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Report to the Chairman, Special Committee on Aging, U.S. Senate: 

United States Government Accountability Office: GAO: 

September 2010: 

Guardianships: 

Cases of Financial Exploitation, Neglect, and Abuse of Seniors: 

GAO-10-1046: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-10-1046, a report to the Chairman, Special Committee 
on Aging, U.S. Senate. 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

As individuals age, some become incapable of managing their personal 
and financial affairs. To protect these individuals, state laws 
provide for court appointment of guardians, who may be professionals 
or family members, to protect the incapacitated person’s personal 
and/or financial welfare. State and local courts are responsible for 
overseeing guardians. In addition, federal agencies may appoint a 
representative payee, in some cases, the guardian, to manage federal 
benefits on behalf of incapacitated adults. Previous GAO reports have 
found that poor communication between state courts and federal 
agencies may allow guardians to continue abusing their victims. 

GAO was asked to (1) verify whether allegations of abuse by guardians 
are widespread; (2) examine the facts in selected closed cases; and 
(3) proactively test state guardian certification processes. To verify 
whether allegations are widespread, GAO interviewed advocates for 
seniors and reviewed court documents. To examine closed criminal, 
civil or administrative cases with a finding of guilt or liability in 
the past 15 years, GAO reviewed court records, interviewed court 
officials, attorneys and victims, and reviewed records from federal 
agencies. To test state guardian certification, GAO used fictitious 
identities to apply for certification in four states. GAO’s results 
cannot be projected to the overall population of guardians or state 
certification programs. 

What GAO Found: 

GAO could not determine whether allegations of abuse by guardians are 
widespread; however, GAO identified hundreds of allegations of 
physical abuse, neglect and financial exploitation by guardians in 45 
states and the District of Columbia between 1990 and 2010. In 20 
selected closed cases, GAO found that guardians stole or otherwise 
improperly obtained $5.4 million in assets from 158 incapacitated 
victims, many of whom were seniors. In some instances, guardians also 
physically neglected and abused their victims. The guardians in these 
cases came from diverse professional backgrounds and were overseen by 
local courts in 15 states and the District of Columbia. GAO found 
several common themes. In 6 of 20 cases, the courts failed to 
adequately screen potential guardians, appointing individuals with 
criminal convictions or significant financial problems to manage high-
dollar estates. In 12 of 20 cases, the courts failed to oversee 
guardians once they were appointed, allowing the abuse of vulnerable 
seniors and their assets to continue. Lastly, in 11 of 20 cases, 
courts and federal agencies did not communicate effectively or at all 
with each other about abusive guardians, allowing the guardian to 
continue the abuse of the victim and/or others. The table below 
provides examples of guardianship abuse cases. 

Table: Examples of Cases of Abuse by Guardians: 

Victim: 87 year old man with Alzheimer’s disease; 
Guardian/state: Former taxi cab driver/Missouri; 
Case details: 
* Guardian embezzled more than $640,000, which included the purchase 
of a Hummer and checks written to exotic dancers.
* County workers found the victim living in the guardian’s filthy 
basement wearing an old knit shirt and a diaper.
* Guardian was sentenced to 8 years in prison and ordered to pay 
$640,000 in restitution. 

Victim: At least 78 victims
Guardian/state: Private agency/Alaska; 
Case details: 
* Agency management stole at least $454,000 over 4 years.
* Executive director used wards’ funds to pay for his credit card 
bills, medical expenses, mortgage payments, and camp for his children.
* Victims received partial repayment, but no criminal charges were 
filed. 

Victim: 20 victims of various ages with mental incapacities 
Guardian/state: Licensed social worker, registered nurse/Kansas; 
Case details: 
* Guardian and his wife sexually and physically abused residents of 
their unlicensed group home and billed Medicare for this “therapy.”
* Residents lived in a house described by the prosecutor as “dirty and 
bug-infested” and were videotaped engaged in forced sexual activities.
* Guardian sentenced to 30 years in prison; wife sentenced to 15 years. 

Source: GAO summary of closed cases of abuse, neglect and financial 
exploitation by guardians. 

[End of table] 

Using two fictitious identities—one with bad credit and one with the 
Social Security number of a deceased person—GAO obtained guardianship 
certification or met certification requirements in the four states 
where we applied: Illinois, Nevada, New York, and North Carolina. 
Though certification is intended to provide assurance that guardians 
are qualified to fulfill their role, none of the courts or 
certification organizations utilized by these states checked the 
credit history or validated the Social Security number of the 
fictitious applicants. An individual who is financially overextended 
is at a higher risk of engaging in illegal acts to generate funds. In 
addition, people with criminal convictions could easily conceal their 
pasts by stealing a deceased person’s identity. The tests raise 
questions about the effectiveness of these four state certification 
programs. 

View [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-1046] or key 
components. For more information, contact Gregory D. Kutz at (202) 512-
6722 or kutzg@gao.gov. 

[End of section] 

Contents: 

Letter: 

Background: 

Allegations of Abuse, Neglect, and Financial Exploitation by Guardians: 

Cases of Abuse, Neglect, and Financial Exploitation by Guardians: 

Undercover Tests Reveal That Four States Offering Certification Failed 
to Adequately Screen Potential Guardians: 

Appendix I: Scope and Methodology: 

Appendix II: Summary of State Laws Related to Guardianships: 

Appendix III: Additional Cases of Abuse, Neglect, and Financial 
Exploitation by Guardians: 

Appendix IV: Summary of State Certification Requirements: 

Tables: 

Table 1: Summary of the 10 Cases in Which Guardians Abused, Neglected, 
or Financially Exploited Their Victims: 

Table 2: Results of Undercover Tests of State Certification Processes: 

Table 3: Additional Cases of Abuse, Neglect and Financial Exploitation 
by Guardians: 

Table 4: Summary of State Certification Requirements: 

Figure: 

Figure 1: Bathroom Used By Guardianship Abuse Victim: 

[End of section] 

United States Government Accountability Office: 

Washington, DC 20548: 

September 30, 2010: 

The Honorable Herb Kohl: 
Chairman: 
Special Committee on Aging: 
United States Senate: 

Dear Mr. Chairman: 

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by the year 2025, the number of 
Americans aged 65 and older will increase by 60 percent.[Footnote 1] 
As citizens age, they may become physically or mentally incapable of 
making or communicating important decisions for themselves, such as 
those required to handle finances or secure their possessions. 
Compared to the general population, adults over the age of 65 are more 
likely to live alone than those of younger ages.[Footnote 2] Given 
these statistics, it is important to ensure that systems designed to 
protect seniors[Footnote 3] from abuse and neglect function properly. 

Courts may appoint a family member, a professional guardian, a 
nonprofit social service agency, or a local or state agency[Footnote 
4], to care for an incapacitated person.[Footnote 5] While many 
guardians[Footnote 6] serve the best interests of the incapacitated 
people they are appointed to protect, others have taken advantage of 
these vulnerable individuals, according to our previous reports. 
[Footnote 7] Given our prior findings of guardianship abuse, you asked 
us to (1) verify whether allegations of abuse, neglect, or 
exploitation by guardians are widespread; (2) examine the facts and 
circumstances surrounding selected cases of abuse by guardians, 
including whether inadequate communication between courts and federal 
agencies placed these victims at further risk; and (3) proactively 
test selected state guardian certification processes. 

To verify whether allegations of guardian abuse, neglect, or 
exploitation are widespread, we interviewed state investigators, 
attorneys, advocates for seniors, and family groups nationwide. We 
also reviewed federal and state court documents. The abuse alleged by 
these sources occurred in 45 states plus the District of Columbia; 
however, this should not be taken to mean that alleged abuse by 
guardians is limited to these states. Allegations should not be 
considered proof of abuse. To select our case studies, we searched for 
instances of guardianship abuse in which there was a criminal 
conviction or finding of civil or administrative liability in the last 
15 years, although in some cases the abuse began much earlier. As part 
of the selection process, we focused on cases involving professional 
guardians, guardianship agencies caring for multiple incapacitated 
people or cases of abuse by family members or other individuals 
involving significant financial loss by the victim. In addition, we 
considered factors such as geographic location, number of victims 
affected and whether the financial abuse involved federal funds. 
Ultimately, we selected 20 cases from 15 different states and the 
District of Columbia for further review. To determine whether these 
guardians continued to receive federal benefits on behalf of their 
victims or others after the abuse was discovered, we analyzed 
databases and case files from the Social Security Administration 
(SSA), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and the Office of 
Personnel Management (OPM).[Footnote 8] We did not examine whether 
state laws and regulations have changed since the abuse in our closed 
case studies occurred. To test the guardianship certification process, 
we posed as prospective professional guardians and made calls to state 
agencies and nonprofits to determine certification requirements. From 
the 13 states with certification programs, we selected 4 states that 
did not require fingerprint background checks or time-intensive 
training courses.[Footnote 9] Investigators created two fictitious 
identities and completed certification requirements in these states. 
We later interviewed state officials and representatives of the 
nonprofits to gather additional information on the certification 
process. Case study findings and undercover test results cannot be 
projected to the overall population of guardians or controls over 
guardian certification programs. See appendix I for additional details 
on our scope and methodology. We conducted our investigation from 
August 2009 through September 2010 in accordance with standards 
prescribed by the Council of the Inspectors General for Integrity and 
Efficiency (CIGIE). 

Background: 

When an adult is found to be incompetent, a court can appoint a 
guardian to oversee the individual's personal and financial well-
being.[Footnote 10] Depending on the incapacitated person's needs, the 
court may appoint the following: a "guardian of the estate," also 
called a conservator, who makes decisions regarding the incapacitated 
person's finances; a "guardian of the person," who makes nonfinancial 
decisions; or a guardian who performs both functions. The appointment 
of a guardian typically means that the incapacitated person loses 
basic rights, such as the ability to sign contracts, vote, marry or 
divorce, buy or sell real estate, or make decisions about medical 
procedures. 

State requirements for guardians vary. Thirteen states offer 
guardianship certification, including 11 states that require certain 
professional guardians to undergo certification[Footnote 11] before 
they can be appointed but generally exempt family members from such 
directives. In 2 other states, certification is optional for all 
guardians. Certification programs in 5 states[Footnote 12] require 
applicants to complete guardianship training, while 9 others order 
them to pass a national guardianship exam, a state exam, or both. 
Three states require applicants to complete both guardianship training 
and pass a competency exam before they can obtain certification. In 
addition, some states conduct background checks using fingerprints. 
Three of the 13 states offering certification also conduct credit 
checks on applicants. Once guardians become appointed, most states 
demand that they report on the well being of the incapacitated person 
and provide an accounting of their ward's finances; however, the 
reporting frequency is left up to the court. See appendix II for 
detailed information on state guardianship laws. The federal 
government does not regulate or directly support guardians. 

Representative payees[Footnote 13] are appointed by SSA, VA, and OPM 
to handle the federal benefit payments they remit to an incapacitated 
person. For beneficiaries older than 50 years of age, court appointed 
guardians also serve as federal representative payees in 1 percent of 
cases at SSA, 13 percent of cases at VA, and 34 percent of cases at 
OPM. The agencies all provide oversight of representative payees, but 
agencies differ in how they screen and monitor them. For example, 
according to SSA, it compares the names and Social Security numbers of 
prospective representative payees against lists of prisoners, fugitive 
felons and parole violators; VA and OPM do not. SSA, VA, and OPM are 
required to oversee how representative payees manage federal benefits 
on behalf of their wards; however, agencies differ in the kinds of 
information they collect from court appointed guardians. For example, 
SSA officials said they require most representative payees, including 
court appointed guardians, to submit a standard accounting form. 
[Footnote 14] According to VA, they ask for a two page accounting 
report, but also ask payees that are court-appointed guardians to 
submit whatever accounting the guardian submitted to the local courts. 
According to OPM, it sends out a brief survey asking for similar 
information, but OPM leaves the local courts to monitor these payees 
and does not require them to complete the survey. While federal 
agencies and state courts often share responsibility for protecting 
many of the same incapacitated seniors, their collaboration is often 
limited, according to our prior report. With few exceptions, federal 
agencies and state courts neither notify other oversight entities when 
they declare an individual to be incapacitated, nor share information 
with each other in instances in which a guardian or a representative 
payee has abused a ward. 

Allegations of Abuse, Neglect, and Financial Exploitation by Guardians: 

Although we could not determine whether allegations of physical abuse, 
neglect, and financial exploitation by guardians were widespread, we 
reviewed hundreds of allegations of abuse occurring nationwide between 
1990 and 2010. In addition, eight individuals that we interviewed, 
including prosecutors, attorneys, investigators and others involved 
with six of the closed cases we examined, told us that they knew of 
other cases of guardianship abuse, or believed that the current system 
of guardian oversight needs to be strengthened in order to protect 
incapacitated persons. While the alleged abuse identified through our 
own research, and reported to us in interviews with investigators, 
attorneys and others, occurred in 45 states and the District of 
Columbia, this should not be interpreted as evidence that guardianship 
abuse is actually occurring on a widespread basis. Most of the 
allegations we identified involved financial exploitation and 
misappropriation of assets. Specifically, the allegations point to 
guardians taking advantage of wards by engaging in schemes that 
financially benefit the guardian but are financially detrimental to 
the ward under their care. Also, the allegations underscore that the 
victim's family members often lose their inheritance or are excluded 
by the guardian from decisions affecting their relative's care. 

