Recovering Stolen Assets: Keystone Helps Retrieve Millions From a Decedent’s Financial Abusers

It is an unfortunate reality that persons – especially elderly persons and dependent adults suffering from mental illness – who are incapacitated and/or socially isolated are more susceptible to financial exploitation through undue influence and fraud than people who are fully competent. Our probate attorneys routinely handle cases in which financial abuse perpetrated against an elderly and/or mentally incapacitated person has led the elderly and/or incapacitated person to surrender some or all of their assets to their abusers or drastically alter their estate plans to favor them. Down the road, the latter scenario can lead to their surviving loved ones having to bring a will or trust contest to try to have the document invalidated.  

In the case of our client’s brother, it may have been his loneliness and depression that led him to befriend strangers who did not have his best interests at heart and overlook their numerous acts of financial abuse. It is, of course, ideal when the victim of financial abuse or one of their loved ones notices the abuse and litigates it while the victim is alive, but too often, financial abuse remains undetected until after the victim’s death, as it did in this case.  

Following the death of a financial abuse victim, their executor/administrator, trustee or loved ones can litigate on behalf of their estate or trust to try to retrieve the assets that were lost to the abuse.  

“Regardless of whether financial abuse is detected before or after a victim’s death, it is crucial swift legal action be taken to prevent further financial harm from being perpetrated,” says Roee Kaufman, a senior associate at Keystone. “As a result of the client contacting us as soon as she suspected financial abuse, we were able to get to work investigating the case and stop any additional financial abuse from taking place.”   

The decedent in this case had been a successful and well-known doctor practicing in an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood for upward of 30 years. After sustaining an injury, he had become physically disabled, which rendered him unable to perform at work and derailed his medical practice. During this time, his bipolar disorder – characterized by mood swings, manic episodes, erratic behavior and depression – was also becoming more pronounced. He was declining physically and mentally, losing the capacity to manage his personal and financial affairs.  

Enter a couple of strangers acting as “caregivers.” Encountering a man who was alone and had hit rock bottom suffering from serious mental illness, they saw an opportunity to financially profit from his compromised physical and mental state.

During this time, the decedent had been arrested and jailed on multiple occasions as a result of manic episodes that affected his ability to think clearly. At one point, he was even placed on an involuntary psychiatric hold. For these reasons, the client believed her brother had been particularly vulnerable to undue influence and fraud at the hands of his so-called caregivers.  

After being authorized to act as the decedent’s agent through a power of attorney, the abusers systematically began siphoning money totaling millions of dollars from the decedent’s accounts.

Eventually, the decedent suffered a sharp decline in his physical and mental health as a result of an illicit psychedelic substance that was provided to him at the direction of his pseudo-caregivers. At this point, he evicted the duo from his home. They, however, were not yet done with their criminal activities, as one of the caregivers transferred millions from the decedent’s brokerage account to his personal account. Soon after, the decedent passed. 

The caregivers ended up moving back into the decedent’s home, which they claimed had been “gifted” to them by the decedent during his lifetime. They also ransacked the home, taking several valuable items of personal property from it, and withdrew even more money from his bank accounts. And to hide their misdeeds from the decedent’s family, they cleared the home of financial documents.

While nothing could possibly make up for the financial abuse and untimely death of our client’s brother, this resounding victory did undoubtedly provide some relief to our client, who could rest assured the abusers didn’t get away with the financial exploitation they committed against her brother when he was at his most vulnerable.  

One can hope that in the process, since the perpetrators were forced to pay such a hefty sum in damages and continue to have a $1 million judgment on their records, Keystone’s work might stop the perpetrators from committing financial abuse against another vulnerable person in the future. 

While the abusers still have not satisfied the $1 million judgment against them, they have been arrested and are awaiting trial in federal court for multiple charges, including wire fraud, aggravated identity theft and conspiracy to engage in money laundering, among others. If they are convicted on all the charges, they face decades in prison.