Source : http://www.rgj.com/article/20091112/NEWS01/91112064/1018/SPORTS/Reno-woman-facing-elder-abuse-and-concealed-weapon-charges-allegedly-found-with-drugs-in-jail-cell
By Jaclyn O'Malley • jomalley@rgj.com • November 12, 2009
A 35-year-old former Washoe County legal guardian jailed last week for bringing an unloaded gun into a Reno court was booked additionally for possessing prescription drugs after deputies found them during a search of her jail cell.
Angela Cheri Dottei was arrested Nov. 3 on suspicion of carrying a concealed weapon into Reno Justice Court. An unloaded firearm was allegedly found in her belongings as she went through the court’s metal detector. Authorities said she had gone to the court for a scheduled hearing. She was arrested on-site and later ordered jailed in lieu of $25,000 cash bail.
Dottei is also under investigation by Reno police for allegedly financially exploiting her elderly wards. A Washoe Family Court investigation revealed she was allegedly stealing money from her wards while in her role as a legal guardian through her company, Assurity Guardian Resources. A judge in September placed sanctions upon her, fined her hundreds of thousands of dollars and suspended her license to work as a guardian.
Wednesday, during a search of her jail cell, deputies found a plastic bag containing multiple types of prescription drugs hidden in hygiene products, said Deputy Brooke Keast. She was booked additionally on two counts of suspicion of possessing a controlled substance by an inmate, which is a felony.
Deputies were still investigating how she possessed the drugs. Keast said that under the law, inmates may not be strip searched unless there is a reasonable suspicion they may have hidden contraband. In this case, she said deputies had no reason to believe she hid anything.
Keast said it’s rare that inmates are found in possession of drugs.
“We always do systematic searches of cells,” she said. “The search is what lead us to finding the drugs. It’s why we do them.”
Reno police fraud detectives say they are investigating Dottei for allegedly exploiting at least three of her elderly wards. No charges have been filed.
Source : http://www.rgj.com/article/20091112/NEWS01/91112064/1018/SPORTS/Reno-woman-facing-elder-abuse-and-concealed-weapon-charges-allegedly-found-with-drugs-in-jail-cell
Showing posts with label confront elder abuse. Show all posts
Showing posts with label confront elder abuse. Show all posts
Friday, November 13, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
California Financial Elder Abuse: The Old and the Wealthy are Prime Targets
June 25, 2009
Posted In: California Financial Elder Abuse
By Steven Peck on June 25, 2009 1:00 AM Permalink
For a little while, at least until the police arrived with an arrest warrant, it must have seemed like the perfect crime.
Authorities charge that investment adviser Jeffrey Southard systematically bilked elderly clients out of $1.8 million in a Ponzi scheme that unraveled when securities regulators began looking into his business. Southard pleaded guilty last week to preying on elderly clients, who turned over their money to him on the promise of guaranteed annual returns of 6 percent to 11 percent.
Instead of enriching his clients, Southard used much of the money to pay his mortgage, private-school tuition, car payments, and other personal expenses.
The story rated a few paragraphs in the newspaper, but the fact is that schemes by investment advisers and other professionals that target elderly clients are proliferating. The reason is, as Willie Sutton put it when asked why he robbed banks, that is where the money is.
People 50 and over are sitting on a vast pile of wealth - 70 percent of the net worth of U.S. households, according to MetLife, the insurance giant. Those assets have been accumulating over several decades of unprecedented economic growth in the United States.
Some elderly are especially vulnerable because they are physically weakened, emotionally vulnerable, or impaired in other ways that might affect their judgment.
That exposure, along with the potential changes in inheritance rules and the sheer magnitude of the over-60 demographic, is helping to fuel a sharp uptick in business for lawyers who are experts in wills and estates and overall wealth management.
This is a rarefied profession in which lawyers dwell in what is to most souls a terra incognita of abstruse tax laws and IRS opinions, the mastery of which can seem more like sorcery than law.
It grows increasingly complex with the size of the estate.
For all the expertise required in complex estate planning, some estate lawyers, especially at some big firms, traditionally played a secondary role. They're known as service partners and are referred work by rainmaker lawyers with important clients who in addition to their commercial transactions may need some help with their bulging portfolios.
Prospective clients should steer clear of independent financial advisers who are not affiliated with a large institution that can make restitution if funds are misappropriated. Make sure that the adviser does not have custody of the funds and thus cannot divert the money for his or her own use. That was the case with Bernie Madoff, and indeed, Jeffrey Southard. In both cases, clients turned over funds directly to their advisers, who in turn used the money for themselves.
