The mysterious and little understood system called guardianship, or conservatorship, burst into the public consciousness in 2021 with the case of pop star Britney Spears. After living under court-ordered restrictions for nearly fourteen years, Spears finally spoke out about her plight: she had been stripped of her civil rights, forced to work, involuntarily medicated, denied the right to freely travel or spend the money she earned, and rejected when she wanted to marry and have a baby.
Britney isn’t the only adult who has lost crucial rights through the guardianship system. An estimated 1.5 and 2 million Americans are currently living under similar court-mandated circumstances. Many of these arrangements for so-called “wards of the court” work out well. But after a yearslong study of the system, author Diane Dimond discovered the number of predatory players appointed by the court to control the life and finances of wards is astounding, and the number of victims is staggering. As Dimond writes in We’re Here to Help, “Consider that every year new guardianships and conservatorships place more than $50 billion under the control of others, and with the average case lasting about six years. . . . Informed critics estimate that predatory players illegally divert multiple billions of dollars from this monstrous cache of money each year.”
Dimond insists that “the sheer numbers of these abusive cases—reported by loving family members and worried friends across the United States—screams for attention to be paid.”

We’re Here to Help reveals that:
• Anyone can file a simple petition with a state court asking that a guardianship be established. Petitioners can be family members, angry business associates, neighbors, former lovers, or total strangers.
• Those at risk include young people with inheritances; individuals who’ve won sizeable workman’s comp or medical malpractice settlements; veterans with attractive pension payouts; and victims of mental illness or brain injuries who, even after they recover, find it nearly impossible to break free from the system.
• Divorce attorneys in contested cases have counselled male clients to petition for guardianship of their uncooperative wives—and judges have complied. The cases highlighted in the book were found in Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, and Florida.
• Women are most affected by guardianship. As elderly widows they become ripe for conscription and their caregivers are most often their daughters, not their sons.
• Guardians give presentations at senior centers and nursing homes urging audience members not to saddle their children with caretaking responsibilities. Guardians may share contact information for those interested with estate and elder law attorneys, who pursue court ordered guardianships.
• Lawyers, guardians, and conservators operating in the guardianship field can charge between $250 and $600 an hour for tasks as mundane as opening mail, paying bills, or answering an email. They can hire any number of assistants, including financial advisors, in-home health care, cooks, landscapers, and personal shoppers. The ward’s estate pays for everything.
• Jurists often allow the guardian to ignore a ward’s will, power of attorney, and other legal documents.
• While some states are enacting reform bills to regulate the current system, there have been no proposals to overhaul it. Congress has known about guardianship’s systemic problems for nearly half a century, but no definitive legislation to curb the exploitation has ever been passed.
By highlighting a multitude of real-life stories, We’re Here to Help explains this secretive process step-by-step. Readers will come to understand how family squabbles over what to do with an at-risk relative can spiral into a complicated nightmare of unwanted court intervention.
Dimond includes chapters about alternative programs a judge could establish, and protective legal steps readers can take to help safeguard their families.

Five Questions for Diane Dimond
Qz; What is guardianship and why write a book about it? Guardianship, or conservatorship, is a system that was set up in the late 1800s and it was designed so that any citizen who couldn’t care for themselves got help from the state.
Traditionally, it protected elderly people with dementia or those with profound physical or intellectual disabilities and had no family to care for them. They became a “wards of the court.” But I discovered the system has morphed over the years into something almost sinister. Judges routinely declare all sorts of people as “incapacitated” and assign strangers—lawyers and guardians—to take control of wards’ personal lives and money. These appointees have enormous power because once a person is declared “incapacitated” they lose all their civil rights. Realize, wards can’t hire a lawyer, vote, write a check, or decide where to live or travel. They can be isolated from loved ones and, most shockingly, overmedicated to keep them compliant. Guardianships or conservatorships must be approved by a judge.
Q: Do “petitions for guardianship” state why the person in question needs to be guardianized?
Yes, but frequently a judge accepts whatever claims a lawyer has made in the petition. These might be exaggerations or outright lies; I found that’s not uncommon in these petitions. But these judges don’t have the staff or the time to vet the contents. They take the word of the officer-of-the-court and approve the guardianship. And, once a person is caught up in the system it’s very expensive—and almost impossible for their family to get them out. Court appointees love the fight because it means more time in court and more hourly fees they can charge.
Q: You’ve been writing about abusive guardianships since 2015. There have been other print and TV exposés about it. Why is it that a majority of the public doesn’t know about this system?
Because most guardianship/conservatorship proceedings are conducted in secret. The court and the players—the lawyers, the guardians, and all the rest—say the outside world cannot be privy to the inner workings because of federal HIPAA laws that protect the privacy of a person’s medical information. There have been some great exposes written and aired on individual horror stories—but never a big-picture, in-depth investigative look at the system as a whole.

