing home,she is the relative to super,he told me to contact his lawyer friend and tell him what happened to him for he needs to back to his home ,he told me he has a friend there she's good to him they make him use the phone when we finish talking before I hang up I ask him where is the friend , he said she is right here beside him,then she started walking away and the workers were calling her I could here them .
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IMO, the POA cannot take all the persons money and then expect to place the person in a NH on Medicaid. Medicaid will ask for back statements and will be able to see the person has been stolen from. A person cannot be put in a NH without fitting certain criteria and with a Doctor signing off. And if he is privately paying, he is not being stolen from.

Yes, you need to contact Adult Protection Services.
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Martinlynforsur Apr 2022
Thanks for responding,when my friend came from the hospital, he could not get home health aid because of his pension and social security was too high, so the super said he and his wife would take care of him objection was made to him about that ,he says my friend does not have money to pay the church where he goes response was we will help with the payments and some could come from the pension and social security, that was not done,the super relative that runs the nursing home was able to get him four hours , the super who has POA refused to pay for the extra 4 hours ,i don't know which of the services was paying those four hours,iwill be going to see him today,all he is saying he did not know the guy could be so wicked and all the paper was sign when he was sick.
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Call APS and report as a Senior at Risk, and give them all of your EVIDENCE of this. They will check on the POA. This should have been as soon as you had evidence of wrong doing. I am uncertain how you got all these reports on what was happening? Was it from the elder involved? Because if he was competent and knew all of this he could have easily taken away the POA.
In any case, call APS in your area.
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Martinlynforsur Apr 2022
Thanks for responding, my friend was doing everything for himself cooking cleaning ,shopping going to church playing the guitar for us doing his banking for himself paying his bill on-time until the pandemic hit 2020 ,this is my friend for about 40 years he was active we talk everyday and he told me the super was taking him to places where he coluld gets free services the next thing I know he was in social security office,he was very happy to be coming out of the house.He was not a threat to himself, he has his own one bedroom apartment which he was quite comfortable, he should have been allowed to stay there ,he said he does not belong in a nursing home ,so he's very upset with the super ,all he saying I should help him to get out of the nursing home all his personal property he said he has no idea what happened to them.
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In a reply below you added more information:

"...when my friend came from the hospital, he could not get home health aid because of his pension and social security was too high, so the super said he and his wife would take care of him objection was made to him about that ,he says my friend does not have money to pay the church where he goes response was we will help with the payments and some could come from the pension and social security, that was not done,the super relative that runs the nursing home was able to get him four hours , the super who has POA refused to pay for the extra 4 hours ,i don't know which of the services was paying those four hours,iwill be going to see him today,all he is saying he did not know the guy could be so wicked and all the paper was sign when he was sick."

What kind of illness or accident did your friend have? So, he assigned a PoA while he was in the hospital?

If you've known him for so long and live close enough to visit him in the facility, then why didn't he contact you when he was in the hospital? Not trying to be contentious, just trying to get an understandable storyline.
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Martinlynforsur, is your friend telling you all of this? Just wondering if your friend has developed memory issues, as I am wondering if what he has been telling you isn't actually happening. "Story telling" is common when it comes to dementia.
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