hey there i'm a state planning attorney
paul ramilah and in this video we're
going to talk about how someone
misuses or abuses the power they have
under a power of attorney
so we've seen it often an example where
let's say mom signed a power of attorney
and mom
who created the power of attorney is
called the principle
and let's say in our circumstance mom
granted power of attorney to
daughter
daughter is what's called the agent
and that power of attorney abuse takes
place when someone who has been given
the power of attorney the agent takes an
action that is not in the best interest
of the person who gave the power of
attorney called the principal
so the agent under a power of attorney
does have a legal duty to act in the
best interest of the principal sometimes
people ask me paul if
if i give my
son power of attorney that means he can
just go to the bank and take all of my
money and do whatever he wants to with
it because i gave him power attorney
well no it doesn't mean he has the right
to do that he has an obligation to take
actions
that are in your best interest so the
agent that you designate
on a power of attorney should be
trustworthy
and perhaps should act consistently with
the decisions that you had made for
yourself
before you became incapacitated because
that's when these powers of attorney are
typically used and abused it's when that
principle the person who created the
power of attorney can no longer act for
themselves so i want to go through
some of the actions that we've seen and
then perhaps in the comments below you
can tell me some circumstances where you
may have seen someone abuse their power
under a power of attorney so one mistake
some agents make
misusing their power under a power of
attorney is they fail to keep the
records and account for all of the money
and property that they are handling
sometimes that's an honest mistake but
it really is important that the agent
keep good records and in case they're
questioned in the future about how
they handle the money for the principal
but as we start getting into you know
misuse and abuse we start talking about
you know self-dealing for example let's
say
mom had a car and mom's now
incapacitated she no longer drives
anymore so it makes sense for mom to
sell her car
so
mom has a 50 000 mercedes benz and you
know what the agent's uh 22 year old
daughter could use a new car
so the agent's daughter buys mom's 50
000
bins used but nonetheless still worth
fifty thousand dollars
agent's daughter buys that car for three
thousand dollars
and so that would be self dealing on
behalf of the agent that's not right
another area where we see some abuse is
is the misappropriation of funds
sometimes we see agents
use the credit cards run up unbelievable
credit card bills
on the principal's credit cards that's
credit card fraud that's not good
so got to be careful for that
sometimes you'll see an agent
treat the principal's bank account
like it's the agent's own bank account
that also a big no-no
sometimes you'll see people making a
state it doesn't fall directly under
power attorney abuse but you'll see
people
uh inappropriately
you know coercing someone into making a
power of attorney daughter says hey mom
look i want to take i'll be happy to
take care of your money let's just go
run down to the lawyer's office and get
a power of attorney signed you can
appoint me as the agent and i'll take
care of all of your money
and mom's like well i don't know if i
want to do that and i don't know if
you're the right person daughter says
come on mom i'll bring you and we'll
make this easy and i'll take you to
lunch after
and so mom signs the power of attorney
you know mom gets dementia and then
daughter's off and running with mom's
money that's not right
sometimes you see just outright theft
with uh someone abusing the authority
that they have under a power of attorney
the principal has a bank account with
250 000 in it
um the principal gives the agent power
of attorney the agent goes to the bank
pulls out 225 000
and puts that into the agent's own bank
account that's outright
theft so got to be careful about that
the concern
about power of attorney abuse is it's
tough to file an action it's tough to
tough to remedy
power of attorney abuse because the
person that is harmed
at the time that abuse is discovered the
person that's harmed is often
incapacitated and so usually the remedy
is for some other person maybe another
child of the principal who's now
incapacitated to initiate a guardianship
or a conservative ship proceeding
to become the legal guardian of the
principle and override actions of that
power of attorney agent and that's a
very
expensive and adversarial proceeding so
um
at best some inappropriate action of a
power of attorney agent at best creates
some serious
sibling conflict
and at worst there it could be a
criminal action with all the uh criminal
you know results that come from that so
have you had if you've seen examples of
power of attorney abuse
you know we've got to keep our eyes open
we got to keep on the lookout if you've
seen some abuse like that just describe
it in the comments below
and it'll tell others what to look for
and it'll keep our you know eyes and
ears open so that
um you know people who are truly trying
to help others can can minimize the
abuse that others are are
doing as a result of being named as an
agent on power of attorney so tough area
tough to remedy
that's why it's so important that people
make the right decisions
they get all of this set up while they
have their good mind they have good
capacity they make good informed
decisions they put the right people in
charge
that can eliminate a lot of these power
of attorney abuses in the future make
sure you like comment subscribe we'll
see you next time i'm paul rabale