Q: How did you obtain such detailed information about this secretive system?
In short, very brave family members came forward—at the risk of contempt-of-court charges and hefty fines—to tell me what their loved ones were going through. They shared horror stories about exploitive and abusive guardians: wards being isolated from the family or forcibly overmedicated, outright theft, even allegations of physical and sexual abuse. Most importantly, these relatives provided me with court documents to back up their allegations. And then they steered me to other families that had similar stories to tell. Throughout the book, you emphasize the role judges play within this system. Why should judges bear special scrutiny? To my mind, the ultimate responsibility for these obvious abuses begins and ends with the judge who ordered the guardianship in the first place. If judges need more training to truly understand what can happen after they establish a guardianship, or more money and staff to get the job done in a compassionate way, then their state legislature needs to step up. If a judge is found to be taking campaign contributions from those they appoint to these very profitable positions (and yes, I discovered that has happened), then that cash flow should be made illegal. If there are repeated complaints against a particular judge, then the state judicial board needs to seriously investigate and consider removing that judge. Think of it this way: most people plan where they want to live, travel, and how to spend their retirement. One judge shouldn’t be able to take all that away under the guise of “protection.” Some people really do need help living their life, but that doesn’t mean they should lose their civil rights or be subjected to humiliating and even criminal behavior.

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Good Morning

#never #wait #perfect #moment #just #take #good #morning

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Everywhere you go,

Leave a glitter trail of

Kindness behind you.

Someone who needs it

May just pick it up.

Good Morning

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I love people
that have no idea
how wonderful they
are and just wander
around making the
world a better place

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I got on to the bus. Seeing the crowd inside, I was upset. There was no place to sit. Just then, a person vacated his seat.The man standing next to the vacant seat could have sat there, but instead he offered the seat to me.

At the next stop, the same thing happened again. He gave his seat to another. This happened 4 times during the entire journey. The man looked like a  normal worker, returning home after a long day at work…

At the last stop when all of us got off, I spoke to him. 

“Why were you giving your seat to another person every time you got a vacant seat?”

His answer took me by surprise.

“I haven’t studied much in my life nor do I know many things. I don’t have much money either. So I don’t have anything much to give to anyone. That’s why I do this everyday. It is something I can do easily. 

“After working all day I can stand for a little longer. I gave my seat to you and you said thank you. It gave me satisfaction that I did something for someone. 

I do this daily & feel I am contributing in some way. 

I go back home refreshed & happy every day that I gave something to someone.”

 I was speechless!

Wanting to do something for someone on a daily basis is the ultimate gift.

This stranger taught me a lot  – 

How easy it is to be rich from within! 

Beautiful clothes, lots of money in the bank account, expensive gadgets, accessories & luxuries or even educational degrees – may or may not make you rich and happy; but a small act of giving is enough to make you feel rich & Happy everyday

By Soolian Lim

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Listen to “Just a little something to lift your spirits and dignity. Country Music John Denver Song” on Spreaker.