Good data are hard to come by, but policymakers, financial institutions, and others with a stake in the issue are making stabs at measuring the problem. In a study released in March, MetLife's Mature Market Institute, a research arm of the insurer, concluded that thefts and other forms of financial exploitation of the elderly amounted to at least $2.6 billion a year. The study found professional advisers, such as lawyers and investment advisers, account for the largest group of offenders at about 18 percent, but they were closely followed by family members pilfering funds and other assets.
Other studies have concluded that family members by far commit most of the financial crimes against the elderly, accounting for 50 percent or more of the cases.
Plenty of such rip-offs are very commonplace, and the wealthy, though often having the benefit of good legal advice and presumably more sophisticated than most, are as vulnerable as anyone.
The Bernie Madoff case made this point amply clear.
A lot of people went to Bernie Madoff; he looked so wealthy and wise. People will trust someone without looking into it. They don't ask, Where is my money going? Wealthy people are not always smarter than people with less wealth.Should you beleive that you or a family member has been the victim of financial elder abuse immediately contact Steven Peck's Premier Legal toll free at 1-866-999-9085 to talk to an experienced California Financial Elder Abuse attorney
http://www.californiaelderlawattorneyblog.com/2009/06/for-a-little-while-at.html
Posted In: California Financial Elder Abuse
By Steven Peck on June 25, 2009 1:00 AM Permalink
For a little while, at least until the police arrived with an arrest warrant, it must have seemed like the perfect crime.
Authorities charge that investment adviser Jeffrey Southard systematically bilked elderly clients out of $1.8 million in a Ponzi scheme that unraveled when securities regulators began looking into his business. Southard pleaded guilty last week to preying on elderly clients, who turned over their money to him on the promise of guaranteed annual returns of 6 percent to 11 percent.
Instead of enriching his clients, Southard used much of the money to pay his mortgage, private-school tuition, car payments, and other personal expenses.
The story rated a few paragraphs in the newspaper, but the fact is that schemes by investment advisers and other professionals that target elderly clients are proliferating. The reason is, as Willie Sutton put it when asked why he robbed banks, that is where the money is.
People 50 and over are sitting on a vast pile of wealth - 70 percent of the net worth of U.S. households, according to MetLife, the insurance giant. Those assets have been accumulating over several decades of unprecedented economic growth in the United States.
Some elderly are especially vulnerable because they are physically weakened, emotionally vulnerable, or impaired in other ways that might affect their judgment.
That exposure, along with the potential changes in inheritance rules and the sheer magnitude of the over-60 demographic, is helping to fuel a sharp uptick in business for lawyers who are experts in wills and estates and overall wealth management.
This is a rarefied profession in which lawyers dwell in what is to most souls a terra incognita of abstruse tax laws and IRS opinions, the mastery of which can seem more like sorcery than law.
It grows increasingly complex with the size of the estate.
For all the expertise required in complex estate planning, some estate lawyers, especially at some big firms, traditionally played a secondary role. They're known as service partners and are referred work by rainmaker lawyers with important clients who in addition to their commercial transactions may need some help with their bulging portfolios.
Prospective clients should steer clear of independent financial advisers who are not affiliated with a large institution that can make restitution if funds are misappropriated. Make sure that the adviser does not have custody of the funds and thus cannot divert the money for his or her own use. That was the case with Bernie Madoff, and indeed, Jeffrey Southard. In both cases, clients turned over funds directly to their advisers, who in turn used the money for themselves.
Good data are hard to come by, but policymakers, financial institutions, and others with a stake in the issue are making stabs at measuring the problem. In a study released in March, MetLife's Mature Market Institute, a research arm of the insurer, concluded that thefts and other forms of financial exploitation of the elderly amounted to at least $2.6 billion a year. The study found professional advisers, such as lawyers and investment advisers, account for the largest group of offenders at about 18 percent, but they were closely followed by family members pilfering funds and other assets.
Other studies have concluded that family members by far commit most of the financial crimes against the elderly, accounting for 50 percent or more of the cases.
Plenty of such rip-offs are very commonplace, and the wealthy, though often having the benefit of good legal advice and presumably more sophisticated than most, are as vulnerable as anyone.
The Bernie Madoff case made this point amply clear.
