Joe Biden is the most obvious example of shameless elder abuse. Unfortunately, in an aging America, he is not alone.
Joe Biden should either be at home enjoying his six or seven grandchildren or in a nursing home regaling others of his knighthood, graduation as valedictorian from Harvard Law School and single-handed capture of a Vietnamese village. Instead, he is put through his minimal paces of making announcements or speaking very briefly to wildly friendly interviewers. The few times he speaks, he generally says something unintelligible or ridiculous; the few times he walks, he either falls or comes close to doing so. Those who ran Biden in 2020, keep him going as president, and push him to run again in 2024, should all be arrested and prosecuted for elder abuse. Jill Biden clearly finds “First Lady” more appealing than just “Dr. Jill,” and people who could not win a popularity contest in their own families find having a barely-there president useful for them to push agendas that most Americans would oppose. Unfortunately, elder abuse does not stop at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. It is a huge problem, especially as America’s population gets older.
We witnessed firsthand with my parents how many of those around them took advantage of them. My parents retired from Chicago to Las Vegas to avoid the cold weather and high taxes of the former. As my mother became more home-bound, they cycled through caregivers. Some did not show up; one paid her phone bill with my dad’s credit card. In the end, they found someone to be with Mom. That which initially seemed like a good match morphed into unaccountable hours and higher and higher hourly fees for no apparent reason. In the last year of Mom’s life, the caregiver made over $100,000, though on our visits to Las Vegas, the hours she was actually in the house had no relationship to the numerous hours she billed. Her husband actually went to a lawyer, apparently to change Dad’s trust. I would guess that they wanted to have whatever was in the will for my brother and myself be transferred to a new trust with them as the beneficiaries. We got in touch with the lawyer he met, who did not help this fellow change the trust documents. When I confronted the husband about going to the lawyer, he claimed that he just wanted to make sure that Dad’s trust was all in order. Sure.
Other neighbors found my dad to be generous and took advantage of his generosity. One hauled off a couch that my mother had promised us was ours. When I asked about the couch, he said that Dad said he could take it. Dad had dementia but his doctor refused to sign off on declaring him cognitively incompetent though I was present when he could not tell the doctor what day of the week or month of the year it was. Had he declared him incompetent, far fewer people would have been able to take advantage of him, as my brother would have had power-of-attorney on all matters related to finances and the contents of the trust. The same neighbor took down a Ring camera we had installed to see who was coming and going from the house. One day in May of last year, the Ring camera with the best view of the area in front of the house went dark. I thought that it was a WiFi issue and I would take care of it on our next visit. When my brother came in July, I asked him to reset the Ring WiFi connection. “There is no camera here, only an outdoor light fixture.” This neighbor did not like that we could keep tabs of his entering and leaving, oftentimes with boxes or other items in his hand. So, he first turned the electricity off for the camera. When I glued the light-switch powering the system in the on position, he simply removed the Ring in the middle of the night. He always called himself a friend of my father and was a pallbearer at the funeral. Such shenanigans infuriated my wife. I told her that if we want them to end, then we should move to Las Vegas. There is a limit to what we can do via Ring, phone calls and visits every few months.
Next we move over to a guy who did some yard work for Dad. As my Dad lived his last years alone and was extremely lonely, he was grateful for anyone who would come by and have a beer with him. So this guy would come by at night for hours at a time. Dad insisted on no cameras in the house, and though we really wanted to know what took place inside, we honored his request. Shortly after this guy showed up nightly, money started to disappear. Dad's banker told me that in the space of two weeks $12,000 vanished from the house. They installed a safe, but she found it busted open. They pleaded with Dad’s bank to limit his withdrawals but the bank said that they could not. He would go to the casino to play the cheap electronic poker machines. After bowling at the same hotel, we would sit with him, and each play was 50 cents, a dollar max. While he was sure that he went through $20 in one evening, bank statements showed withdrawals at the casino of $800 or more. The same banker tried to get access to video in the casino to see if he was using all of the money or if someone was taking part of the cash from him. They said that they do not show the video to anyone, including the police. In the end, the banker took his ATM card and provided him with money, but even that would disappear without a full explanation.
As for the police, I spent a few hours during one visit at a local station to lodge a complaint against the characters described above, especially the guy who did the yard work, as he seemed to be the most present when the large amount of money disappeared. The staff at the police department was very sympathetic, and as theirs was the station closest to Sun City, they knew lots of stories of caregivers and others who simply walked off with the money and property of those in their care. Sometimes, it was legitimate; other times it was a signature from a client with dementia on a brand new will document. In the end, our case was assigned to a detective who closed it for lack of evidence. If the neighbor had left the Ring in place, we might have been able to tie the disappearing money to those who came into and out of the house on the same days, but the thefts occurred after the Ring was disabled. The same banker said that she personally gave Dad $2,000 in cash and the next day she found $1 in his wallet. He had no idea how much money he had had or where it had gone.
Even after death, abuse did not end. Many items from the house, including Dad’s car, vanished. When I made inquiries, everyone used the magic “Dad said” to claim that he personally had told that so-and-so was to get the car, and so-and-so was to get some artwork, etc. We came the day after Dad’s passing, and the house was upside down. We did not know what my brother had taken (my dad always encouraged us to take anything from the house we wanted) or what Dad's acquaintances and neighbors took for themselves before our arrival. They conveniently shut down the WiFi feeding the Ring while they were taking things out of the house in preparation for Dad’s move from Las Vegas to a home in Dallas. After intense negotiations, we received a painting back from someone who had known Dad for the 20 years they had been in Vegas. My father had promised this painting to my wife and after much complaining about things that disappeared before we arrived, we did get it back.
Elders from Joe Biden to Joe Anybody are being abused. When Germany first set up a social security system, only 1 percent of its population reached the age of 65. Today, people are living actively into their 90s and beyond. As much wealth has been accumulated and saved by older Americans, they are prime targets for those who wish to take advantage of their often lonely or difficult conditions. As for my dad, someone prescribed him a Xanax tablet which he took on the flight from Vegas to Dallas to live closer to my brother. He fell asleep on the plane, his first flight in over 20 years. When he got to Texas he never woke up. America’s elders are her treasure. They gave their all to make America the greatest country in the world. We should take great care of them and also protect them from those who would rob them of their belongings as well as their personal dignity.
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