Alee Carrino-Ohio
What I’ve learned over the past 5 years being a National Guardianship Reform Advocate observing more than 50 probate guardianship hearings, both in person and zoom, across the country, is that this isn’t just an isolated issue. It’s a systemic crisis affecting millions. Families are being ensnared in a corrupt system that profits from the exploitation of human lives and estates. How do I know? My mother was put into a lockdown unit with an ankle monitor. She appeared to be overmedicated, neglected, and abused. As a concerned daughter I filed for emergency guardianship in 2020, when she almost died from sepsis. I spent thousands of dollars trying to save my mom’s life. I couldn’t free her. She was being isolated. Even though I was a nurse’s aide, I wasn’t allowed to take her out of the facility for any reason. For 5 years she was in two separate facilities from February 6, 2019, until she died January 15, 2024.
One judge determines the fate of an American citizen without hearing from the person, or seeing any of the evidence, and yet continues to make unjust rulings that negatively impact a person’s life and their family forever. The American Bar Association realizes there’s a problem and yet, regrettably, most fail to obey their oath as law officers of the court. I believe this abusive guardianship system should be abolished and end the unchecked power of qualified immunity. It isn’t about helping others but using courts as tools for human and estate trafficking. Families deserve the fundamental right to care for their loved ones without interference from profit-driven state actors who operate without oversight or consequences.
Geralyn Lambou-Florida
My parents lived in Florida for over 20 years. Our father (93) was diagnosed with dementia and allegedly influenced against his will by a group of elder care professionals, doctors, guardians, and lawyers who placed him into an undisclosed facility. His rights were taken away. He was isolated for over three years, and he died under guardianship as a ‘Ward’ of the State. The family was notified two months after his death. We fought a losing battle to honor his end-of-life wishes, expressed to his family long before his mental decline. He’d adamantly expressed his desire to stay in his home until his death and be free to engage in horticulture projects.
Even though we’ve gone through this dreadful nightmare, I find it hard to believe this happened to my family. The judges in our case have always ruled in their favor, despite high fees, laws broken, and many glaring mistakes. They successfully kept an elderly man away from his family in the last years of life. They kept us from visiting, saying goodbye, and mourning his death. They displayed no regard for the lifetime bonds his children and grandchildren had with him. Before this, I believed in the judicial process, but no more. It seems to us we’ve experienced a rigged system where elders are easily taken away from their loved ones and taken advantage of. We were robbed of precious time with our father in his final years and are still fighting in court for what little remains of the estate.
Dean Sallas- Illinois
Dean Sallas is an honorable veteran who served in the US Army with the Combat Engineers and in the Army Post office from 1960-66. He’s been denied visitation with his wife of fifty years through court appointed guardianship. Dean, in his own words…
“My wife and I are both in our 80’s. We were successful in our careers and 57-year marriage together in Illinois. My wife was an educator and taught 5th grade, a very sought after teacher. I was a real-estate agent, property manager with multi-million dollars in assets. We lived on our investments and earned income. We raised a son and daughter and put them through university with no loans.
At the beginning of 2006, a year before her retirement, while mentoring 3 other teachers, my wife suffered a cranial aneurysm, a stroke. She had enough sick leave days to last through the end of the school year in 2007. She survived an operation and at retirement she applied for her pension and so did our children. The Illinois teachers’ retirement system said too many people applied, stopped the pension, and suggested a guardian to determine where the pension should be sent. This landed us in the hands of the Probate court. Our son went to court to be her guardian. In 2010, the judge appointed one of their own as Public Guardian. My doctor suggested we should go for mental and physical evaluations, which we did. My wife went to two doctors, a PhD in psychological testing, and a psychiatrist MD. They found her competent and in no need of a guardian. I went to court and applied for her restoration, to free her from guardianship. We had a trial Oct 30.
Dec 2018: Even though I had been adjudged fully qualified through a PhD and Psychiatric testing, and people from discussion groups, her computer mastery class, and others who interacted with her within the community testified to her competence, neither my son, daughter, nor myself were appointed by the court, and she wasn’t restored, though each mental health professional had tested, and found her competent twice, a year apart. We lived in our home under their control for thirteen years. They found it to be acceptable living conditions. During this time, I retired and ran out of savings. The court controlled our monies, received the bills and agreed to pay our mortgage and utilities out of her $7,000.00 monthly retirement funds. Every year since 2010, they came every three months to check on the smoke detectors and furnace.