Although we continue to receive new allegations from family members 
and advocacy groups, we could not locate a single Web site, federal 
agency, state or local entity, or any other organization that compiles 
comprehensive information on this issue. We attempted to identify 
entities compiling this information by contacting state courts, 
federal agencies, advocacy groups, and a professional guardian 
association. We also searched the Internet. Our research did not 
identify any public, private, or non-governmental organization that 
systematically tracks the total number of guardianships or allegations 
of abuse, neglect, and exploitation by guardians. GAO previously found 
that many of the courts we surveyed did not track the number of 
guardianships that they were responsible for monitoring.[Footnote 15] 
Our work also identified differences in the way courts track 
guardianships. For example, in some jurisdictions, records of 
guardianship appointments were available online, but in many areas 
they were not. Some federal agencies identify guardians who also serve 
as representative payees for federal beneficiaries, but they do not 
keep a list of all court appointed guardians. Some states maintain 
lists of certified guardians, but these lists understate the number of 
guardians because often family members and certain other guardians are 
exempt from certification requirements. 

We also discovered that information about complaints or disciplinary 
action taken against guardians may not be publicly available. In 
addition, we found that state and local enforcement may consist of 
measures not specific to guardians, such as discipline by a bar 
association for lawyers or by a regulatory board for Certified Public 
Accountants. Thus, the exact number of allegations about abuse, 
neglect or exploitation by guardians remains unknown. 

Allegations should not be considered proof of actual abuse. However, 
the hundreds of allegations we discovered came from a number of 
sources, including our own research on closed criminal and civil 
cases,[Footnote 16] advocacy groups, news reports, family members, 
concerned citizens, and legal professionals. Frequently, we identified 
multiple allegations from each of our sources. For example, an 
attorney who belongs to the National Guardianship Association provided 
us information on over 300 cases of alleged abuse, neglect, and 
exploitation by guardians between 1990 and 2009. Examples of potential 
abuse, neglect, and exploitation appear below: 

* Public guardians appointed to care for an 88-year-old California 
woman with dementia allegedly sold the woman's properties below market 
value to buyers that included both a relative of the guardian and a 
city employee. One of the public guardians also moved the ward into 
various nursing homes without notifying family members, who had to 
call the police to help them find their relative. The woman developed 
bed sores during this time that became so serious her leg had to be 
amputated at the hip. 

* In Nevada, a former case manager in the public guardian's office who 
started her own guardianship business is accused of using her position 
to take at least $200,000 from her wards' accounts, in part, to 
support her gambling habit. 

* A New York lawyer serving as a court appointed guardian reportedly 
stole more than $4 million from 23 wards, including seniors suffering 
from mental and physical impairments as well as children suffering 
from cerebral palsy due to medical malpractice. Some of the stolen 
funds were part of a court award intended to pay for the children's 
medical and developmental needs. 

* In Arizona, court-appointed guardians allegedly siphoned off 
millions of dollars from their wards, including $1 million from a 77-
year-old woman whose properties and personal belongings, such as her 
wedding album, were auctioned at a fraction of their cost. 

* A Texas couple, ages 67 and 70, were declared mentally incompetent 
and placed in a nursing home after the husband broke his hip. Under 
the care of court-appointed guardians, their house went into 
foreclosure, their car was repossessed, their electricity was shut 
off, and their credit was allowed to deteriorate. The couple was 
allegedly given a $60 monthly allowance and permitted no personal 
belongings except a television. 

* In 2001, a Texas probate judge was appointed a guardian for a 91- 
year-old woman who displayed signs of senility. She later changed her 
will for the first time in 40 years, bequeathing $250,000 to the 
probate judge, the court appointed guardian, the judge's personal 
accountant, and the court-appointed attorney associated with her case. 

* A 93-year-old Florida woman died after her grandson became her 
temporary guardian by claiming she had terminal colon cancer. He then 
moved her to hospice care, where she died 12 days later from the 
effects of morphine. The woman's condition was later determined to be 
ulcerative colitis, and the guardian's claims that she had 6 months to 
live were false. In addition, the guardian is accused of stealing 
$250,000 from the woman's estate. 

* In Michigan, two former public guardians allegedly embezzled 
$300,000 from at least 50 clients between 1999 and 2009. One of the 
reported embezzlers used the wards' funds to buy animal feed and other 
supplies for her farm. 

Cases of Abuse, Neglect, and Financial Exploitation by Guardians: 

We examined 20 cases in which guardians stole or otherwise improperly 
obtained more than $5.4 million in assets from 158 incapacitated 
victims. In some of these cases, the guardians also physically 
neglected and abused the people they had been appointed to care for. 
We obtained our information from court documents, disciplinary 
records, and our own interviews and research. The guardians in these 
cases possessed diverse professional backgrounds and were located in 
15 states and the District of Columbia, however, we observed several 
common themes: (1) state courts failed to adequately screen potential 
guardians, appointing individuals with criminal convictions and/or 
significant financial problems to manage estates worth hundreds of 
thousands or millions of dollars; (2) state courts failed to 
adequately oversee guardians after their appointment, allowing the 
abuse of vulnerable seniors and their assets to continue; and (3) 
state courts failed to communicate with federal agencies about abusive 
guardians once the court became aware of the abuse, which in some 
cases enabled the guardians to continue to receive and manage federal 
benefits. 

State Courts Failed to Adequately Screen Potential Guardians. In 6 of 
our 20 case studies, state courts failed to adequately review the 
criminal and financial backgrounds of prospective guardians, leading 
to the appointment of individuals or organizations whose past should 
have raised questions about their suitability to care for vulnerable 
seniors. For example, in one case, a federal tax lien worth $25,783 
had been filed against a prospective guardian, yet 5 years later, an 
Iowa court appointed him to serve as a guardian for an estate worth 
hundreds of thousands of dollars. In another case, a New York attorney 
had declared bankruptcy just 3 years prior to being appointed by a 
court to serve as guardian over a senior's estate. In yet another 
case, a guardian certified in the state of Washington passed a 
criminal background check, but had $87,000 in federal and state tax 
liens filed against her. The court did not conduct a credit check 
before appointing her to serve as a guardian over one senior's estate. 

State Courts Failed to Adequately Oversee Guardians after Their 
Appointment. In 12 of our 20 case studies, state courts failed to 
oversee guardians after their appointment, allowing the abuse of 
vulnerable seniors and their assets to continue. Courts ignored 
criminal and/or financial problems of guardians who served multiple 
roles with conflicting fiduciary interests. They also failed to review 
irregularities in guardians' annual accountings or sanction delinquent 
guardians. In one case, a federal tax lien of $31,000 was filed 
against a Washington state guardian just one month after she was 
appointed to care for a senior. Yet, a Washington court allowed her to 
continue serving as the man's guardian. In another case, a Kansas 
social worker served as a guardian, conservator, federal 
representative payee, therapist, landlord, and service provider to at 
least one senior victim. This enabled him to make payments to himself 
from the senior's estate and avoid the oversight, checks, and balances 
that might have existed if all these roles were performed by different 
individuals. In a third case, a Colorado conservator failed to file 
any interim financial reports over the course of 3 years to inform the 
court of the fees he was charging to the ward's estate. Despite this 
repeated failure, the court examiners did not investigate the 
conservator or make any other inquiries about the missing reports, 
telling the victim's family members that they had neither the time nor 
the knowledge to deal with the case. 

State Courts Failed to Communicate with Federal Agencies about Abusive 
Guardians. In 11 of our 20 case studies, state courts failed to 
communicate with federal agencies about ongoing abuse committed by 
guardians. For example, in one case, a District of Columbia guardian 
continued to serve as the victim's SSA representative payee for four 
years after the court was alerted to thefts by her secretary. In 
another case, an Arizona court appointed a senior's niece to manage 
her aunt's affairs as her guardian. The aunt was 90 years of age, and 
suffered from dementia. The guardian also served as a representative 
payee for her aunt's Social Security benefits, and the SSA continued 
sending the guardian federal benefits during the abuse. This permitted 
the guardian to gain access to over $18,000 of the victim's Social 
Security benefits in a single year. In the end, an Arizona court 
discovered that the guardian misappropriated more than $200,000 from 
her aunt's estate and used the money to give loans to and pay for 
unauthorized gifts for her children. Some of these funds might have 
included the victim's Social Security benefits. The SSA did terminate 
the niece as the aunt's representative payee, but the SSA told us that 
it did not terminate her for misusing the aunt's funds. The SSA 
determines that misuse occurs when a payee does not use or conserve 
the beneficiary's Social Security benefits in such a way that benefits 
the beneficiary's current and foreseeable needs. The SSA was 
apparently unaware of the extent of abuse that the court determined 
the guardian committed against the aunt's estate, and possibly her 
Social Security benefits. In a third case, the VA suspended a North 
Carolina guardian as a representative payee when he failed to file 
annual accountings 2 years in a row. However, once the guardian 
submitted the accountings, the VA reinstated him as the victim's 
representative payee and resumed sending him federal benefits. The VA 
did not notify the local court of problems with the guardian, who 
eventually misappropriated $332,730 from the victim over a 14-year 
period. 

Table 1 below provides a summary of the 10 cases in which guardians 
abused, neglected or financially exploited their victims, followed by 
a more detailed narrative on each of the first five cases. Table 2 
contains details on an additional 10 cases we reviewed. 

Table 1: Summary of the 10 Cases in Which Guardians Abused, Neglected, 
or Financially Exploited Their Victims: 

Case: 1; 
Victim(s): Two seniors and 18 other victims with dementia and mental 
illnesses; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: November 2005; 
Guardian/state: Licensed social worker and his wife, a registered 
nurse/Kansas; 
Case details: 
* The guardian and his wife sexually and physically abused their 
victims and billed Medicare for the cost of this "therapy"; 
* Victims lived in an unlicensed group home described by the 
prosecutor as "dirty and bug-infested." They were kept in isolation 
and videotaped while engaging in forced sexual activities and nude 
farm work; 
* According to a federal court order, the guardian paid himself more 
than $102,000 from one senior's inheritance and used some of those 
funds for purported "therapy" that he provided to her; 
* The federal court found that guardian failed to file any required 
accountings with the court. It also found that the guardian wrote 
checks as payments off the victim's estate, which bore notations that 
did not sufficiently note their legitimacy. Further, the guardian 
never filed required accountings with the SSA; 
* A federal court sentenced the guardian to 30 years in prison and his 
wife to 15 years in prison for involuntary servitude and fraud. The 
federal court ordered the couple to pay six victims, Medicare, and the 
Mennonite Mutual Aid a total of $534,806 in restitution. The remaining 
restitution balance is $364,511. 

Case: 2; 
Victim(s): 87 year old man with Alzheimer's disease; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: March 2008; 
Guardian/state: Taxi cab driver/Missouri; 
Case details: 
* Guardian was a felon convicted of armed robbery and other crimes, 
yet became the victim's legal representative, conservator, co-trustee, 
and beneficiary; 
* Guardian embezzled over $640,000 from the victim, which he used in 
part to purchase a Hummer and a Chrysler as well as gift payments to 
himself and others, including exotic dancers; 
* Victim was discovered in the guardian's basement wearing an old knit 
shirt and a diaper, extremely dehydrated and confused; 
* Guardian was sentenced to 8 years in federal prison without parole, 
and ordered to pay $640,820 in restitution. No part of this amount had 
been paid by February 2010, according to the prosecutor. 

Case: 3; 
Victim(s): At least 78 victims; 
Guardian/state: Professional guardian agency/Alaska;
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: November 2004; 
Case details: 
* Company officers mismanaged or stole an estimated $454,416 from 
their wards between about 1998 and 2002, according to the information 
provided to Alaska's U.S. Bankruptcy Court by a trustee; 
* Executive director used company checks to pay for his utility bills, 
mortgage payments, credit card bills, medical expenses, and church 
camp for his children; 
* One mentally ill veteran's inheritance was depleted from $90,000 to 
almost nothing over 3 years in the early to mid 1990s in part because 
the company purchased mental health services at rates 1,500 percent 
higher than necessary, made improper travel charges, and charged twice 
for the same services; 
* Victims received partial restitution through bankruptcy proceedings, 
but no criminal charges were filed. 