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Ritz Music Studio has teamed up with Grammy award winning songwriters Terry Britten and Graham Lyle who wrote for artists such as Tina Turner, Michael Jackson and Lenny Kravitz to present ‘Make A Difference’ a song and campaign dedicated to the NHS Staff and Volunteers caring for those affected by Covid-19. All donations raised from the release of the campaign will go directly to the NHS and runs alongside our music memorabilia auction, Rock and Ribbon which raises funds for ‘NHS Charities Together’ though bids on our iconic items.
THE ROCK & RIBBON AUCTION goes live 01 May 20. Sign up at https://rockandribbon.com to be notified of the iconic music memorabilia that will be available to bid on with 100% of the funds raised going to the NHS.

Founded by model and designer Elle Liberachi, The Rock and Ribbon Auction began with a collaboration for Breast Cancer Awareness with Queen guitarist Brian May and saw the auctioning of his ‘Red Special’ guitar raise over £8,000 for the ‘Breast Cancer Campaign’ Charity.
Now, more than ever we feel it is important that we come together and support the NHS and the ‘Make A Difference’ Campaign is our way to show our gratitude and support for the amazing work the NHS and health care providers all over the World do for us.

We are immensely proud and in awe of NHS staff and volunteers as they work tirelessly to save lives and care for COVID-19 patients. Separated from their families and away from their homes, these incredible people work day and night to treat as many people as possible in need of care.

Together and with memorabilia from the Music Industries most revered Artists & Songwriters, we give our respect, gratitude & support to the people on the frontline of the NHS via our fundraising auction, Rock & Ribbon.

Together we can make a difference.

All donations to the ‘Make A Difference’ Campaign via our JustGiving page and 100% of the proceeds from the Rock & Ribbon Music Memorabilia Auction will be donated to ‘NHS Charities Together’

Get involved & donate at www.rockandribbon.com or direct to our fundraising page
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraisin…
Thank you

Composed by Graham Lyle and Terry Britten
Goodsingle/BMG TerryTunes/Kobalt
Recorded and mixed by Martin Hannah and Liam Hebb

Special Thanks to –
Annie Lennox
Rick Stein
Dame Judy Dench
Tom Daly
Fearne and Jesse Wood
Eleanor Tomlinson
Michael Morpurgo
Elle Liberachi
Michael Stephenson-Green
And Jeff the dog

https://rockandribbon.com
https://www.nhscharitiestogether.co.uk
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraisin…

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This conference was the birth of The Beijing Platform for Action, the most progressive blueprint ever for advancing women’s rights. Our founders were in Beijing 25 years ago, and every day since we’ve continued to call for the recognition of the fundamental human rights of women.

25 years later and gender equality is far from being realized. Every five years since 2000, Equality Now has highlighted explicitly sex discriminatory laws that need to be reformed in our Words & Deeds report.

Today we’re releasing our 5th Words & Deeds report and we need your help.

YOUR WORDS & DEEDS TO DO LIST:

Learn

Read the report

Learn more about the Beijing Platform for Action

Share

? Tweet your commitment to Words & Deeds

? Share Words & Deeds on Facebook

? Explore our social toolkit for other ways to share

Take Action

? In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the law says the husband is head of the household.

Call on the President to amend the family code to ensure equality in marriage.

? Section 103 of Tunisia’s Personal Status Code limits daughters’ inheritance rights and provides that any sons inherit twice as much as daughters.

Call on the President of Tunisia to ensure equality in inheritance law.

? In Russia, the labor law automatically bars women from being employed in 456 types of work.

Call on the President of Russia to ensure equality in the workplace.

? In Paraguay, the law prescribes a lower penalty, a fine, for sexual offences against adolescent girls between the ages of 14 – 16 than for rape of a child or a woman.

Call on the President of Paraguay to protect adolescent girls from sexual violence.

?Explore all the laws you can take action on

Your continued support allows us to make sure governments uphold their commitments they made to women 25 years ago. Thank you.

In solidarity,

Antonia Kirkland

Global Lead, Legal Equality & Access to Justice

Donate

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