Once, when we were away, they came and said the refrigerator had rotten food and a toilet wasn’t working properly. We had several refrigerators, freezers, and toilets, all operational. That afternoon, we were told they’d gotten a court order to remove my wife from the house. This upset her so badly she checked herself into the hospital. A week later they showed up with a court order and removed her. My lawyer, my son and I weren’t allowed to know where she was. She was temporarily moved to my daughter’s house. I was allowed to call for a couple months. Then, she was moved to an assisted living facility with no visitation. They stopped paying our mortgage and utilities. Our house of fifty years was foreclosed on, losing more than half a million in equity. Everything we owned was gone. I believe the court was in violation of several laws including Illinois Statute. 755 ILCS 5/11a – 22.
I’m an 88-year-old veteran suffering emotional trauma, missing my wife, fighting to be reunited. Stay away from guardianship! A foundation recently put me up in a motel for three months. They stopped paying. I’m living in my current home, a 2005 Toyota minivan, for over three years in the summer heat and winter snow.
Beverly Shaw-Missouri
My husband suffered a stroke the day after Thanksgiving, November 2022. After a long stay at the hospital and a good nursing home for rehab, he was at home recovering. I’ve been taking excellent care of him doing physical and occupational therapy, giving him daily baths, keeping records of his meds, taking him to doctor appointments. I took him downtown every day and would talk about what we saw and who we talked to as a means of mind and memory exercise. He regained physical and mental health. We were back to resuming a happy life.
He wanted to go on a vacation after being cooped up for so long. We stopped off in Michigan and visited his hometown in Indiana. This is where our nightmare started. During our visit, in the extreme August summer heat he got dehydrated, so I took him to the local hospital for IV fluids. Medical intervention didn’t go well. Even though I had medical power of attorney we became entangled in a legal web in Indiana leading to a court appointed guardianship. They claimed I wasn’t taking care of my husband and he’s staying in guardianship permanently. I believe this to be a wrongful confinement far from where we lived in Missouri, what I call medical kidnapping. They took all my rights away, confiscated our bank account, and placed him in an Indiana nursing home. If there is any neglect or abuse
going on I’m not able to confirm my suspicions. I haven’t been
permitted to see him in nine months. My only hope to get him
back home was to give our son guardianship, but our
relationship was estranged.
In desperation, and love for my husband, I loaded up my van and went on an extraordinary journey to New York. I drove 15 hours, loaded with pictures, flyers, and his two emotional support goats, to get help from the media. I camped out in Rockefeller Center for two weeks, talking about my plight to whoever would listen. I got into the New York Times, WCBS Radio, Channel 12 Westchester News. SEE Blaise Gomez-Westchester News. 17 I raised $36,000 and hired a lawyer and fought for almost a year, conserving money for the legal battle, and to feed my goats, by eating only once a day. All together I spent $43,000 on attorneys. As soon, as I ran out of money, they separated us. I need to hire an attorney again, but that costs more money. I’m sixty-six years old, sleeping in my 2014 Hyundai Sonata van with my husband’s two goats, Marshmallow and Brownie. This isn’t the way I pictured my retirement years. I’m not done and will not stop till I get my beloved husband back home where he belongs and deserves to be. I love him! I’ll do whatever it takes.
https://westchester.news12.com/missouri-woman-travels-more-than-
1000- miles-to-ny-to-seek-help-reuniting-with-her-husband
Rebecca Harber-Georgia
Our nightmare began when we visited a rehab facility in Florida after my husband of thirty years suffered a stroke. When he was admitted it was determined he required a CPAP machine at night. The clinic referred him to a hospital in Florida, where I, Rebecca, expected to be trained on the CPAP machine to care for him at home in Georgia. During the eight days he was admitted, things went horribly wrong! I was falsely accused of removing the CPAP machine. APS was called. I was arrested and held for four hours on false charges. My rights as a medical durable power of attorney, healthcare surrogate, temporary guardian, and permanent guardian of my dying husband were disregarded, as was my status as estate administrator. I was denied access to court records and hearings involving my husband’s well-being. My access and visitation were denied during the final days of my husband’s life.