Case: 4; 
Victim(s): 20 senior and disabled victims; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: January 2006/October 2008; 
Guardian/state: Office of the Public Guardian/California; 
* Two staff in the office of the public guardian stole a combined 
total of $97,000 from senior and disabled public wards with no one 
else to care for them; 
* One woman admitted stealing $90,000 by cashing victims' pension and 
Social Security checks while working temporarily in the public 
guardian's office. She testified that a permanent staff member had 
taught her to steal and split the proceeds with her; 
* The permanent guardian used victims' funds to buy herself jewelry, 
clothing, and electronics and stole valuables from their homes; 
* The prosecutor and nursing home staff said that the permanent 
guardian placed clients in her friend's nursing facility, described by 
the investigator as "a complete hellhole" and was convicted of taking 
kickbacks from a worker she hired to clean victims' homes; 
* The temporary guardian was sentenced to 5 years, 4 months in prison 
and $93,000 in restitution, of which she had paid $70,000 as of July 
2010. The permanent guardian was sentenced to 9 months in prison, 5 
years probation and $9,880 in restitution, of which she had paid 
$2,420 as of July 2010. 

Case: 5; 
Victim(s): 71 year old with dementia, schizophrenia, and alcohol 
dependency; 83 year old with mental incapacitation; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: November 2005; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/District of Columbia; 
* A guardian's negligence allowed her secretary to embezzle nearly 
$50,000 from two elderly victims. Also, the guardian neglected to 
collect $39,000 of rental income for over four years on behalf of one 
victim; 
* The court found that the guardian's secretary embezzled funds from 
two victims' accounts by writing checks to herself and to a high-end 
department store; 
* The guardian's failure to pay taxes for one victim led to her house 
being confiscated and sold by tax authorities, according to a probate 
court complaint. The victim was rendered homeless, but the guardian 
claimed in a letter to the court that the woman preferred to live in 
city shelters; 
* The guardian continued to be the victim's representative payee for 4 
years after the scheme was uncovered, according to SSA data; 
* The secretary disappeared with the embezzled money. Neither the 
secretary nor the guardian faced criminal charges, although the 
guardian was suspended from legal practice. The probate court ordered 
$97,000 in restitution, which was paid by bond companies, except for 
$27,000 still owed to the one victim's estate, as of August 2010. 

Case: 6; 
Victim(s): 85 year old woman and 79 year old man; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: June 2005/January 2006; 
Guardian/state: Certified Public Accountant/Iowa; 
Case details: 
* A CPA with known financial problems was appointed as conservator of 
two seniors and used his position to misappropriate $167,325; 
* The court found that the guardian wrote himself 21 checks ranging 
from $2,000 to $25,000 from one victim's estate, while failing to pay 
for her rent and prescription drugs; 
* The guardian refused to bring clothes and other belongings to the 
victim's nursing home, according to her guardian ad litem.[A] He also 
disposed of the victim's personal belongings, leaving her without her 
wedding band, personal papers and family photos; 
* The court found that the guardian misappropriated $15,000 from 
another victim by writing checks to his business and fraudulently 
altering the payee to make the checks appear legitimate; 
* The guardian repaid the misappropriated amounts and $3,014 in fines, 
so the court did not order restitution. The guardian worked at a CPA 
firm as of September 2010, although he lost his CPA license and served 
150 days in prison with 5 years probation. 

Case: 7; 
Victim(s): 82 year old with Alzheimer's disease; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: June 2008; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/New York; 
Case details: 
* Under court appointed guardians' watch, the value of a retired 
judge's estate dropped from several million dollars to almost nothing 
in 6 years and accrued $1 million in taxes, interest, and penalties; 
* The guardian had declared bankruptcy just three years prior to her 
appointment, accumulated $119,500 in debt just two years prior to her 
appointment, and accumulated $4,917 in debt during the guardianship, 
yet the court repeatedly renewed her appointment six times in 3 years; 
* Court judgments and accountings show that the guardian 
misappropriated at least $327,000 to pay herself, family, and friends 
for purported caretaking and home improvement services. She personally 
misappropriated $200,000 and some of the misappropriated funds were 
used to pay her mortgage and other expenses; 
* The attorney spent $120,000 of the victim's money to renovate a 
property that he no longer owned. Title had been transferred to a new 
owner for almost a year, but the attorney was apparently unaware of 
the status of a property she had been appointed to protect; 
* The guardian never faced criminal charges but was suspended from 
legal practice by a New York court and was later ordered to pay the 
estate $403,149. The court decision was affirmed on appeal. As of June 
2010, the guardian had paid nothing toward the judgment. 

Case: 8; 
Victim(s): 101 year old with Alzheimer's; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: July 2005; 
Guardian/state: Certified Public Accountant/Colorado; 
Case details: 
* The guardian stole $2 million from the victim's estate, forcing her 
family to mortgage her house to pay her bills, according to her niece; 
* The guardian funneled $1 million of the victim's funds to his 
company, then purchased an athletic club specializing in handball, 
according to the investigator's report and interviews; 
* The guardian also made a series of improper and bogus loans to 
family and friends totaling almost $1 million; 
* The court apparently failed to communicate the guardian's removal, 
so he continued to be listed as payee for OPM benefits. Also, SSA did 
not monitor the guardian because the guardian avoided SSA oversight by 
never applying to be a representative payee; 
* Due to the thefts, the victim's niece said they had to mortgage the 
victim's house to meet monthly bills, including $6,000 in nursing home 
fees; 
* The CPA was sentenced to 12 years in prison and was ordered to pay 
restitution of over $2.5 million, of which he had paid $4,366 as of 
June 2010. 

Case: 9; 
Victim(s): Four victims over 70 years of age with dementia or 
Alzheimer's disease; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: November 2005; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/Connecticut; 
Case details: 
* The conservator stole more that $120,000 from the estates of four 
seniors; 
* According to a state inspector's affidavit, the conservator used 
$24,500 from two seniors' estates to pay a housekeeper to clean and 
garden her home in Connecticut. A state prosecutor described the house 
as "magnificent." According to a real estate Web site, the home has 
five bedrooms and three baths, and was on sale for $1.2 million as of 
December 2009; 
* The state prosecutor contended that the conservator manipulated one 
victim's tax forms by increasing her tax withholdings so that the 
victim would receive $87,000 in refunds. The prosecutor said that it 
was reasonable to infer that the conservator pocketed the money for 
her personal use; 
* According to SSA data, the conservator served as a representative 
payee for at least three of the four senior victims; 
* In February 2006, the conservator was sentenced to 15 months in 
prison based on a "calculated continued pattern of deception for a 
lengthy period of time." After this sentence, she was scheduled to 
serve 5 years of probation. She was ordered to pay more than $120,000 
in restitution to four victims and agreed to resign from the 
Connecticut Bar. According to the court's probation office, as of June 
2010, she still owed $48,557 in restitution to at least one senior's 
estate; 
* According to a police report and sentencing documents, in May 2009, 
while the conservator was on probation, she was arrested for stealing 
from a friend's purse and shoplifting purses worth thousands of 
dollars from a Connecticut department store. This occurred after she 
served 15 months in prison for her previous crimes. She pled guilty in 
November 2009 for the thefts, and was sentenced to a total of 20 
months in jail. It wasn't until January 2010, that the SSA terminated 
her as representative payee for another individual. 

Case: 10; 
Victim(s): 81 year old man with dementia; 77 year old man with 
dementia and seizures; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: September 2004/February 2008; 
Guardian/state: Professional Guardian/Washington; 
Case details: 
* A certified professional guardian used one ward's estate to generate 
tens of thousands in unnecessary fees and failed to visit another ward 
for nearly 8 months, yet she continues to serve as a guardian; 
* The court appointed the guardian to oversee one victim, even though 
$87,000 in tax liens had been filed against her during the previous 6 
years. Another federal tax lien of $31,000 was filed against her just 
1 month later; 
* The guardian hid the man's will from the court and family members, 
and continued filing motions contrary to his written wishes in order 
to generate $20,000 in legal fees for herself; 
* In another case, a court appointed attorney found that the guardian 
failed to visit the ward for 8 months and was 9 months delinquent in 
filing a personal care plan and asset inventory for the ward; 
* The guardian received disciplinary letters for both cases, but 
continues to serve as guardian for 86 incapacitated adults. She is 
also a representative payee for 69 beneficiaries at SSA, 3 
beneficiaries at VA, and 2 beneficiaries at OPM. 

Source: GAO. 

[A] A guardian ad litem is appointed by the court to represent the 
interests of the ward for a limited time or in a single court action. 
For example, a guardian ad litem may investigate wrongdoing by a court 
appointed guardian or may be appointed as a temporary guardian while a 
more suitable guardian is found. 

[End of table] 

Case 1: A Kansas husband and wife, who owned an unlicensed group home 
for mentally ill adults, abused and financially exploited a 50-year 
old woman in their care. The husband served as the victim's guardian 
and conservator, enabling the couple to convert the victim's funds for 
their own use, and amass nearly $250,000 from the woman. In addition, 
they forced her and other residents to perform sexual acts for almost 
two decades as part of the fraudulent therapy treatment that they 
billed to Medicare, a federal court and jury found. At least 20 
chronically and severely mentally ill adults, including at least one 
with schizophrenia, resided at the home--described by federal 
prosecutors as "dirty, bug-infested, and run down." The husband, a 
licensed clinical social worker, and the wife, a licensed nurse, 
served the residents in multiple capacities: landlord, caregiver, 
representative payee and, in the case of the 50-year old woman, the 
husband served as guardian. Federal prosecutors successfully argued 
that this helped the couple conspire to control their victims, and to 
fraudulently gain access to their Social Security benefits and bill 
Medicare for $216,906 in purported therapy. The husband also 
videotaped the sexual activities, nudity, and farm work that he forced 
victims to do as part of their "therapy" for his own viewing. One 
resident testified that the husband established and enforced a code of 
silence and secrecy in order to control and exploit them, creating 
what he called "a secluded, small, cult-like organization." 

The state court that appointed the guardian was either unaware of the 
multiple roles that he served in the victim's life or failed to 
question the conflicts between them. According to a federal court 
order, the guardian paid himself more than $100,000 from one senior's 
inheritance, using some of those funds for the purported "therapy," 
and converting the rest for his own personal use. The guardian 
accounted for a portion of the money he disbursed and provided no 
supporting documentation. The guardian, under state law, was required 
to file annual reports on the condition of the victim's estate and 
well being. The couple also forced the victim to work on their farm 
nude and participate in nude massages while the pair watched. 

After the abuse was discovered by children on a school bus who saw the 
residents working in the nude on the couple's farm, the local 
authorities and the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector 
General launched an investigation. Subsequently, a Kansas court 
removed the husband as the woman's guardian and the Kansas State Board 
of Nursing suspended the wife's nursing license. In addition, SSA 
terminated the couple as representative payees for the six victims 
receiving Social Security benefits. In 2006, a federal court sentenced 
the husband to a prison term of 30 years for the crimes of involuntary 
servitude, forced labor and health care fraud. In 2009, the wife was 
sentenced by the same court to a prison term of 15 years for the same 
three crimes. At the husband's sentencing, the judge compared 
conditions at the house to those of a third world prison, and 
concluded at the wife's sentencing that "...but for the sighting by 
the children on the school bus, I am firmly convinced that [the group 
home] would be in business today." 

The federal court ordered the couple to pay six victims, Medicare, and 
the Mennonite Mutual Aid a total of $534,806 in restitution, including 
$250,000 to be paid to the guardian's former ward. As of May 2010, the 
court had received a total of $170,246 from the couple's seized and 
forfeited group home and $51 that the wife had earned by making 
license plates while in prison. The husband, however, had not paid any 
restitution directly as of May 2010. 

Case 2: A Missouri taxi cab driver who became the guardian of a 
retired, Kansas City antiques dealer with Alzheimer's disease 
embezzled more than $640,000 from his ward and kept him confined in 
what federal prosecutors described as a filthy basement wearing a 
diaper until shortly before his death. The cab driver became 
acquainted with the senior while regularly transporting him from his 
home to various destinations, including restaurants and a bank. In 
July 2003, the antiques dealer fell and hit his head, requiring a 
surgically implanted shunt to be put in his head to control fluid in 
his brain. Due to his medical condition, he was admitted to the 
skilled care section of a nursing home and later transferred to an 
independent-living apartment. The cab driver presented himself to 
nursing home management as the senior's caretaker. Federal and local 
law enforcement officials, however, depicted the relationship between 
the cab driver and antiques dealer as improbable based on the 
background, appearance, and values of the two men. They described the 
cab driver as a large, foul-mouthed felon convicted of armed robbery 
and other crimes. They portrayed the antiques dealer, meanwhile, as a 
small, fastidious dresser who hailed from a wealthy family, lived in 
an exclusive neighborhood, and kept well-to-do friends. Nevertheless, 
they said that with the help of lawyers, the cab driver over time 
became the legal representative, guardian, conservator, co-trustee 
(along with a bank), and beneficiary of the antiques dealer and his 
assets. He assumed this control through the power vested in the legal 
documents that the parties signed, although the federal prosecutor 
said he saw indications that many of the signatures did not appear to 
belong to the antiques dealer. Federal and local law enforcement 
officials said in an interview that a probate hearing did not occur 
because the victim was not a ward of the state and he appeared to 
consent to the changes. 

