MISPLACED TRUST

BY

© Mae Charles

CHAPTER 1 NO NOT IN MY FAMILY

The very first thought that will come to mind when you read this book is, "No! Not in MY family! It would NEVER happen to us! Well, the sad truth is that everything changes when there is money at stake, whether it be a small or a large amount. Families that ate breakfast every day for twenty years, celebrated Christmas and Easter together, went on vacations/holiday every year, and then...suddenly, stop speaking to each other. They begin to accuse one another of all sorts of despicable things. Sounds crazy, right? Well, read on and see what I have seen for the last ten years....see what REALLY happens in REAL life.

Let’s start at the beginning and look at your situation. When you first decided to create a Trust to protect your loved ones, did you ask your family for their opinion?  If you did, were they all in agreement with your choices as to who was to be left in charge, who would make crucial decisions, and, most importantly, WHO WOULD CONTROL YOUR MONEY? If you did, I’ll bet there was at least some minor bickering, maybe even some harder feelings, right? It is rare that everyone is in complete agreement, even in preparation.

So, after all was said and done, you went ahead with your Trust and if you are like most people, you are still sticking by that old, No! Not in MY family will there be a problem, denying the greed, betrayal, and misplaced trust that I have seen every day that I’ve worked in the legal industry.

Unfortunately, the sad truth is that once you are no longer here, and you are not the one controlling the family, things have a way of happening that you would not think possible....everything just seems to go awry.  Yes, I know. As you read these words, you’re still thinking, This is ridiculous!.  No matter what this Woman is saying, not one member of my family would even begin to behave unfairly towards any of the others....not in MY family! 

To start off, I’ll mention what is considered a small family - only two heirs; perhaps brother and sister.

In the first case the parents had two adult children - the Daughter, a responsible person...the Son, a drug lover.  The responsible Daughter was put in charge.  The parents didn’t want to hurt the other child, or leave him out of their Trust even though he couldn’t stop using drugs. In addition, he was a thief, a liar, and could be extremely cruel as is typical of many addicts.

However, the parents DID insert a stipulation in their Trust stating that Mr. Druggie could not have any money from the estate unless he was completely sober.  Sadly, there are numerous ways around this.  He can bring a sample to a lab, which of course, wouldn’t be his.  He can become friendly with a person in the lab and the results can be to his choosing. There are many other ways around the parent’s stipulation.

To attempt to prevent such a dodge, the responsible daughter was told to drive her brother to a lab where he would be forced to give his specimen in real time.  This was an excellent decision, HOWEVER, Mr. Druggie figured out the cycle of when he would be brought for the test, and managed to stay clean for just long enough to pass the test, and then it was back to the needle!

After a while, and unfortunately, the junky son and some of his stupid druggie junky associates actually obtained a copy of the Trust and, after reading it, decided that Junkie son should be given all of his inheritance money right then, regardless of the parents’ wishes that he had to remain clean for several years.  So, Druggie son and Friends began to harass the good Sister as well as the Law Office which was administering the Trust. 

Although two attorneys and one paralegal explained the facts to Mr. Druggie on at least (no exaggeration!) six occasions, Druggie son continued to harass his sister. Eventually, his sister had to change her phone number.

So, Mr. Druggie started driving by her home, leaving notes on her door demanding money, and generally making Sis’s life miserable.

It became so bad that after years of harassment, Sis, in order to escape from brother junkie and his gang, was forced to sell her home AND their parents home AND move to a new city to finally escape Mr. Junkie.

So, when you decide who should be in charge of things after you have joined your ancestors, THINK particularly about ALL of your children, and then consider how they really will behave when you are gone.

One of the worst things you can do to the good child, or the good children, is to put them in charge of money for the bad child or the bad children, especially if they are addicted to drugs OR alcohol OR gambling, OR even if they are on government assistance because they are lazy and refuse to work. That would really be unfair to the good kids because the bad kids will harass anybody in charge of the money, PLUS they will harass and annoy the law firm trying to close out the estate.

Eventually, the bad kids may even commit crimes such as forging checks or stealing valuable items. They will do whatever it will take to get the money they want/need to get whatever it is they need/want.

In many of the cases in our files, we referred to the troublesome sibling as the evil sister or evil brother. 

The second case is about a family, again with an adult sister and brother.  The brother is the responsible child this time.  Their parents were killed when the children were young and they were raised by their Grandmother.

The Grandmother was a lovely woman, but she was older when her child was killed in a tragic automobile accident.  Grandma really tried to do a good job, but the granddaughter was wild - she started drinking and sleeping around at a very young age.  By the time she was sixteen, granddaughter was pregnant with her first child. Rather than allow Grandmother to help, granddaughter ran away to the southern part of the United States where she eventually bore two more children by two other men.  She loved alcohol and men, in that order.