I believe all this was to hide the true causes of my husbands’ death, revealed in autopsy. Apparently, the court presumed I was guilty of outrageous conduct, a charge that was never proven. No evidence was presented to the court of assault, neglect, or not properly taking care of him. The Department of Children and Families (DCF) in Florida admitted they had only accusations, no evidence, that I’d done anything improper. I was then pressured into a $210,000.00 payment (out of our life savings to free my husband from Florida and transport him to a private facility in Georgia on or about April 23, 2021, under a guardianship. We were isolated from him for nine months. He died without me or his mother by his side.
Many people face similar interventions to gain guardianships and take from families what belongs to them. I became a national husband, and wives advocate to show a better way that if I’d known could have changed the direction of my case. I see the same pattern. I’ve learned that bogus charges often are made that include poisoning their spouse, not taking care of them properly, interference with medical care, or staff, verbal and physical abuse, all to gain a guardianship over someone. It’s important to know your rights. When you’re taken under a “for- profit guardianship” you have no idea what’s happened to you.
Elaine Mickman-Pennsylvania
Many people have no idea what goes on in our family courts system, specifically in divorce court. Elaine Mickman, tells a story of what can go wrong when a mother of five is faced with divorce, including two attempts to declare her incapacitated. Elaine’s story serves as a warning to all who are faced with divorce in our broken family court system.
Her book is on Amazon: Court-Gate…the Courts “Divorced from the Law” without Liberty or Justice at all. Elaine Mickman
Venus Gist-California-Care Advocate and Consultant, Seniors, and Family
My Family was hooked into a Probate Court conservatorship in California. We rescued my mother from a substantial residential care facility. I found evidence her life was in danger. If I sugarcoat my words, it won’t address past, current, and future cases within probate and family Courts. When decisions must be made in court concerning a family’s loved one probate and family judicial systems disregard family relationships. There’s no perfect family, but in many cases, like ours, there are family members who’ve been legally designated to govern family business. I have my B.A. in Family/Child Psychology and my M.S. in Family and Human Development, which is a blessing, but nothing supersedes being raised and cared for by a loving family.
Why do attorneys, conservators, guardians, etc., take advantage of families and plunder their estates and judges allow it? All my advocate associates agree, it’s all about the money!! Sure, some cases warrant court involvement when there’s no family, but when concerned family members are excluded, it may be unlawful, but courts do it daily. I feel, after my probate court experience, court officials lack integrity, respect, and accountability. There was poor communication, and a lack of concern. My parents had a trust, and my mother required higher quality care. It appeared to me there was evidence the conservator misappropriated funds.
Be careful when you call APS and CPS! Some social workers may not be on your side. There are those inside the system who abuse our seniors and children and build their wealth upon our family’s blood, sweat and tears. As advocates we yearn for the day, we, the people, know the truth. Our advice: “Don’t go to court!” The courts get rich from “family conflict.” It’s best to acknowledge family differences and collaboratively invest in a professional family mediator outside the court system. We’ve seen attorney fees in California run as high as $700 an hour. Every court official will get paid, but not the family. It’s a lucrative game you don’t want to play! God bless and protect us all!
Julie Belshe-National Guardianship Liberty Movement
My Parents, Rudy and Rennie North, were taken from their home in2013 by former guardian April Parks, currently in jail with her business partner Mark Simmons. Concerning these events, ‘The Guardians’ documentary directed by Billie Mintz is on Amazon Prime and YouTube. A New Yorker article “How the Elderly Lose their Right’s” 41 by Rachel Aviv is available to view. I’ve started a nonprofit organization called National Guardianship Liberty Movement. My goal is to offer public awareness and much needed assistance to help curtail and prevent exploitative and corrupt involuntary guardianships. Unfortunately, we’ve witnessed innocent family members and thousands of others become prematurely deemed incompetent, put into involuntary guardianships, and stripped of their constitutional and civil rights.
We’ve been proactive and, thankfully, been able to prevent individuals from becoming a guardianship statistic. It shouldn’t be this hard to fight to save someone’s life. It’s not easy and not enough. We want to end human and estate trafficking due to corruption taking place in our courts. Our team has 20 years, collectively, firsthand experience, and would like to hold Accredited Symposiums to educate others. Hopefully, guardianship will one day be far less restrictive, whether a temporary, or permanent situation. Thank you for this opportunity. We look forward to bringing this valuable resource to our fellow Americans.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/09/how-the-elderly-lose-their-
rights accessed April 24, 2025, 5:15pm
Erica (afraid to share last name)-Losing My Friend to the Court
At one time, I believed in good old-fashioned, American Justice. I believed the laws in our country are there to protect everyone. Sadly, I found out the hard way. The gentleman I cared for very much grew to be a friend while I worked as his private caretaker. Our happy world was turned upside down. Thinking of protecting my friends’ rights, and my own, I reached out to lawyers, one for each of us, hoping they would help us. My friend and I were ripped apart from each other against our wills. He was forced into a guardianship. They issued a restraining order against me and put him in a nursing home at the peak of Covid. Nobody had the courtesy to explain to him what happened. He still called, begging me to visit. I wasn’t allowed to. Any asset or wealth is fair game. It’s designed to create fees, filing bogus motions and restraining orders, selling off the victim’s belongings, and answering emails. They’ll charge a fee for making a list of fees. All of this was done, I believe, to control my friends’ wealth. ($2.5M).