The cab driver removed the antiques dealer from the nursing home to 
the cab driver's residence in 2004. About a year later, a Kansas City 
Police Department detective received a tip that the antiques dealer 
was being exploited. The detective said in her investigative report 
that she and other law enforcement officials visited the cab driver's 
residence to check on the antiques dealer. They found him wearing an 
old knit shirt and a diaper, confined to a basement isolated from the 
remainder of the house except by surveillance camera. He was 
bedridden, covered with a dirty blanket, and unable to leave the room. 
He had no access to a telephone or water. He was also extremely 
dehydrated and confused. He died of natural causes 12 days after being 
removed from the basement at the age of 87. A subsequent search of the 
cab driver's residence revealed new furniture in almost every room of 
the home, two large-screen television sets, new silverware, and new 
accessories. The detective noted that this area of the house was 
relatively clean. Figure 1 below is a photograph of the half bathroom 
the victim was forced to use. 

Figure 1: Bathroom Used By Guardianship Abuse Victim: 

[Refer to PDF for image: 2 photographs] 

Source: United States Attorney's Office, Western District of Missouri. 

[End of figure] 

An investigation by federal and local law enforcement officials 
determined that the cab driver had used his personal and legal 
guardianship relationship with the antiques dealer to enrich himself 
and others. For example, he purchased a $35,000 Chrysler 300 and a 
$52,000, burnt orange Hummer H2 with "Bad to the Bone" emblazoned 
across the windshield. He also secured checks to himself and others, 
some of whom were exotic dancers. The cab driver was indicted on 16 
counts, including felony bank and mail fraud. In a plea agreement, he 
admitted to making material false representations, possessing and 
negotiating unauthorized forged checks and instigating improper money 
gift payments to himself and others. He also admitted to defrauding 
financial institutions by misrepresenting or forging either his 
authority to write checks or his authority to withdraw the elderly 
man's trust account funds, and/or misrepresenting the use and purpose 
of those funds. He was sentenced in October 2008 to 8 years in federal 
prison without parole and ordered to pay restitution of $640,820--none 
of which has been paid, said the U.S. assistant attorney that 
prosecuted the case. 

Case 3: A mentally ill veteran saw his $90,000 inheritance rapidly 
depleted in the early to mid 1990s while under the care of an Alaskan 
professional guardianship company that later declared bankruptcy amid 
allegations that it mismanaged, converted, stole or embezzled at least 
$454,416 from its wards. The veteran had served four years in the U.S. 
Navy before being honorably discharged in 1966. He developed 
schizophrenia after leaving the service, experiencing more than a 
dozen hospitalizations in Alaska and stays in a number of VA hospitals 
in Wisconsin and Illinois. From 1976 onward, however, he participated 
in various community health programs in Alaska. After he received his 
inheritance in 1992, the Alaska Superior Court appointed a private 
guardianship company as his conservator. By 1995, the inheritance was 
gone, but the veteran continued to receive Social Security benefits 
and a VA pension. After the veteran intentionally cut his left wrist, 
the private company was appointed to be his guardian in February 1996 
as well. The state court held that he was unable to physically care 
for himself or manage his money and would always need supervision. 

In December 1996, the Alaska Superior Court ordered a court visitor 
[Footnote 17] to report on the company's handling of the veteran's 
assets. The court visitor found a "disturbing breakdown" of costs and 
called some of the fees charged "unheard of," concluding that the 
money had been managed in a "spend down" fashion rather than in a 
frugal and conscientious manner. For example, she noted that the 
company had purchased mental health support services for the veteran 
at a rate that was 1500 percent higher than necessary. She also found 
improper travel charges, "vague charges for 'case management 
services'," and multiple staff charging for the same service. The 
veteran's conservatorship and guardianship were transferred to a new 
private company formed by former employees of the first one, but after 
concerns arose about it as well, the Alaska Superior Court made the 
veteran a ward of the state's Office of Public Advocacy (OPA). In 
1999, OPA filed a complaint in state court on behalf of the veteran to 
recover money from both private guardianship companies. 

The private company that served as the veteran's first conservator and 
guardian filed for bankruptcy in May 2002. An attorney for the veteran 
negotiated a settlement with the bankruptcy trustee for a payment of 
$42,500, or less than half of his inheritance. The trustee, however, 
also determined that corporate officers and directors mismanaged, 
converted, stole, embezzled, over-billed and took through other means 
an estimated $454,416 from other wards between about 1998 and 2002. A 
wards claim fund was established for that amount to help restore the 
assets of the company's clients. The trustee noted at the time that 
critical records were suspiciously destroyed by a fire and a final 
accounting of the wards' losses might never be known. An investigation 
conducted by a company official found that the group's former 
executive director at the time and an employee stole from wards in 
number of ways: writing checks payable to the company that 
investigators labeled as "direct theft"; writing checks to themselves; 
withdrawing cash; paying corporate credit card bills; and charging for 
services not rendered, among other actions. 

Case 4: Two women working as public guardians for a county government 
in California stole over $97,000 from 20 senior and disabled victims, 
and one further used her authority to collect kickbacks from a man she 
hired to clean out victims' homes. [Footnote 18] The victims were 
placed by the court in the care of the county public guardian's 
office, which serves as the guardian of last resort for individuals 
who have no family members willing or able to take care of them. One 
of the guardians involved in the theft was a temporary employee of the 
office, while the other guardian had worked there for 22 years. The 
temporary guardian was responsible for removing checks from the mail 
for deposit into wards' accounts, but over a 2 year period, she stole 
$90,000 in checks from six clients. The temporary guardian testified 
that she stole the funds at the direction of the permanent guardian, 
and split the proceeds with her. Among the thefts were $58,470 in 
monthly pension checks from a retired public school teacher and $2,034 
from a retired cook with Alzheimer's. Even after the temporary 
guardian transferred out of the office in June 2004, she continued to 
cash checks. Local prosecutors said they were not able to determine 
whether she obtained the checks with the assistance of her former co-
worker or by returning to the office to steal from the mail pile, 
which was kept in an open area. In January 2006, the temporary 
guardian pled guilty to felony theft from an elder, tax fraud, and 
embezzlement by a public officer and was sentenced to five years, four 
months in prison and ordered to pay $93,344 in restitution. As of July 
2010, she had made $70,000 in restitution payments. The permanent 
guardian, whose name was not on the cashed checks and who denied 
involvement, was not charged with these crimes. 

However, the investigation subsequently broadened to include other 
potential charges against the permanent guardian who was convicted in 
October 2008 of bribery, theft of public funds, receiving stolen 
property and theft from a dependent person. She was sentenced to 9 
months in jail and ordered to pay $9,879 in restitution, but as of 
July 2010, she had repaid just $2,420. According to the local 
prosecutor's trial brief, the permanent guardian used clients' funds 
to buy herself jewelry, clothing, wigs, cosmetics, perfume, CDs, and 
electronic equipment worth $7,000. For example, using the funds of a 
wheelchair-bound woman living in a nursing home, the permanent 
guardian bought herself $600 of perfume in one month, depleting the 
account of a woman who had just $3,000 in assets. One month later, she 
was reimbursed for $225 she claimed to have spent on jewelry for the 
client, including three pairs of long, dangling pierced earrings. 
However, the elderly woman did not have pierced ears and the earrings 
were later found in the guardian's home. Searches of her home also 
revealed coins, stamps, televisions, and a DVD player that she had 
stolen from other clients, both living and deceased. 

In addition to the thefts, the permanent guardian used her position to 
enrich herself in other ways. A jury found that the guardian had taken 
kickbacks from the man she hired to clean out the houses, in one case 
instructing him to bill for a fictitious employee so that she could 
collect an additional $1,500. According to the prosecutor and grand 
jury testimony, the permanent guardian also used her authority to 
place several clients in facilities owned and operated by her friends, 
even though the facilities were located almost an hour away and the 
guardian had previously been investigated but not charged for taking 
kickbacks from one of the friends. The investigator described one of 
the friend's nursing homes as "a complete hellhole" with a stench. 
When her clients moved into a nursing facility, the permanent guardian 
would throw away everything in their houses, according to the 
prosecutor, because it was easier than putting the client's property 
in storage. One woman returned from a stay in the hospital to find 
that the permanent guardian had disposed of all her belongings, 
including her photographs, according to the investigator's testimony. 

The thefts and abuse of power in this case were allowed to continue in 
part because of poor court oversight of guardianship cases managed by 
the Public Guardian's Office. For example, the office was several 
years late in filing annual accountings for some guardianship cases, 
but a probate court official told the prosecutor that the court did 
not have enough staff to review accountings or even track all its 
cases. Given the lack of oversight, it is possible that the thefts 
extended beyond the 20 identified victims, but no audit was done to 
determine whether funds had been stolen from any of the hundreds of 
other Public Guardian clients. 

Case 5: A District of Columbia guardian breached her fiduciary duty by 
delegating her responsibilities to her secretary, who embezzled nearly 
$50,000 from two elderly wards--one of whom lost her home because of 
the guardian's failure to pay property taxes. The oldest victim was an 
83-year-old who worked for the Merchant Marine during World War II and 
spent the rest of her career as a civil servant at the District of 
Columbia Department of Human Services, according to federal employment 
records. After a probate court determined her to be mentally 
incapacitated, an attorney was appointed as both her guardian and 
conservator. Although the elderly woman received $1,170[Footnote 19] 
monthly income from both her federal pension and Social Security 
benefits, the attorney never applied to become a representative payee, 
effectively shielding herself from federal oversight, SSA and OPM data 
show. Assisting with the conservatorship was a woman that the attorney 
hired as her secretary after representing her in court on theft 
charges. The attorney gave most of her conservator responsibilities to 
the secretary, including writing and receiving checks on estates, 
which a DC court found to be inappropriate. The secretary forged the 
attorney's signature on 34 checks drawn on the victim's estate 
account, totaling more than $42,000 over the course of a year. One of 
the checks was made out to a high-end department store; the rest were 
payable to the secretary herself. 

The secretary embezzled from another victim under the attorney's care 
during the same period, a DC court also found. The 71-year-old-woman 
was suffering from alcohol dependency, mild dementia, and 
schizophrenia. The attorney served as the court-appointed conservator 
and the representative payee for her Social Security benefits. The 
secretary forged the attorney's signature on two checks drawn on the 
victim's estate account totaling $5,150, according to a court judgment 
and a probate clerk's memo. One of the checks, in the amount of 
$3,000, was deposited into the Merchant Marine's account, the judgment 
and memo show, in an apparent attempt to hide her previous 
embezzlement. The secretary made the other check for $2,150 payable to 
herself. Also, according to a court judgment, the guardian neglected 
to collect $39,000 of rental income on behalf of the victim for over 4 
years. In addition, the attorney failed to pay property taxes on the 
elderly woman's home, a probate court complaint stated, prompting 
local authorities to auction it and causing her ward to become 
homeless. The attorney wrote a letter to probate court officials prior 
to the move saying the woman preferred to reside in city shelters. The 
attorney also claimed to have hired a social worker to help find her 
ward housing, but an attorney for the successor guardian said there 
was no evidence that a social worker was ever hired. The guardian also 
failed to file the last two required reports with the probate court, 
and submitted each of the prior required reports late to the probate 
court, according to the successor guardian's attorney and to the DC 
probate court. 

The secretary later vanished and the attorney said she never saw her 
again, according to a DC court judgment. The disappearance did not 
cause the attorney to suspect her secretary of any wrongdoing, nor did 
it lead her to examine the bank statements that the secretary had 
maintained. In the opinion of the court, had the attorney reviewed the 
bank statements, she likely would have noticed her secretary's 
misappropriations. Subsequent secretaries identified problems with the 
account, but the attorney said she thought they were all incompetent 
and fired them one after the other. In letters to the court and the 
bar, the attorney said the secretary had been a good, trusted employee 
and blamed the ward's bank for negligence. By the time the court 
discovered the embezzlement from the Merchant Marine, the victim had 
already died. Four years later, the attorney was finally replaced as 
representative payee for the other victim's Social Security benefits, 
SSA data show. 

In November 2005, a DC court suspended the attorney for violating 
professional conduct standards and engaging in misconduct as a result 
of her repeated failures to cooperate with disciplinary investigations 
by Bar Counsel. The probate court ordered $97,000 in restitution for 
the two victims, which was paid by the bond companies that insured the 
attorney, except for $27,000 still owed to the latter victim's estate. 
The attorney was not criminally charged but was ordered to comply with 
Bar Counsel's information requests, to show rehabilitation as well as 
fitness to practice law, and to reimburse the estates before she could 
be reinstated to the DC Bar. Bar records show the attorney was still 
suspended as of June 2010, thus indicating her continued failure to 
meet the full conditions of reinstatement. 