A lot of people went to Bernie Madoff; he looked so wealthy and wise. People will trust someone without looking into it. They don't ask, Where is my money going? Wealthy people are not always smarter than people with less wealth.Should you beleive that you or a family member has been the victim of financial elder abuse immediately contact Steven Peck's Premier Legal toll free at 1-866-999-9085 to talk to an experienced California Financial Elder Abuse attorney
http://www.californiaelderlawattorneyblog.com/2009/06/for-a-little-while-at.html
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
The shame of elder abuse
Agencies report rates of neglect, mistreatment are on the rise Agencies report rates of neglect, mistreatment are on the rise
By Rita Savard, rsavard@lowellsun.com
Updated: 06/09/2009 08:22:50 AM EDT
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San Ou, who escaped the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, has allegedly been a victim of elder abuse in Lowell from her own stepson. She is holding an old photograph of her mother and father. SUN/David H. Brow
Related
ABUSE
Jun 9:
Detecting Signs of abuse
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LOWELL -- Sitting in her warm, dark living room, the woman thumbs through old photographs.
It's a long way from Lowell to Cambodia. When she stops at a black-and-white picture of her parents, San Ou seems to feel the distance.
A wisp of a thing at 5 feet, 100 pounds, it's hard to imagine Ou hovering on the knife's edge between life and death more than once -- and surviving. But the nightmares she has lived through have taught her something no one can take away from her.
"Life is a gift," she says.
After surviving genocide in her native Cambodia, Ou, 64, eventually settled in Lowell, where she again became a victim of abuse. This time, it was at the hands of a family member.
Last month, elder-abuse reports ...
(continue reading here) http://www.lowellsun.com/ci_12551611
www.elderrightsadvocates.com
Make a difference - email stopguardianshipabuse@gmail.com
By Rita Savard, rsavard@lowellsun.com
Updated: 06/09/2009 08:22:50 AM EDT
var requestedWidth = 0;
if(requestedWidth
San Ou, who escaped the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, has allegedly been a victim of elder abuse in Lowell from her own stepson. She is holding an old photograph of her mother and father. SUN/David H. Brow
Related
ABUSE
Jun 9:
Detecting Signs of abuse
if(requestedWidth
if(requestedWidth > 0){
document.getElementById('articleViewerGroup').style.width = requestedWidth + "px";
document.getElementById('articleViewerGroup').style.margin = "0px 0px 10px 10px";
}
LOWELL -- Sitting in her warm, dark living room, the woman thumbs through old photographs.
It's a long way from Lowell to Cambodia. When she stops at a black-and-white picture of her parents, San Ou seems to feel the distance.
A wisp of a thing at 5 feet, 100 pounds, it's hard to imagine Ou hovering on the knife's edge between life and death more than once -- and surviving. But the nightmares she has lived through have taught her something no one can take away from her.
"Life is a gift," she says.
After surviving genocide in her native Cambodia, Ou, 64, eventually settled in Lowell, where she again became a victim of abuse. This time, it was at the hands of a family member.
Last month, elder-abuse reports ...
(continue reading here) http://www.lowellsun.com/ci_12551611
www.elderrightsadvocates.com
Make a difference - email stopguardianshipabuse@gmail.com
Monday, June 8, 2009
Confronting Elder Abuse
Elder Abuse is a very serious crime and is recognized and punished as a third degree FELONY in Texas. A Felony is considered to be a crime of a grave and atrocious nature and is an offense punishable by death or imprisonment in the state penitentiary of Texas.
Even though my sister and I worked diligently to help our dad and our mom live out the lives which God intended, we never suspected that an abusing caregiver was working even more diligently to end our parent's lives. We were naive and trusting, believing that someone with the job of "caregiver" actually cared about her patients. We hope that by relating our experience, by telling others what we have learned, we may save some other parent, some other loved one from fear, abuse and an early death.
My sister and I believe that our dad was one of the greatest individuals of his generation. We will always love our wonderful father, and we will never forget that our dad died before his time.
(continue reading) http://www.iannarino.us/elderabuse.php
Even though my sister and I worked diligently to help our dad and our mom live out the lives which God intended, we never suspected that an abusing caregiver was working even more diligently to end our parent's lives. We were naive and trusting, believing that someone with the job of "caregiver" actually cared about her patients. We hope that by relating our experience, by telling others what we have learned, we may save some other parent, some other loved one from fear, abuse and an early death.
My sister and I believe that our dad was one of the greatest individuals of his generation. We will always love our wonderful father, and we will never forget that our dad died before his time.
(continue reading) http://www.iannarino.us/elderabuse.php
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