Janice Wolk (JW) Grenadier-founder of JudicialPedia
Janice is the ex-wife of a son of a judge, with an ex-mother-in-law that is divorce lawyer. My motivation comes from knowing the system from the inside out and not wanting what happened to me happening to anyone else. She was sentenced to 30 days in jail for not having $8,100 to pay my ex-husband. I spent 22 days in jail / 14 of those days in solitary confinement. Janice is a Certified ADA Advocate & Mediator and an expert on the “Judicial Crisis” in the United States of America. She has intervened in several guardianships, divorce, criminal, foreclosure, J6, Trump and government cases throughout the United States.
The Judges are ignoring the rule of law and the United States and the State Constitutions, the rights of the citizens and are ruling with bias of the Constitution and allowing their religious and political views to cloud their judgements. The reason for founding JudicialPedia is believing that the Constitution was what the Judiciary followed. I hope you will join me in making the needed change of Making the America Judiciary Accountable.
You can find JudicialPedia at Website: https://judicialpedia.com
Doug Franks-Georgia
Doug Franks spent four and a half years fighting Florida’s guardianship system to free his mother, Ernestine, from an unwanted guardianship in Pensacola, Florida. Ernestine faced the prospect of spending her final days alone, cut off from her family. In November 2016, Doug’s persistence paid off. After years of court battles and media campaigns, Ernestine was finally freed from guardianship and could return home to live where she chose. Both mother and son were overjoyed to be reunited.
Tragically, Ernestine’s freedom was short-lived. After just 45 days of enjoying her liberty including simple pleasures like her favorite ice cream, she suffered a massive heart attack and died in Doug’s arms. Since then, Doug has dedicated himself to guardianship reform, working with Florida legislators and families nationwide to strengthen guardianship and probate laws. His advocacy continues through his website: http://freeernestine.com
Tiffany Shabazz
In 2021, my husband suffered a stroke and was later hit by a car, which left him disabled but still mentally competent. Despite his repeated requests to be with me and our children, his sisters took control of his care without legal authority. They isolated him. The hospital cut off visitation rights. He begged to come home. I felt his care was neglected. He passed away on October 21, 2023. I’ve been exposing how families are trapped and silenced by probate court interference.
Marian Kornicki-New York
I’m part of a human rights coalition, the ‘Victims and Families Devastated by Guardianship Coalition,’ exposing intentional financial exploitation we’ve experienced. There’s a perverse incentive to push people into guardianship by courts, lawyers, and government agencies to take control of their assets. For decades, there’s been a persistent financial motive to exploit people by putting them into guardianships. What really happens to people and their families is so far beyond belief it’s hard for the public to grasp. Elected officials defer action with useless periodic legislation. We must seek to ensure the federal government stops funding guardianship. We need to light a fire under law enforcement. Do we want a system whose existence depends on taking away people’s rights?
Guardianship’s inappropriate for anyone. Once people understand there’s no benevolent component, being gas lighted as to what guardianship is, they’ll want to end it. I’ve written three articles published in “Mad in America. Guardianship Destroyed My Family” -January 10, 2022.
https://www.madinamerica.com/2022/01/guardianship-destroyed-family-draft/
accessed August 2, 2024, 11:00am
Laura “Pebbles” Martinez-Thrash-Texas
My husband’s been isolated from us for over 6 years. Being trapped in probate court hearings and being fed into a guardianship even after the judge had said a guardianship isn’t needed is like being sentenced to prison without ever committing a crime. We must continuously bring attention to systemic abuse of conservatorships and guardianships nationwide! There aren’t many things more traumatic than being isolated from loved ones.