Undercover Tests Reveal That Four States Offering Certification Failed 
to Adequately Screen Potential Guardians: 

Many of the guardians in our case studies had a poor track record of 
managing finances or a criminal background, yet courts failed to 
identify these warning signs before appointing them to care for 
vulnerable seniors. Certification programs are intended to provide 
assurance that a guardian is qualified to fulfill their role or, 
according to one certifying organization, is "worthy of the 
responsibility entrusted to him or her." Thirteen states have a 
guardian certification program. In 11 states, certification is 
mandatory for some professional guardians and in two states, 
certification is optional for professional guardians. However, our 
investigation found that an individual with a poor credit history or a 
criminal using a fake identity can easily gain certification in the 
four states we tested. Utilizing two fictitious identities, we 
obtained guardianship certification from New York and North Carolina 
and met guardianship certification requirements for Illinois and 
Nevada.[Footnote 20] 

One of our fictitious applicants had a credit report that showed 
$30,000 in outstanding debt, a repossessed car and a credit score of 
528. None of the courts or certification organizations in our tests; 
however, checked the applicant's credit history. Some states require a 
guardian to obtain a bond to protect against the misappropriation of a 
ward's assets. According to one official, many bonding companies check 
the applicant's credit history before the guardian can obtain the 
bond. However, as our case studies demonstrate, the courts do not 
always verify that the guardian is bonded. An individual who is 
financially overextended is at higher risk of engaging in illegal acts 
to generate funds. In addition, none of the certifying organizations 
verified our applicants' fingerprints or discovered that the Social 
Security number used by one fictitious applicant belonged to a dead 
person. This creates the risk that people with criminal convictions 
could steal a Social Security number and conceal their pasts to become 
certified guardians.[Footnote 21] The certification organizations we 
tested also did not verify the academic and professional credentials 
submitted by our fictitious applicants. Our undercover tests call into 
question the ability of these state certification programs to 
effectively prevent criminals and individuals with bad credit from 
gaining control over the lives and assets of vulnerable seniors. Table 
2 summarizes the results of our investigation. 

Table 2: Results of Undercover Tests of State Certification Processes: 

State: Illinois; 
Certification steps: In Illinois, only politically appointed guardians 
are required to obtain certification; 
however, any prospective guardian is eligible to be certified. To 
obtain certification, guardians must: 
* Register with the Center for Guardianship Certification; 
* Pass National Certified Guardian Examination; 
Results of undercover tests: 
* We applied for guardianship certification from a national 
association using fictitious names and background information. 
Certifying organization did not require Social Security numbers or 
other identifying information; 
* Certifying organization did not verify the educational or 
professional credentials we claimed and did not conduct background 
checks or credit checks on our fictitious applicants; 
* Our fictitious applicants passed the National Certified Guardian 
Examination in March 2010. Exam proctor asked to see photo 
identification, but did not identify our bogus driver's licenses; 
* Illinois court officials told us they do not generally conduct 
criminal background checks on guardians. 

State: Nevada; 
Certification steps: In Nevada, only private professional guardians 
with 3 or more unrelated wards are required to obtain certification; 
however, any prospective guardian is eligible to be certified. To 
obtain certification, guardians must: 
* Register with the Center for Guardianship Certification; 
* Pass National Certified Guardian Examination; 
Results of undercover tests: 
* We applied for guardianship certification from a national 
association using fictitious names and background information. 
Certifying organization did not require Social Security numbers or 
other identifying information; 
* Certifying organization did not verify the educational or 
professional credentials we claimed and did not conduct background 
checks or credit checks on our fictitious applicants; 
* Our fictitious applicants passed the National Certified Guardian 
Examination in March 2010. Exam proctor asked to see photo 
identification, but did not identify our bogus driver's licenses; 
* Nevada court officials told us they do not generally conduct 
criminal background checks on guardians. 

State: New York; 
Certification steps: In New York, all professional guardians must 
obtain certification prior to appointment. To obtain certification, 
guardians must: 
* Register for training; 
* Attend a 1 day training course; 
* Complete an application listing Social Security number, educational 
and professional background; 
Results of undercover tests: 
* We registered for the training course using fictitious names. We 
were not asked to prove our identity before training began; 
* In April 2010, we successfully completed the training, which did not 
include any tests to assess our comprehension of the subject matter; 
* We submitted a four page form that included Social Security numbers 
and other identifying information for our fictitious applicants, but 
New York courts did not conduct background or credit checks on them; 
* Courts also did not verify fictitious educational and professional 
credentials of our fictitious applicants; 
* Both of our fictitious applicants became certified guardians in New 
York. 

State: North Carolina; 
Certification steps: North Carolina does not require guardians to 
obtain certification; however, the North Carolina Guardianship 
Association (NCGA) offers a state certification exam. To obtain 
certification from NCGA, guardians must: 
* Register with NCGA; 
* Pass North Carolina Guardianship Competency Exam; 
Results of undercover tests: 
* We registered to take the state exam using fake educational and 
professional backgrounds and North Carolina addresses; 
* Certifying organization did not require Social Security numbers or 
other identifying information and did not conduct background checks or 
credit checks on our fictitious applicants; 
* Certifying organization did not verify the educational or 
professional credentials we claimed; 
* Exam proctor verified the photo identification of one applicant, but 
did not ask to see photo identification for the other; 
* We passed the North Carolina state exam in May 2010 and our 
fictitious applicants received badges attesting to their status as 
certified guardians 2 weeks later; 
* Certifying organization officials told us they do not conduct 
criminal background checks on their guardians. 

Source: GAO. 

[End of table] 

Illinois and Nevada. Illinois and Nevada require certain guardians 
[Footnote 22] to obtain certification through the Center for 
Guardianship Certification (CGC), a private nonprofit that offers 
national guardian certification. We submitted applications to the 
organization using two fictitious identities with driver's licenses 
from Virginia. We also listed fake educational and professional 
backgrounds for our applicants, which the certifying organization did 
not verify. For example, one applicant claimed to have a law degree 
and almost 3 years experience as a guardian, while the other claimed 3 
years of experience as a guardian at a nonexistent guardianship firm. 
Both applicants studied for and passed the National Certified Guardian 
Examination, which covers guardianship ethical principles and best 
practices. After the exam, a proctor asked to see the photo 
identifications of our fictitious applicants, but failed to recognize 
them as bogus driver's licenses. Once we passed the test, the names of 
our fictitious applicants were listed on the organization's website as 
nationally certified guardians. Passing the national exam is the sole 
requirement to be a certified guardian in Illinois and Nevada. 
Officials in both states told us that local courts do not conduct 
background or credit checks, indicating that each of the two 
fictitious guardians could have been appointed by a court in those 
states with no further screening. 

New York. In New York, applicants for certification are required to 
attend a 7-hour training course. We registered for the training course 
using the same two fictitious identities we did for CGC, which the 
training provider did not verify by requiring participants to present 
picture identification. The training class covered topics such as 
legal duties and responsibilities, ethics, and mandatory visits, but 
did not include a test to determine whether students understood the 
material. At the end of the course, both of our fictitious applicants 
received a Certificate of Attendance, enabling them to register with 
the New York Office of Court Administration (OCA). We registered using 
fictitious names, addresses, and Social Security numbers of our 
fictitious applicants, but OCA did not use this information to conduct 
a criminal background or credit check. In addition, OCA did not verify 
the personal, educational, and professional backgrounds of our 
fictitious applicants before listing them on the New York Unified 
Court System's Web site as certified guardians eligible to be 
appointed in up to five counties. New York law prohibits an individual 
who has a prior felony conviction or has been convicted of a 
misdemeanor in the past 5 years from serving as a guardian. However, 
court officials told us that courts do not conduct a criminal 
background check on certified guardians before they are appointed and 
instead rely on the guardian to disclose their prior convictions. 

North Carolina. North Carolina does not require guardians to be 
certified; however, the North Carolina Guardianship Association (NCGA) 
offers certification to North Carolina guardians. To obtain 
certification, applicants must pass the North Carolina state 
guardianship exam. We applied to NCGA using the same fake educational 
and professional backgrounds as in the other states and North Carolina 
addresses. NCGA did not conduct a criminal background or credit check, 
and did not verify our applicants' professional credentials. We 
studied for and passed the North Carolina Guardian Competency Exam, 
which covers guardianship laws and regulations in North Carolina, 
under the names of our fictitious applicants. Before the start of the 
exam, the proctor asked to see the photo identification for one of our 
fictitious applicants, but failed to recognize it as bogus Virginia 
driver's license. Additionally, the proctor failed to check the photo 
identification of our second fictitious applicant. Once we passed the 
test, the names of our fictitious applicants were listed on the NCGA's 
Web site as certified guardians. They also received identification 
badges attesting to their status. While North Carolina does not 
require guardians to be certified, according to NCGA officials, 
certification is held in high regard by the courts because it helps 
the guardian prepare for their role. However, NCGA officials told us 
that they do not perform criminal background checks or credit checks 
on applicants. 

As agreed with your office, unless you publicly announce the contents 
of this report earlier, we plan no further distribution until 30 days 
from the date of this letter. We will then send copies of this report 
to the Commissioner of Social Security, the Director of the Office of 
Personnel Management, and the Secretary of Veterans Affairs. In 
addition, the report is available at no charge on the GAO Web site at 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov]. 

Please contact me at (202) 512-6722 or kutzg@gao.gov if you have any 
questions concerning this report. Contact points for our Offices of 
Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last 
page of this report. 

Sincerely yours, 

Signed by: 

Gregory D. Kutz: 
Managing Director Forensic Audits and Special Investigations: 

[End of section] 

Appendix I: Scope and Methodology: 

To verify whether allegations of guardian abuse, neglect, or 
exploitation are widespread, we interviewed state investigators, 
attorneys, advocates for senior citizens, and family groups; reviewed 
past cases of abuse disclosed publicly on databases such as WestLaw, 
Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) and LexisNexis; 
reviewed federal and state court documents related to criminal and 
civil litigation; and sought leads from state investigators, 
attorneys, and senior citizen advocacy groups. Except for the case 
studies discussed below, we did not attempt to verify the facts 
related to the allegations we reviewed nor can we use information 
gathered from the case studies to project to or characterize all court 
appointed guardianships. 

To select our case studies, we searched for instances of guardianship 
abuse in which there was a criminal conviction or finding of civil or 
administrative liability in the last 15 years, though in some cases 
the abuse began much earlier. As part of the selection process, we 
focused on cases involving professional guardians, guardianship 
agencies caring for multiple incapacitated people or egregious cases 
of abuse by family members or other individuals serving as guardians. 
In addition, we considered factors such as geographic location, number 
of victims affected and whether the financial abuse involved federal 
funds. Ultimately, we selected 20 cases from 15 different states and 
the District of Columbia for further review. To the extent possible, 
we conducted interviews with related parties, including state and 
local court officials, victims, family members of victims, advocacy 
groups, and professional guardian certification organizations. 
Further, where applicable, we reviewed police reports, court 
investigations, financial records, and professional guardian 
disciplinary files. We also conducted searches to determine whether 
the abusive guardians in our case studies had previous criminal 
histories or financial problems, and we contacted probate courts to 
determine whether they are still serving as guardians today. In our 
case studies, we identified vulnerabilities in court oversight of 
guardianships, but we did not examine whether state laws and 
regulations have changed since the abuse occurred. To determine 
whether these guardians continued to receive federal benefits on 
behalf of their victims or others, we analyzed databases and case 
files from the Social Security Administration (SSA), Department of 
Veterans Affairs (VA), and the Office Performance Management (OPM). 
Further, we conducted interviews with the SSA, VA and OPM officials 
responsible for oversight of representative payees to gather 
information about the agencies' policies and procedures for 
appointing, overseeing and disciplining representative payees. 

To test the guardianship certification process, we identified states 
that have certification programs or require their guardians to obtain 
certification. Once we identified these states, we reviewed the 
current state statutes and legislation and the requirements necessary 
for obtaining certification. Using counterfeit documentation and 
fictitious educational and professional histories, GAO investigators 
created two fictitious identities. One identity used the Social 
Security number of a deceased individual and the other had a credit 
history showing thousands of dollars of debt and a very low credit 
score. Using these two identities, we applied to take the guardianship 
competency exams required for Illinois, Nevada, and North Carolina and 
guardianship training in New York in order to complete the 
certification requirements in these four states. We selected these 
four states based on potential vulnerabilities in the states' 
background checks and our ability to complete certification 
requirements within the timeframe of our investigation. For example, 
we selected states that did not conduct background checks with 
fingerprints, which provide more assurance of an applicant's identity 
than background checks without fingerprints. In addition, a 
fingerprint background check could potentially have identified our 
investigators. We did not test states in which applicants were 
required to spend multiple days attending training classes or states 
that had no scheduled examinations for guardians between December 2009 
and May 2010. To meet the different states' requirements for 
certification, we took the National Certified Guardian Exam, a state-
based certification exam, and completed a one-day guardianship 
training. We posed as family members and sent emails to court 
officials to determine what background or credit checks courts conduct 
on applicants for certification. 

