Ugh, it's one thing after another.

[BlasterMaster]

So, awhile ago I posted that my half-brother received an infection on his foot from his job at a NYC construction company and as a result had to get the foot amputated. He had no medical insurance and the construction company refused to provide compensation. Welp, my family just settled with the company. Their paying for most of his medical expenses (surgery, the prosthetic, and the physical therapy), are transferring him to a desk job at the company (better pay and safer), and implementing better safety measures (including offering health insurance to the rest of their workers).

Great news right? Welp, it was until I got word my grandmother died. She was quite wealthy, very old (in her 90's), and unfortunately, quite paranoid. She disowned my father, my half-brother, my sister (for being lesbian), and myself and ended up willing everything (except one key thing) to her "partner" (aka a gold digger named Carl). "Carl" (aka the demon has a name) is a 55 year old snake in human skin that somehow convinced my grandmother to disown her own flesh and blood as well as give him the few million dollars she had inherited from my grandfather. He then went to try and get my father to sign a contract so that we would end up paying for her funeral and he'd get her mansion in the Hamptons.

Yeah, that ain't happening. My entire family is now in a bitter legal dispute with this snake over my grandmother's mansion. The mansion was in my grandfather's name and my grandfather willed it to his son (aka my father). My grandmother's paranoia became so bad that she threatened to sue her own son over the deed to the home. Well, she can't hurt my family anymore and has gone to meet her maker but what's left is a mess of a legal battle that will cost my family and relatives hundreds of thousands of dollars in lawyer fees. I hope we win this fight but dammit, it just never ends! 🙁

 

[kurchatovium]

I am in a similar situation. My mom took care of her sister for over 50 years until she was not physically able to do so anymore and someone came in to help her. Well to shorten up a rather nasty series of events this evil lady convinced my aunt to sign over her estate to her and a sleazy lawyer. So we have been in litigation for over a year. Its messy, its nasty and the hardest part is seeing how sad all this made my mom who is a very good person.

Get yourself a good estate attorney. If you dont have a lot of money they will work on contingency. You wont get as much money but at least you will get something. Best of luck to you.

 

[BlasterMaster]

I am in a similar situation. My mom took care of her sister for over 50 years until she was not physically able to do so anymore and someone came in to help her. Well to shorten up a rather nasty series of events this evil lady convinced my aunt to sign over her estate to her and a sleazy lawyer. So we have been in litigation for over a year. Its messy, its nasty and the hardest part is seeing how sad all this made my mom who is a very good person.

One would think your aunt would have looked into signing the rights to the estate over to either your mother or another relative with the contractual obligation that she'd be taken care of by the family. I'm guessing she became paranoid with age (like my grandmother) and refused to look into that eh? Given that she apparently needed the care of another person for over 50 years, I'm guessing she's disabled (or was disabled) in some way? I hope you manage to get the estate back. Losing it to a thief would suck. 🙁

Get yourself a good estate attorney. If you dont have a lot of money they will work on contingency. You wont get as much money but at least you will get something. Best of luck to you.

Fortunately my whole family is good friends with a minor executive at a very big and successful NYC law firm (the type that handle legal affairs for mega corporations and billionaires) so through that friendship (and the calling in of a favor) we've secured a pretty damn good duo of estate lawyers. But yeah, this is probably gonna drag on for years. Oh well. 🙁

 

[kurchatovium]

One would think your aunt would have looked into signing the rights to the estate over to either your mother or another relative with the contractual obligation that she'd be taken care of by the family. I'm guessing she became paranoid with age (like my grandmother) and refused to look into that eh? Given that she apparently needed the care of another person for over 50 years, I'm guessing she's disabled (or was disabled) in some way? I hope you manage to get the estate back. Losing it to a thief would suck. 🙁



Fortunately my whole family is good friends with a minor executive at a very big and successful NYC law firm (the type that handle legal affairs for mega corporations and billionaires) so through that friendship (and the calling in of a favor) we've secured a pretty damn good duo of estate lawyers. But yeah, this is probably gonna drag on for years. Oh well. 🙁

Part of the trouble with my aunt is she was spoiled. She felt she deserved to be taken care of 24/7. She felt she deserved to have an entourage of people looking after her. She did have some medical/physical issues but she could have been much more independent than she was. My grandmother made my mom promise to look after her... probably the only mistake my grandma made. This attitude of feeling the need to be taken care of constantly set up this other caregiver and attorney to take advantage of her, that combined with a lot of drugs enabled them to swoop right in. Its a complicated case because other family members we found took advantage of her as well. I thank god we have a set of good attorneys that were recommended to us by a family friend.

Thanks for your good wishes and wish you the best of luck as well. Its good you have good attorneys as well. In cases like ours they are a godsend.

 

[Nedstacey2]

@ILuvDebonairDamsels, so sorry to hear about your family struggles and especially about your half-brother; awful that he's been maimed for life, even if his company belatedly took some responsibility. And I hope Carl hasn't left you with the indelible impression that we guys in our mid-fifties are all snakes (though a lot of us do shed our skin frequently).

Speaking of snakes, I could use a good law firm myself about now. Fortunate for you that you had special connections that got you those estate lawyers, and I truly hope everything works out for you in the end.