Elder Law Commons^™

"Granny Goes To Jail" Redux, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

From Idiots And Lunatics To Incapacitated Persons And Respondents: The Evolution Of Guardianship Law In Rhode Island, Mark B. Heffner

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Running Past Landmines--The Estate Attorney's Dilemma: Ethically Counseling The Client With Alzheimer's Disease, Joseph Karl Grant

Journal Publications

This Article examines the ethical dilemmas faced by attorneys who represent clients suffering from Alzheimer's disease. To do so, this Article raises three (3) hypothetical case studies,and applies the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct, and the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel ("ACTEC") Commentaries, where appropriate, to those hypothetical case studies. Additionally, this Article proposes initiatives to ameliorate the lack of awareness and discussion of Alzheimer's disease in the law school curriculum, and finally, modest initiatives that the practicing bar can embrace to further a discussion and awareness among practicing attorneys about the ethical dilemma attorneys face in …

Elder Law: An Annotated Bibliography, 2011-2016, Nancy Levit

Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

A 360 Degree View Of Roles And Responsibilities Concerning Diminished Capacity: Financial Advisers’ Obligations To Clients, Lawyers Representing Clients, And Lawyers Preparing Their Practices, Elissa Germaine, Nicole G. Iannarone, Teresa Verges

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Aging is inevitable and impacts everyone. The risk of a person developing cognitive impairment or some other incapacity affecting daily life increases with each passing year. While some will live long lives without suffering from cognitive decline, others will not be so fortunate. One thing is clear: seniors have the greatest risk of developing some form of impairment that will impact their ability to make their own decisions and that will put them at risk of fraud by predators or of harm by well-intentioned but ill-informed persons seeking to help them. As lawyers representing clients in FINRA proceedings, PIABA …

Lawyers’ Obligations When Representing Clients With Diminished Capacity, Elissa Germaine

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Lawyers have a significant role to play in protecting clients with diminished capacity from financial exploitation. PIABA members, in particular, see the issue from a unique vantage point – usually after a person with diminished capacity (or a family member or concerned third party) notices a drop in value in his or her brokerage account and approaches the lawyer to help figure out what happened in the account and, if appropriate, to pursue a claim to recover damages. As such, members must understand their own obligations as lawyers to clients with diminished capacity, obligations that apply in the context …

Measuring Older Adult Confidence In The Courts And Law Enforcement, Joseph A. Hamm, Lindsey E. Wylie, Eve M. Brank

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Older adults are an increasingly relevant subpopulation for criminal justice policy but, as yet, are largely neglected in the relevant research. The current research addresses this by reporting on a psychometric evaluation of a measure of older adults’ Confidence in Legal Institutions (CLI). Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) provided support for the unidimensionality and reliability of the measures. In addition, participants’ CLI was related to cynicism, trust in government, dispositional trust, age, and education, but not income or gender. The results provide support for the measures of confidence in the courts and law enforcement, so we present the scale as a …

It Takes A Village: Using Seniors To Help Divorcing Families, Forrest S. Mosten, Lara Traum

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

The wisdom of an underappreciated elderly population can offer invaluable assistance to underserved pro-se litigants facing family conflict. This Article will uncover the confluent needs of the family court system and the growing elderly population in the United States. Section II of this Article will explain the struggles of the family court system, outline the historic role of the elderly in addressing family conflict, propose the creation of an Elder Volunteer Corps to address these communal needs, and discuss the benefits of creating such a corps. Section III will suggest logistical approaches to forming an Elder Volunteer Corps, focusing on …

Ethical Challenges Of Using Law Student Interns/Externs To Expand Services To Low-Income Older Adults, Eleanor Lanier

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

Said I, But You Have No Choice: Why A Lawyer Must Ethically Honor A Client's Decision About Mental Health Treatment Even If It Is Not What S/He Would Have Chosen, Michael L. Perlin, Naomi Weinstein

Articles & Chapters

This paper addresses a remarkably under-considered topic: the ethical standards for lawyers representing persons with mental disabilities. Although there is an extensive body of literature endorsing “zealous advocacy” as the standard for the criminal defense lawyer in “ordinary” cases, there is virtually no literature (or case law) on this question in this context.

Our thesis is simple. We reject the model of “paternalism/best interests” that is regularly substituted for a traditional legal advocacy position, and a substitution that is rarely questioned. We believe this presumption flies in the face of statutory law, constitutional law, and international human rights law, and …

Selective Issues In Effective Medicaid Estate Recovery Statutes, Raymond C. O'Brien

Scholarly Articles

Medicaid is a joint federal-state partnership program that provides medical care to the elderly, blind, and disabled poor. Unlike Medicare, Medicaid will pay for long-term care, leading millions of persons in need of such care to “spend-down” income or assets to qualify as sufficiently needy or poor. However, the state can eventually seek recovery of expenditures made through estate recovery programs following the death of both spouses. As it currently stands, states have no choice but to become increasingly vigilant in pursuing private funds in order to pay for Medicaid expenditures. As a result, elderly citizens and their families will …

The (Ir)Rationality Of (Un)Informed Consent, Barbara A. Noah

Faculty Scholarship

This essay considers the problem of over-utilization of medical care at the end of life and the lack of truly informed consent and briefly considers the multiple causes of these phenomena. It then explores the inherent challenges to making informed medical decisions using concepts of Knightian uncertainty, bounded rationality, optimism bias, and other heuristics. The essay concludes that uncertainty inherent in these decisions means that challenges to making truly informed decisions about medical care are even more substantial than physicians acknowledge or patients ever realize. Acknowledging these challenges is the first step to better medical decision making. informed consent has …

Legal Capacity For All: Including Older Persons In The Shift From Adult Guardianship To Supported Decision-Making, Rebekah Diller

Articles

For the last several decades, guardianship has been the subject of continual calls for reform, often spurred by revelations of guardian malfeasance and other abuses in the system. Recent developments in international human rights law pose a more fundamental challenge to the institution. Under Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), governments may not deprive individuals of their “legal capacity”—or right to make decisions and have those decisions recognized as legally binding—on the grounds of disability. In the wake of the CRPD, the concept of supported decision-making has gained growing acceptance as …

Avoiding Overtreatment At The End Of Life: Physician-Patient Communication And Truly Informed Consent, Barbara A. Noah, Neal R. Feigenson

Faculty Scholarship

This Article considers how best to ensure that patients have the tools to make informed choices about their care as they near death. Informed decision making can help reduce excessive end-of-life care and unnecessary suffering, and result in care that aligns with patients’ well-considered values and preferences. The many factors that contribute to dying patients receiving too much therapy and life-prolonging care include: the culture of denial of death, physicians’ professional culture and attitudes toward treatment, physicians’ fear of liability, physicians’ avoidance of discussions about prognosis, and the impact of payment incentives that encourage overutilization of medical technologies.

Under the …