[End of section] 

Appendix II: Summary of State Laws Related to Guardianships: 

The following list provides an overview of specific issues involving 
state laws in the 15 states and the District of Columbia, in which our 
case studies occurred. 

Alabama: 

* Provides - "The court shall exercise [its'] authority ... so as to 
encourage the development of maximum self-reliance and independence of 
the incapacitated person…" Ala. Code § 26-2A-105, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian required to report the condition of the ward and 
the ward's estate as ordered by the court on petition of any person 
interested in the ward's welfare. Ala. Code § 26-2A-78(b) (5), (2009). 

Alaska: 

* Provides - that a full guardian of an incapacitated person has the 
same powers and duties respecting the ward that a parent has 
respecting an unemancipated minor child. Alaska Stat. § 13.26.150(c), 
(2009). 

* Provides - guardian is to file a report with the court 90 days after 
appointment and then annually. The report is to include the wards 
present mental and physical condition, changes in capacity, services 
being provided and any significant actions taken by the guardian as 
well as a financial accounting. Guardian is to file an additional 
report should the court order it, the guardian is removed or 
terminated or there is a significant change in the wards condition. 
Alaska Stat. §§ 13.26.117 & 13.26.118, (2009). 

* Provides - incapacitated person retains all rights except those 
expressly limited by court order. Alaska Stat. §§ 13.26.090 & 
13.26.150(c) (4), (2009). 

Arizona: 

* Provides - "In exercising its appointment authority ... the court 
shall encourage the development of maximum self-reliance of the 
incapacitated person." Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 14-5304, (2009). 

* Provides - the guardian is to submit a written report to the court 
annually that addresses any major changes in the wards physical or 
mental condition, a summary of the services provided by the guardian 
and the date the ward was last seen by a doctor or nurse practitioner. 
Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 14.5315, (2009). 

California: 

* Provides - a distinction between guardians and conservatorships, 
generally limiting guardians to unmarried minors. As to 
conservatorships California provides "A limited conservatorship …shall 
be designed to encourage the development of maximum self-reliance and 
independence of the individual..." Cal. Civ. Prac. & Trust Proc. § 
25:14, (2009) and Cal. Prob. Code § 1801(d), (2009). 

* Provides - court shall review six months after appointment of 
conservator and also one year after appointment, thereafter annually. 
Cal. Prob. Code. § 1850(a) (1) & (2), (2009). 

* Provides - conservator recommends for or against disqualification 
from voting. Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 5357(c) (2009). 

Colorado: 

* Provides - "The court, whenever feasible, shall grant to a guardian 
only those powers necessitated by the ward's limitations and 
demonstrated needs and make appointive and other orders that will 
encourage the development of the ward's maximum self-reliance and 
independence." Colo. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 15-14-311(b)(2), (2009). 

* Provides - within 60 days after appointment guardian is to report to 
the court in writing on the condition of the ward, guardian's personal 
care plan for the ward, accounting of money and assets in guardian's 
control. Thereafter guardian is to report annually. Colo. Rev. Stat. 
Ann. § 15-14-317, (2009). 

Connecticut: 

* Provides - "The court may assign to a limited guardian the custody 
of the ward for the purpose of exercising any, but not all, of the 
following limited duties and powers, in order to assist the ward in 
achieving self-reliance: (1) To assure and consent to a place of abode 
outside the natural family home, (2) to consent to specifically 
designed educational, vocational or behavioral programs, (3) to 
consent to the release of clinical records and photographs, (4) to 
assure and consent to routine, elective and emergency medical and 
dental care, and (5) other specific limited powers to assure and 
consent to services necessary to develop or regain to the maximum 
extent possible the ward's capacity to meet essential requirements." 
Conn. Gen. Stat. Ann. § 45a-677(d), (2009). 

* Provides - such annual reports shall include significant changes in 
the capacity of the ward, services provided to the ward, significant 
actions taken by the guardian, significant problems encountered by the 
guardian and whether such guardianship should continue. Conn. Gen. 
Stat. Ann. § 45a-677(f)&(g), (2009). 

* Provides - no patient hospitalized or treated in a public or private 
facility for psychiatric disabilities shall be deprived the right to 
vote unless such patient has been declared incapable. Conn. Gen. Stat. 
Ann. § 17a-541, (2009). A guardian or conservator may file a petition 
to determine such individual's competency to vote. Conn. Gen. Stat. 
Ann. § 45a-703, (2009). 

District of Columbia: 

* Provides - "The court shall …encourage the development of maximum 
self-reliance and independence of the incapacitated individual." D.C. 
Code Ann. § 21-2044, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to report in writing to the court semi-annually 
on the condition of the ward and of the ward's estate. D.C. Code Ann. 
§ 21.2047(a)(5), (2009). 

Iowa: 

* The law is silent on how much self-reliance to place with the ward. 

* Provides - guardian to file initial report within 60 days of 
appointment thereafter annually. Report to include condition of the 
ward, activities, living arrangements, services, visits, etc. Iowa 
Code Ann. § 633.669, (2009). 

* Provides - if court appoints a guardian based on mental incapacity 
court shall make separate determination as to ward's competency to 
vote. Iowa Code Ann. § 633.556, (2009). 

Kansas: 

* Provides - "A guardian shall exercise authority only as necessitated 
by the ward's limitations." Kan. Stat. Ann. § 59-3075, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file written report annually in such form as 
the court may require. Kan. Stat. Ann. § 59.3083, (2009). 

Missouri: 

* Provides - The court "shall design the guardianship so as to 
encourage the development of maximum self-reliance and independence in 
the individual." Mo. Ann. Stat. § 475.080, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file report annually addressing number of 
contacts with the ward, date last seen by a doctor and the purpose, 
any major changes in the physical or mental condition of the ward and 
the need for continuation of guardianship. Mo. Ann. Stat. § 475.082, 
(2009). 

* Provides - no person who has a guardian of his estate or person by 
reason of mental incapacity shall be entitled to vote. Mo. Const. 
art.VIII, § 2. 

New Hampshire: 

* Provides - "No person shall be deemed incompetent to manage his 
affairs, to contract, to hold professional, occupational, or motor 
vehicle driver's licenses, to marry or to obtain a divorce, to vote, 
to make a will or to exercise any other civil right solely by reason 
of that person's admission to the mental health services system." N.H. 
Rev. Stat. Ann. § 135-C:56, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file an annual report with the court within 
90 days after the anniversary date of the guardian's appointment 
addressing medical condition, major hospitalizations, care and 
treatment, services, and living conditions of ward and need for 
continuation of guardianship. N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 464-A:35, (2009). 

* Provides - no deprivations "except as provided by law," which 
includes the right to vote. N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. §135-C:56, (2009). 

New York: 

* Provides - "Any guardian appointed under this article shall be 
granted only those powers which are necessary to provide for personal 
needs and/or property management of the incapacitated person in such a 
manner as appropriate to the individual and which shall constitute the 
least restrictive form of intervention…" N.Y. Mental Hyg. Law § 81.02, 
((2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file initial report within 90 days of 
appointment by the court, thereafter annually in the month of May. The 
report shall be in a form prescribed by the court and shall include 
any major changes in the physical or mental condition of the ward, 
statement by a physician, psychologist, nurse clinician, or social 
worker or other person who last examined the ward, resume of 
activities and need to continue. N.Y. Mental Hyg. Law §§ 81.30 & 
81.31, (2009). 

North Carolina: 

* Provides - "To the maximum extent of his capabilities, an 
incompetent person should be permitted to participate as fully as 
possible in all decisions that will affect him." N.C. Gen. Stat. 35A-
1201. 

* Provides - "If the clerk determines that the nature and extent of 
the ward's capacity justifies ordering a limited guardianship, the 
clerk may do so." N.C. Gen. Stat. 35A-1212. 

* Provides that the guardian shall file an initial status report 
within 6 months after being appointed followed by a second status 
report within one year, thereafter annually. N.C. Gen. Stat. 35A-1242. 

Oklahoma: 

* Provides - "The court shall ... encourage the development of maximum 
self-reliance and independence of the incapacitated or partially 
incapacitated person…".Okla. Stat. Ann. tit. 30, § 1-103, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file at least annually and address 
significant changes in the capacity of the ward, services provided, 
significant actions taken by guardian, problems encountered, and 
should appointment be continued. Okla. Stat. Ann. tit. 30, §§ 4-303, 4-
305 & 4-306, (2009). 

* Provides - person adjudged incapacitated shall be ineligible to 
register to vote. Okla. Stat. Ann. tit. 26, § 4-101, (2009). 

Texas: 

* Provides - "The court shall design the guardianship to encourage the 
development or maintenance of maximum self-reliance and independence 
in the incapacitated person." Tex. Prob. Code Ann. § 602, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file written report annually that addresses 
living arrangements, guardian visits, physical and mental health, 
unmet needs of the ward. Texas Prob. Code Ann. § 743, (2009). 

Washington: 

* Provides - "The legislature recognizes that people with incapacities 
have unique abilities and needs, and that some people with 
incapacities cannot exercise their rights or provide for their basic 
needs without the help of a guardian. However, their liberty and 
autonomy should be restricted through the guardianship process only to 
the minimum extent necessary to adequately provide for their own 
health or safety, or to adequately manage their financial affairs." 
Wash. Rev. Code Ann. § 11.88.005, (2009). 

* Provides - guardian to file report with court annually that 
addresses ward's medical and mental status, activities, changes in 
functional abilities, and identifies professionals who have assisted. 
Wash. Rev. Code Ann. § 11.92.043, (2009). 

* Provides - assignment of guardianship for incapacitated person does 
not result in loss of voting rights unless court determines person 
incompetent for purposes of voting. Wash. Rev. Code Ann. 11.88.010(5), 
(2009). 

[End of section] 

Appendix III: Additional Cases of Abuse, Neglect, and Financial 
Exploitation by Guardians: 

Table 3 provides a summary of ten additional case studies in which 
guardians abused, neglected or financially exploited their victims. 

Table 3: Additional Cases of Abuse, Neglect and Financial Exploitation 
by Guardians: 

Case: 11; 
Victim: 80 year old man; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: February 1998; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/Oklahoma; 
Case details: 
* An attorney took $37,000 from the victim's account, using some of 
the funds to buy into a get-rich-quick scheme with a bank in Nigeria; 
* According to the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruling, the attorney shared 
a law practice with his father, who had become incapacitated; 
* The attorney had borrowed money to pay his debts. When he heard 
about a bank in Nigeria promising $28 million for assistance setting 
up a corporation, he believed it was the solution to his financial 
problems; 
* When the Nigerian scammers asked him to send money, the attorney 
took his incapacitated father to the bank and had him withdraw money 
from the account of one of his wards. The attorney sent the funds to 
Nigeria; 
* The attorney resigned from the Oklahoma Bar in 1998 after it was 
discovered that he taken funds from a guardianship account for his own 
use; 
* In 2007, he applied for reinstatement to the Bar, claiming to have 
been rehabilitated through an organization he founded to help lawyers 
with character problems. He was readmitted and is now free to practice 
law and accept guardianship cases in Oklahoma. 

Case: 12; 
Victim: 71 year old woman with Alzheimer's; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: August 1996; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/Oklahoma; 
Case details: 
* An attorney converted $175,000 from an elderly woman's estate, but 
later testified that he had caused her no harm; 
* According to relatives, the victim had no children and lived 
frugally all her life. She asked a partner in a local law firm to be 
her conservator because she did not trust her brother, who had a 
gambling problem, to protect her assets; 
* An audit found that the attorney converted $44,600 for his income 
taxes, $39,000 in checks payable to himself and $1,600 for his 
international phone bills; 
* The audit also showed monthly payments of between $225 and $630 to 
the victim's brother and his wife for 7 years. Relatives said the 
attorney allowed the brother to move into the victim's house and paid 
his bills out of the victim's estate, even though the victim had 
sought a conservator to protect her estate from her brother; 
* Court records show that the attorney did not file a single annual 
accounting with the courts in ten years as conservator, and his final 
accounting omitted numerous unauthorized payments to himself. He 
admitted to the woman's relatives that he had paid himself whatever he 
felt he deserved in conservator's fees; 
* In 1996, the attorney received a 5 year deferred sentence for 
embezzlement by a trustee, an unusually light sentence for such a 
large loss, according to the prosecutor; 
* The attorney only paid $7,000 in restitution himself; his father, 
and later his fiancée, paid a total of $78,000 on his behalf. The 
remaining $90,000 identified by the audit had not been repaid by 2007, 
when he applied for reinstatement to the Bar; 
* The guardian's petition for reinstatement to the Bar was denied in 
October 2007. The court disagreed with his contention that the victim 
never suffered because "she always was provided for," finding that the 
attorney had violated her trust "when it mattered most." 