The Grandson stayed with his Grandmother and was the decent, responsible one of the two children.   He went to college nights, and earned a Bachelor’s degree.  He worked hard and as the Grandmother’s health deteriorated due to age he took care of her in between working about 50 hours a week.  He kept the home clean, and when Grams needed additional money for her medical expenses and asked Grandson to help her by refinancing her home, without hesitation he agreed. After all, he actually had been making the mortgage payments since he was sixteen. He made small contributions when working part time. Then, when he worked more hours and his income increased, he made the full mortgage payments.

Grams could have taken out a reverse mortgage, but she didn’t want to because she knew that when she passed on, her Grandson would have to sell the home within one year to pay off the loan. The smart and loving move was for her to refinance with him, and then put him on the deed.  At the time, between her social security, her late husband’s pension, and Grandson’s salary, it was fairly easy going and it solved her cash flow problems.

Sadly, once she died, the greed of her family reared its ugly head.  The alcoholic sister flew out from Georgia with her children and moved into the peaceful, clean home.  The Grandson, who had been named as Successor Trustee, had just lost the only Parent he ever really knew, and now he had to contend with these new problems.

He continued to work, but when he would come home at night, his drunken sister would have other drunks in the home who were also taking drugs.  It was more than he could bear emotionally.

Then, when the drunken sister discovered that she was also an heir/beneficiary of the Trust, the Grandson’s life took on a new dimension. He started coming home from work to parties with strangers that his sister had brought into his home. His first task was to rid himself of his sister and her drunken friends.  This didn’t take much.  He refinanced the property, and paid her off.  She had money and left.

The next relative to enter the mess is the Grandson’s aunt (the sister of his Mother). She was another matter entirely, and a bad one at that! She was furious when she discovered that her Mother had given half the home to her nephew and, in addition, that she would only receive a part of the money which came from the bad sister’s share, but none of the good Grandson’s share! She harassed the nephew by calling constantly she harassed the law firm with rude, nasty phone calls and letters, she made wild accusations against everybody; she then refused, when the Grandson offered her, his evil aunt, a fair price to buy her out, to accept the deal. She was entitled to thirty percent after expenses, but she wanted fifty percent before the Grandson had paid all expenses. 

I don’t know where these greedy, lazy, uncaring people get the strength and energy to fight and cause trouble. Maybe it is because they never lifted a finger to help out when the Grandmother was alive? I mean, where was this evil person when her very own Mother needed care?  Where was her wallet when the woman who gave her life needed money for medical expenses?  And finally, where was her check book for the mortgage each and every month for all those many, many years? I see these same scenes over and over in about 30% of the cases that come across my desk. And they are from family members whose Parents had said to me, Never with MY children! Never in MY family! 

CHAPTER 2DRUGS ARE NO ONE’S FRIEND

Here’s a third example of a grandmother with an estate plan choosing her grandson as Successor Trustee.  She had three sons, all of whom were on drugs.  She kept an immaculate home which was heavily liened by bail bondsman due to the numerous arrests of her sons.  Every time one of them needed to be bailed out of jail, they convinced her (their Mom), they would pay her back if she would lend her credit to bail them.  Of course, they never did because they immediately began snorting or injecting or smoking drugs again. The sad part was she had a Grandson who was wonderful to her and she didn’t allow a monetary provision for him in her Trust.

As soon as Grandmother passed away, the nightmare began.  Her Grandson called the law office handling the estate in an attempt to obtain funds from the estate so he could hold a nice funeral service and she could have a proper burial.  Initially, one of the druggies was named as first Successor Trustee.  He refused to cooperate, and as a result of this contemptible behavior, that druggie’s very own Mother was on ice at the funeral home for three months.

All three sons tried every way they could to grab money from their deceased Mother’s bank accounts, all of them too selfish to care that their dear mother had died. They needed to steal as much as possible to keep the drugs running through their veins. To make matters worse, if that is possible, one of the brothers was a police informant.  Not only did he steal to feed his drug habit, he would also then snitch on his brothers to the police so that the police, knowing the other two brothers had drugs AND cash in their possession, would arrest them. Can you imagine the twenty-five year old Grandson dealing with this disgusting turn of events?

Well, it gets even better (or, I should say, "It gets even worse!)! After all these nefarious events were occurring, the Grandson finally convinced the first Successor Trustee to sign off so he could bury his beloved Grandmother. The Grandson had to get that money as soon as possible because the three druggies were cleaning out their Mom’s home and selling off her prized furnishings, her personal items (clothing, jewelry, antiques, ANYTHING!) to buy more drugs.  In addition, because they kept running into little stashes of cash which Grandmother had kept around for emergencies, the home turned into a druggie’s party paradise which was