Broward Injury Lawyer Blog
Florida’s guardianship system has come under fire amid revelations of numerous abuses and reports of exploitation, damaging relationships and leaving wards financially and emotionally worse-off.
A Fort Lauderdale guardianship attorney can assist individuals looking to intervene in a potentially damaging guardianship arrangement. Although Florida law requires a three-person committee (at least one a physician or psychiatrist) be responsible to examine a person before he/she can be deemed incapacitated, that exam is all it takes before a guardian is suddenly granted broad powers over their ward. Almost every decision in their life can be controlled by a guardian.
What is being discovered in some of these cases is that there is lack of transparency and impartiality. for example, in a case out of Central Florida reported by The Orlando Sentinel, in the case of an elderly man whose sons pushed for guardianship under the care of a “professional guardian” – one whose attorney is not only the son-in-law of a panel doctor who declared numerous individuals incapacitated. The son-in-law also works at the law practice the doctor (who is also a lawyer) founded, the same one at which his wife and daughter still work.
This, ethics experts say, simply “doesn’t pass the smell test.” Is the system designed for the protection of Florida’s elderly and vulnerable people? Or for the benefit of a small group of insiders? Continue reading