Case: 13; 
Victim: 84 year old WWII veteran; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: April 2004; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/North Carolina; 
Case details: 
* A federal indictment accused the guardian of embezzling $332,730 
over a 14 year period, during which he was allowed to continue serving 
as a guardian despite clear indicators of fraud; 
* The victim had been a ward of the court since his discharge from the 
military in 1946, according to the indictment. The guardian was the 
former president of the county bar association; 
* The guardian wrote checks to himself from the victim's estate and 
cashed a CD worth $163,000 for his personal benefit, according to the 
indictment. He also filed false accountings with the court and the VA 
to cover up his misappropriations. For example, he certified that the 
victim's bank balance was $356,142, when in fact the account had been 
depleted to $21,792; 
* The guardian also deposited the victim's funds into guardianship 
accounts for other wards to disguise his misappropriations from these 
individuals, according to the federal indictment; 
* Despite two suspensions of VA benefits for failure to file 
accountings, he was allowed to continue serving as the victim's 
guardian and representative payee; 
* After pleading guilty, the guardian served a 51 month prison 
sentence with 3 years parole according to his federal sentencing. As 
of June 2010, he had paid $3,112 of the $467,000 in court ordered 
restitution. 

Case: 14; 
Victim: 81 year old man, mentally incapacitated; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: May 2008; 
Guardian/state: Court appointed guardian/Texas; 
Case details: 
* The guardian, who was the victim's son, admitted to misappropriating 
some of his father's veterans' benefits for his own benefit, which a 
federal prosecutor contended was more than $300,000; 
* For example, according to the federal prosecutor, within a two-year 
period, the guardian used his father's estate to write himself $32,130 
in "business loans" and $201,483 in promissory notes. He used the 
proceeds of these supposed loans for his own personal benefit; 
* In 2006, the local county court that appointed the guardian filed a 
court motion seeking to remove the guardian for failing to reimburse 
the funds that he took from the victim's estate. The motion was later 
transferred to a local district court, which ultimately dismissed this 
motion in 2008 for lack of prosecution. As of June 2010, neither the 
county nor district courts have formally terminated the guardian; 
* In 2008, a federal court sentenced the guardian to 2 years and 6 
months in federal prison, 3 years supervision upon his release, and 
ordered him to pay more than $272,800 in restitution. As of June 2010, 
the guardian had only paid back $17,689 in restitution, according to a 
federal court, and still owes $255,112 in restitution. 

Case: 15; 
Victim: 90 year old woman with dementia; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: February 2000; 
Guardian/state: Licensed healthcare practitioner/Arizona; 
Case details: * A niece misappropriated $235,561 from her aunt's 
estate, according to an Arizona court. Although a plea agreement 
prohibited her from managing the victim's finances as a guardian in 
Arizona, the agreement stated that she would be allowed to continue to 
manage the victim's well-being as a guardian in California; 
* An Arizona court found that within a three-year period, the niece 
took hundreds of thousands of dollars from aunt's estate to give loans 
and pay for unauthorized gifts to her children; 
* The niece's attorney documented these transactions in two annual 
accountings that were submitted to the court, but the attorney never 
attempted to stop her or notify the court about her improprieties; 
* One annual accounting filed with the Arizona court documents that 
she managed $18,000 of the victim's SSA benefits in just one year. 
According to SSA data, the guardian was terminated as the victim's 
payee, but not for misuse, indicating that the abuse was not 
communicated to the SSA; 
* The niece was given 3 years probation and ordered to make full 
restitution. However, she only repaid $45,561 and her insurance 
company paid the remaining $190,000; 
* A state prosecutor stated that the victim moved to California, where 
she had no other relatives to care for her. Because of this, the 
niece's plea agreement stated that she would be permitted to serve as 
the victim's guardian in California, provided she had no authority 
over the victim's finances there. 

Case: 16; 
Victim: 74 year old mentally incapacitated man; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: October 2007; 
Guardian/state: Victim's son/New Hampshire; 
Case details: 
* The victim's son misappropriated $137,206 from his father, fled to 
American Samoa and escaped punishment for his actions; 
* Despite criminal charges of marijuana possession and disobeying a 
police officer, he was allowed to continue as guardian; 
* After the guardian quit his job and divorced his wife, he sought 
court permission to relocate his father to American Samoa and borrow 
$90,000 from the estate to finance a new business and marry his Samoan 
girlfriend, according to a court judgment and interviews. The court 
denied both requests; 
* The court removed him as guardian and ordered him to file a final 
accounting. Instead, the guardian fled the country with thousands from 
his father's estate. The bond company repaid the estate and obtained a 
default judgment against the guardian totaling $203,510; 
* According to the bond company's attorney, the guardian never faced 
criminal charges. Investigators hired by the company said they tracked 
the guardian to Pago Pago, American Samoa where he draws Social 
Security disability due to an injury sustained from falling out of a 
banana tree. In July 2009, a Samoan court ordered the guardian to pay 
back the bond company in $300 monthly payments. As of June 2010, the 
guardian has paid $3,300. 

Case: 17; 
Victim: 89 year old incapacitated woman; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: July 1995; 
Guardian/state: Court appointed guardian/Alabama; 
Case details: 
* An Alabama court found that a guardian's negligence enabled her 
attorney to embezzle almost $53,000 from the ward's estate; 
* The guardian testified that her attorney directed her to use a 
cashier's check to withdraw all the funds in the victim's account, 
approximately $53,000, and endorse the check over to him. He claimed 
that he would deposit the sum into an account with a higher interest 
rate; 
* After the attorney's death, the guardian said that she discovered 
that he had taken the funds for his own personal use; 
* In July 1995, the Alabama court held the guardian liable for the 
attorney's actions because she never demanded to see the attorney's 
bank statements, but instead believed that the attorney was taking 
care of all the guardianship duties for which she was responsible; 
* As a result of the guardian's negligence, the guardian's surety paid 
$61,472 in restitution, and the guardian paid nothing. 

Case: 18; 
Victim: 80 year old woman with dementia; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: September 2008; 
Guardian/state: Victim's niece/Arizona; 
Case details: 
* A niece misappropriated more than $150,000 from her elderly aunt's 
estate; 
* The niece was appointed as guardian less than 5 years after filing 
for Chapter 13 bankruptcy twice and being arrested numerous times for 
and pleading guilty to issuing numerous bad checks. Further, the court 
appointed her despite the victim's attorney's objection due to his 
belief that the guardian was not close to her aunt; 
* Further, the guardian received court permission to sell the victim's 
ranch to pay for her medical bills, provided that she would obtain a 
bond to protect the victim's estate. The guardian, however, was unable 
to obtain the required bond due to poor credit and a prior bankruptcy, 
information she had disclosed to the bonding company before; 
* After the sale, the guardian misappropriated $150,000 from the 
victim's estate, according to an Arizona court, leaving the victim in 
danger of losing her housing and medicine, according to her court-
appointed attorney; 
* SSA data shows that the niece served as the aunt's representative 
payee, giving her access to the victim's Social Security benefits. In 
2005, an Arizona court held the niece's insurance company liable for 
her actions; 
* The court ordered $198,721 in restitution against the guardian, for 
which the surety was held liable and paid. In addition, the court 
ordered that "treble damages" be awarded because the guardian breached 
her fiduciary duties to the victim, thereby increasing the total 
restitution amount to $596,165, amounting to three times the amount 
for which the surety was held liable. As of May 2010, the guardian has 
failed to pay the remaining $397,443 in restitution that is due. 

Case: 19; 
Victim: 92 year old victim, with significant memory loss and limited 
judgment; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: May 2009; 
Guardian/state: Attorney/New York; 
Case details: 
* A New York attorney manipulated his elderly and mentally 
incapacitated client into revoking her trust in order to generate 
nearly $74,000 in excessive fees for himself; 
* The New York Supreme Court found that the guardian convinced the 
victim to appoint him as her trustee, power of attorney and health 
care proxy. Just two months later, her doctor found that she had 
limited judgment due to memory loss and was vulnerable to financial 
exploitation; 
* The attorney had the victim to revoke her trust, generating $74,000 
in excessive commissions and fees for himself, and convinced the court 
that the victim had revoked the trust voluntarily, despite the 
doctor's diagnosis that she had impaired judgment; 
* The court recommended that it could either appoint the attorney to 
serve as the victim's guardian, or allow the attorney to continue to 
serve as the victim's trustee instead. However, in the end, it allowed 
both to occur, appointing the attorney to serve as the victim's 
guardian, and permitting the revocable trust to continue; 
* Then, the attorney had the victim to revoke her trust, generating 
$74,000 in excessive commissions and fees for himself, and convinced 
the court that the victim had revoked the trust voluntarily, despite 
the doctor's diagnosis that she had impaired judgment; 
* He later sought to terminate the guardianship, requesting more than 
$27,000 in additional guardianship commissions and legal fees, which 
the court denied as excessive. In May 2009, the court denied these 
fees because he had already "collected nearly every conceivable fee" 
from the woman's estate; 
* According to the guardian's final accounting, the SSA, unlike the 
court that appointed the guardian, was not made aware of the victim's 
death before it had already paid hundreds of dollars in Social 
Security benefits to the guardian, months after the victim died. 

Case: 20; 
Victim: 15 elderly victims; 
Date of conviction, settlement, plea agreement, or finding of 
liability: December 2001; 
Guardian/state: Professional guardian agency/Washington; 
Case details: 
* A professional guardianship agency responsible for 59 incapacitated 
wards was found to have committed "persistent and repeated" 
guardianship reporting violations; 
* A court appointed guardian ad litem found that the professional 
guardian agency failed to notify the court that 7 of its wards had 
passed away, and in one of these cases the court was not notified 
until 2 years after the ward's death; 
* In addition, the agency had no system in place to remind them when 
mandatory annual accountings were due and instead waited for an 
overdue notice from the court to submit reports; 
* The agency was found to be non-compliant in 15 cases. The guardian 
ad litem recommended the agency to continue to limit the number of 
wards under its care and regain compliance within 30 days; 
* The agency came into compliance and Certified Professional Guardian 
Board records indicate that the guardian agency continues to operate 
today with 42 wards; 
* The agency currently acts as representative payee for 28 wards. 

Source: GAO. 

[End of table] 

[End of section] 

Appendix IV: Summary of State Certification Requirements: 

Table 4 below provides a summary of the state certification 
requirements. 

Table 4: Summary of State Certification Requirements: 

State: Alaska; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* License; 
* Private Professional Guardian/Conservator; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* Yes; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* National exam[A]; 
* No; 
Other requirements: Professional Guardians/Conservators must: 
* Be 21 years of age; 
* Have two or more years of professional client casework experience or 
a least an associate degree in human services, social work, 
psychology, sociology, gerontology, special education; 
or has six months' employment experience in a position involving 
financial management, or has at least an associate's degree in 
accounting; 
* Must be certified by the Center for Guardianship Certification. 

State: Arizona; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* License; 
* Fiduciaries (Guardians and Conservators); 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* Yes; 
* Yes; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* State exam; 
* Must attend and complete a session on the roles and responsibilities 
of the certified professional fiduciary; 
Other requirements: Fiduciaries must: 
* Be 21 years of age; 
* Be US citizens; 
* Not be a convicted felon; 
* Not have been civilly liable in an action that involved fraud, 
misrepresentation, material omission, misappropriation, theft or 
conversion; 
* Must possess one of the following: a high school degree or GED 
equivalent and 3 years experience as a guardian, conservator or 
personal representative; a bachelor degree and 1 yr of experience as a 
guardian, conservator, or personal representative, a high school 
degree or GED equivalent and a certificate of completion from a 
paralegal program and 2 years experience as a guardian, conservator, 
or personal representative; a high school degree or GED equivalent and 
a certificate of completion from an accredited educational program 
designed to qualify a person as a fiduciary and 2 years work 
experience as a guardian, conservator, or personal representative; 
a juris doctorate degree and currently admitted to practice law, 
active and in good standing; a high school degree or GED equivalent 
with evidence of an appointment as a foreign fiduciary and 3 years 
experience as a guardian, conservator, or personal representative; 
a high school degree or GED equivalent and certified as a registered 
master guardian by the National Guardianship Association. 