Eliot Bernstein-Florida
My two adult children were conscripted into guardianship for minors without any hearings for competency or following any Florida Guardianship laws whatsoever with no due process. The guardian and courts ignored pleas for the lawyers, guardians, and judges to cease and desist this deprivation of their legal rights as adults. The guardianship was allegedly used to silence their legal rights as adults regarding their family’s inheritance, and seize from them monies yet unaccounted for, and other properties from trusts left by their grandparents. Attorneys for disgruntled relatives, who, with their children, were wholly disinherited from the estates and trusts, filed endless pleadings with the courts to facilitate this alleged fraud against the adult children, which the Florida courts entertained.
Despite legal notice of the problem, the courts continued to allow the attempted confiscation of real properties through this weaponization of the legal system, including their home. A foreclosure was filed against their home by the attorneys, and even though at the time of filing they were legally adults for many years, they were never served process as adults, as they were listed as minors in the pleadings, when factually, they weren’t. The alleged crimes against our family in the Florida courts, which the courts have facilitated, with guardians and lawyers, are continuous and ongoing. It seems anyone trying to expose what the courts are doing is retaliated against with their family members. Several have been falsely imprisoned for making the attempt. We’ve met over 500 victims in the last few years. The main difference in our guardianship horror story is that in most cases victims are elderly, not young adults.
Yes, here in Florida, at this time, you can be whisked off your porch and put in a facility, and with a short, 30-minute capacity hearing and medical evaluation that is usually rigged and shoddy, your entire legal and property rights seized. Often, you’ll be medicated. Sedated, while lawyers, guardians, judges, and probably the cops who protect them pilfer millions upon millions of your hard-earned monies faster than you or your family can protect them. This is a well-oiled international machine of legally trained wrongdoers. Now the crimes are against a family’s adult children. Apparently, your rights and property can be from you if they just state that you are a minor when you aren’t. One must ask where the press and police are to stop this madness.
Brandee Ritsema-Michigan
In 2000, my mother fell off a horse leaving her in a coma for seven years. When she woke, she was paralyzed and brain injured. For 25 years, I navigated the probate system, learned the law, and fought back. I successfully had the facility charged twice for abuse and neglect. I feel in retaliation they worked to criminalize me as advocacy grew. My children were entangled in the family court system. I refuse to be silenced.
Marsha Joiner-TS Radio
Marsha is a Podcaster and hosts the popular ‘Betrayed by Hospice’ Podcast on TS Radio Network. Marsha has been exposing the intentional hastening of end of life for many elderly who are unfortunate enough to be subjected to this organization whose main purpose is death. In her book the stories are similar, the drugs used, the lies and manipulation, the betrayal by medical staff. Marsha published her book ‘Betrayed by Ho$pice and Healthcare, stories from the Deathbed’ now on Amazon. We all die one day but t should be when it’s our time and not when someone else decides your life is of no value.
Her shows: https://tsradionetwork.buzzsprout.com/
Katherine (Katie)-Jackson Indiana
Katherine (Katie) Jackson, an Indiana mother, refuses to back down to the Department of Child Services after she claims they falsely framed her as negligent, denying her child’s legitimate medical diagnoses and doctor’s orders that resulted in her children being removed from her care for almost three years in 2022, portraying her as unfit and a danger to her children. Her child, being born severely premature at 23 weeks, retains significant illnesses and a multitude of developmental delays. Because she’s not a medical professional, doctors dismissed Katherine’s pleas and actively interfered with her advocacy for her daughter’s incredibly rare disease. The diagnosis of this genetic condition, known as Pilarowski Bjornsson Syndrome (PBS) was shared by only 10 individuals worldwide at the time, and is now recognized in 46 individuals. In addition, the child suffers from alopecia, a more common and visually identifiable condition, which presents as hair loss.
“Throughout this nightmare, I have been trying to advocate for my child in a world where mothers are consistently dismissed by medical professionals who think they know best,” said Katherine Jackson. “I refuse for my children to believe I have done anything but protect and love them, and I want nothing more than to have them back with me where they belong. I will continue to fight on behalf of my children, myself, and mothers everywhere who have suffered the same fate. You are not alone, and I will not back down.”
So far, this case has racked up three million dollars in court fees, legal expenses and associated costs. Katherine (Katie) is also fighting criminal charges against her with a possible sentence up to ten years in jail. As we see it the only ‘crime’ she is guilty of is loving her children. Visit her website: https://www.momfightsback.com/