State: California; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* License; 
* Fiduciaries (Guardians and Conservators); 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* Yes; 
* Yes; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* State exam; 
* Must complete 30 hours of prelicensing education courses provided by 
an educational program; 
Other requirements: To become licensed, fiduciaries must: 
* Be at least 21 years of age; 
* Be a US citizen, or legally admitted to the US; 
* Not have been convicted of a crime substantially related the 
qualifications, functions, or duties of a fiduciary; 
* Not have engage in fraud or deceit in applying for license; 
* Not have engaged in dishonesty, fraud, or gross negligence in 
performing the functions or duties of a professional fiduciary; 
* Have not been removed as a professional fiduciary by a court for 
breach of trust; 
* Agree to adhere to the Professional Fiduciaries Code of Ethics and 
to all statutes and regulations; 
* Must possess at least one of the following; a baccalaureate degree 
from a college or university accredited by a nationally recognized 
accrediting body or a higher level of education; an associate's degree 
from a college or university accredited by a nationally recognized 
accrediting body or a higher level of education and at least three 
years experience working as a professional fiduciary or working with 
substantive fiduciary responsibilities; or at least 5 years of 
experience working as a professional fiduciary or working with 
substantive fiduciary responsibilities. 

State: Florida; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Registration; 
* Professional Guardianship; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* Yes; 
* Yes; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* State exam; 
* Must obtain 40 hours of instruction and training within 1 year of 
appointment; 
Other requirements: To become licensed, professional guardians must: 
* Be competent; 
* Be a resident of Florida; 
* Not have been convicted of a felony, judicially determined to have 
committed abuse, abandonment, or neglect against a child; 
* Must pass a Florida Professional Guardian competency exam; 
* Must obtain 40 hours of instruction and training within 1 year of 
appointment; 
* Must register with Statewide Public Guardianship Office within 30 
days of bond anniversary date; 
* Must show proof of a $50,000 blanket bond. 

State: Illinois; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Politically Appointed Guardians; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* National exam; 
* No; 
Other requirements: Must be appointed by the Governor. 

State: Nevada; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Professional Guardians; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* National exam; 
* No; 
Other requirements: A professional guardian must: 
* Be competent; 
* Must be a resident of Nevada; 
* Have not been convicted of a felony, unless the court determines 
that such conviction should not disqualify the person from serving as 
the guardian of the ward; 
* Have not been judicially determined to have committed abuse, neglect 
or exploitation of a child, spouse, parent or other adult; 
* Have not been suspended for misconduct or disbarred from the 
practice or law; the practice of accounting, or any other professional 
which involves the management or sale of money, investments, 
securities or real property and requires licensure from the state; 
* Must have three or more unrelated wards. 

State: New Hampshire; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Professional Guardians; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No[B]; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* National exam; 
* No; 
Other requirements: A professional guardian must: 
* Be a national certified guardian or national master guardian with 
the Center for Guardianship Certification (CGC) and maintain this 
status; 
* Be a resident of New Hampshire or have a resident agent; 
* Adhere to the Standards of Practice published by the National 
Guardianship Association (NGA); 
* Adhere to the Model Code of Ethics published by NGA; 
* Provide a bond that is acceptable to the court; 
* Carry malpractice insurance and provide proof of insurance on an 
annual basis to the administrative judge of the probate court; 
* Comply with all requirements of applicable statutes, regulations, 
and court rules and orders; 
* Disclose to the court any conflicts of interest upon discovery of 
such conflict; 
* Provide necessary and appropriate quality guardianship services as 
dictated by ward's needs; 
* Certify that the guardian will maintain generally accepted standards 
of accounting on all funds of all wards in their custody or their 
control; 
* Adhere to billing and annual report requirements; 
* Consult with a national certified guardian or national master 
guardian that has been approved by Probate Court Administrative Judge 
for a least the first two cases; 
* Be approved by Probate Court Administrative Judge; 
* Be subject to removal from the list of approved guardians for non-
compliance. 

State: New York; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Professional and Nonprofessional Guardians; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* No exam; 
* Must complete a one-day 6 hour training course; 
Other requirements: To apply the guardian must: 
* Be 18 years of age; 
* Not have a prior felony conviction, or have been convicted of a 
misdemeanor within the last 5 years; 
* Not be a an active or former judge of the Unified Court System of 
the State of new York, or a spouse, sibling, parent or child of such 
judge within two years from the date that the judge left judicial 
office; 
* Not be an employee of Unified Court System of the State of New York 
or a spouse, sibling, parent, or child of an employee who hold a 
position of salary grade JG24 or equivalent; 
* Not be a person who has served as a campaign chair, coordinator, 
manager, treasurer or finance chair for a candidate for judicial 
office, or the spouse, sibling, parent or child of that person, or 
anyone associated with the law firm of that person for a period of two 
years following the judicial election; 
* Not be an attorney currently disbarred or suspended from the 
practice of law. 

State: North Carolina; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* N/A[C]; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* State exam; 
* No; 
Other requirements: To apply the guardian must: 
* Disclose misdemeanor or felony convictions; 
* Disclose actions of fraud, misrepresentation, material omission, 
misappropriation, theft, or conversion where the guardian has been 
found civilly or criminally liable; 
* Must have at least 5 years of guardianship services experience. 

State: Oregon; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* N/A[D]; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* National and State exam; 
* Must complete 32 hours of education/training with at least 3 hours 
in the areas of legal, ethics, health/medical, social and financial 
services; 
Other requirements: A professional guardian/conservator must: 
* Be 21 years of age; 
* Have a Bachelor's degree from an accredited educational institution 
with a minimum of 1 year experience as a fiduciary or court-appointed 
trustee with 2 or more clients that are unrelated to you or be the 
person primarily responsible for fiduciary duties under the direction 
of an Oregon Certified Professional Fiduciary or have an Associate's 
degree from an accredited educational institution with 3 years 
relevant experience in the field of legal, health, social, or 
financial services with 1 year experience as a fiduciary or court-
appointed trustee with 2 or more clients that are unrelated to you or 
be the person primarily responsible for fiduciary duties under the 
direction of an Oregon Certified Professional Fiduciary; 
* Must not have been convicted, plead guilty, or no contest to a 
felony; 
* Must not have been found civilly or criminally liable for an action 
of fraud, moral turpitude, misrepresentation, material omission, 
misappropriation, theft, or conversion; 
* Must not have been relieved of responsibilities as a guardian or 
conservator; 
* Must not have been found liable of subrogation action by an 
insurance or bonding agent; 
* Must be bonded in accordance with state statutes and local practice; 
* Must review and understand the Oregon Revised statutes (ORS), the 
GCA of Oregon Standards of Practice, The NGA Standards of Practice, 
and NGA Code of Ethics. 

State: Texas; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Professional guardians and public guardians; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* Yes; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* State exam; 
* No[E]; 
Other requirements: A guardian must: 
* Be 21 years of age; 
* Must have a high school diploma or GED equivalent; 
* Must have two years of relevant experience related to guardianship 
or have at least a four-year degree in a field related to guardianship. 

State: Utah; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Specialized Care Professional; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* No; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* National exam; 
* No; 
A specialized care professional must: 
* Be certified or designated as a provider of guardianship services by 
a nationally recognized guardianship accrediting organization; 
* Licensed by or registered with the Division of Occupational and 
Professional Licensing as a health care provider including, but not 
limited to, a registered nurse, a social service worker, certified 
social worker, or clinical social worker, a marriage and family 
therapist, a physician, or a psychologist, or has been approved by the 
court as one with specialized training and experience in the care of 
incapacitated persons. 

State: Washington; 
Type of program offered/requirements apply to: 
* Certification; 
* Professional Guardians; 
Fingerprint background check/credit checks: 
* Yes; 
* No; 
Exam/training requirements: 
* No exam; 
* Must complete a 6 month program that includes 56 hours of classroom 
sessions and 34 hours of online distance learning.
A professional guardian must: 
* Be 18 years of age; 
* Have an Associate's degree from an accredited institution and have 4 
years experience working in a position relevant to guardianship 
services or have a Bachelor's degree from an accredited institution 
and two years experience working in a position relevant to 
guardianship services; 
* Be competent; 
* Have not been convicted of a felony or misdemeanor involving moral 
turpitude; 
* A resident of Washington; 

Source: GAO. 

[A] Center for Guardianship Certification requires applicants to be at 
least 21 years of age, possess a high school degree or GED equivalent; 
have one year of relevant work experience related to guardianship or 
the following educational requirements: (1) a degree in a field 
related to guardianship, or (2) completion of a course curriculum or 
specifically related to guardianship approved by the CGC; not been 
convicted on a felony; not been civilly liable in an action that 
involved fraud, misrepresentation, material omission, 
misappropriation, moral turpitude, theft, or conversion; not been 
relieved of responsibilities as a guardian by a court, employer, or 
client for actions involving fraud, misrepresentation, material 
omission, misappropriation, theft, or conversion; must be bonded in 
accordance with state statutes and local practice; and not found 
liable in a subrogation action by an insurance or bonding agent. 

[B] New Hampshire conducts a criminal background check on professional 
guardians, but does not include fingerprints. 

[C] The North Carolina Guardianship Association offers guardianship 
certification; however, certification is optional and is not required 
by law. 

[D] The Oregon Guardian/Conservator Association, through the Center 
for Guardianship Certification, offers guardianship certification; 
however, certification is optional and is not required by law. 

[E] Certified guardians must complete 12 hours of continuing education 
during the two-year certification period. Provisionally certified 
guardians are bound by the same continuing education rules as 
certified guardians. 

[End of table] 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] In 2009, the U.S. Census Bureau projected that the population of 
adults 65 and older will increase from 40.3 million in 2010 to 64.3 
million in 2025. 

[2] According to U.S. Census, in 2008, 1 in 3 adults aged 65 and older 
lived alone compared to 1 in 10 adults between the ages of 15 and 64. 

[3] We define "seniors" as adults aged 50 and older, the population 
served by AARP, formerly known as the American Association of Retired 
Persons. 

[4] State and local agencies include a Public Guardian, which is a 
publicly-funded state or county office that may be appointed to serve 
as guardian, and state and local Offices of Aging, which provide a 
variety of services to seniors and may be appointed to serve as a 
guardian. 

[5] Incapacitated persons may include both seniors and younger adults, 
but this report focuses on cases involving seniors. 

[6] For convenience, we use the term "guardian," even though some 
states use other terms or differentiate between an individual or group 
that controls only the finances and one that controls the ward's 
personal affairs, including health decisions. Court-appointed 
guardians may be family members or professionals. 

[7] GAO, Collaboration Needed to Protect Incapacitated Elderly People, 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-04-655] (Washington, D.C.: 
July 13, 2004); and Little Progress in Ensuring Protection for 
Incapacitated Elderly People, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-1086T] (Washington, D.C.: September 
7, 2006). 

[8] OPM manages retirement programs for federal employees. 

[9] A fingerprint background check could potentially have identified 
our investigators 

[10] The court can also appoint a guardian for incapacitated minors or 
adults less than 50 years of age, but we have limited our 
investigation to cases where at least one victim was 50 years or older 
at the time of the abuse. 

[11] For convenience, we use the term "certification," even though 
some states require their guardians to register or become licensed 
prior to appointment. 

[12] Two additional states require guardians to complete training 
after they are appointed by the court. However, these states do not 
require a guardian to obtain certification. 

[13] We defined "representative payees" to include VA fiduciaries, OPM 
representative payees, and SSA representative payees who receive 
federal benefits on behalf of incapacitated beneficiaries. 

[14] SSA officials said that on-site state mental heath facilities 
that serve as representative payees are not required to file this form. 

[15] See [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-1086T] and 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-04-655]. 

[16] Closed criminal and civil cases with a finding of liability would 
be considered proven instances of abuse by guardians; however, we did 
not examine the facts and circumstances surrounding all closed cases 
we identified. Those that we did not examine are included in this 
section. 

[17] In Alaska, a court visitor is appointed when a petition for 
guardianship or conservatorship is filed to investigate involved 
persons and the situation and recommend to the court an appropriate 
resolution. Court visitors are also reappointed every 3 years to 
review and report to the court regarding existing guardianship and 
conservatorship cases. The state's Office of Public Advocacy is 
required by Alaska statute to provide court visitor services. 

[18] Staff employed by the Public Guardian's Office are responsible 
for making medical and financial decisions for wards, serving as a 
representative payee for the wards' federal benefits, and taking care 
of the wards' personal needs. 

[19] The $1,170 represents an averaged total of monthly federal 
pension and Social Security benefits for the elderly woman. 

[20] These certification programs were administered by the nonprofit 
Center for Guardianship Certification (Illinois, Nevada), the 
nonprofit North Carolina Guardianship Association, and the New York 
Office of Court Administration. 

[21] Certification programs in 6 of the 13 states conduct fingerprint 
background checks to verify an applicant's identity. 

[22] Illinois requires politically appointed guardians to obtain 
certification. Each county in Illinois has a public guardian appointed 
by the governor to serve wards in that county if appointed by the 
court. With the exception of Cook County, public guardians are not 
state employees and may make their living as a guardian or in some 
other line of work. Nevada requires guardians with three or more 
unrelated wards to obtain certification. 

[End of section] 

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