Probate reform: Arizona’s emerging hot-button public policy issue

Arizona is on a roll with efforts to address estate abuse, corrupt probate practices and EstateofDenial.com applauds all that is happening.

While not believing one singularly right way exists to approach this or any other issue, we do believe that measures enacted by state officials in response to an educated and engaged – even outraged – citizenry will ultimately be the most effective agents of change.  As government closest to the people has the most direct vested interest in local communities, county seats and statehouses are the logical venues in which to challenge the increased threat posed to personal freedom and private property via abusive use of probate venues and probate instruments like wills, trusts, guardianships and powers of attorney.

Politics is something of a “monkey see, monkey do” world.  Probate reformers across the U.S. should pay close attention to both the mechanics and outcome of Arizona’s effort.  Localized success could encourage similar activism and serve as a model for other states.

So what’s happening in Arizona?

A new Courthouse Steps blog aptly describes Arizona as being in the “Eye of the Storm” with a number of public policy issues including the not-so-known issue of probate reform.

Illegal Immigration, Employer Sanctions, Medical Marijuana…these are the legal issues in which Arizona finds itself on the frontlines, all generally well-known and well-publicized.  However, there is a groundswell of action for an issue that is not so public, not so well-known as these issues, but just as insidious as illegal immigration in depriving honest people from what is rightfully theirs and every bit as controversial as the previously illegal drug, we now call medicine.

It is Probate Reform.

This site along with an Arizona Probate Reform Facebook page is poised to keep people informed and “rally the troops” as the process moves forward.

Sonoran Alliance is another blog that sounds knowledgeable and prepared to join the action.

For most Americans, the concept that the government could take control of your life, seize for redistribution all of your assets, and deprive you of the comfort of family and friends while doing so is beyond a Kafkaesque notion. The court ordered control of lives, destruction of families, elimination of personal wealth, and the complete disregard for individual directives is happening.  These are not isolated cases of bad people, mismanaged funds, or folks with duplicitous intent looking to surreptitiously get rich quick off of Grannies life savings…there are many cases of full blown, court ordered removal of Constitutional rights, personal directives being ignored, families drug though years of legal wrangling based on hearsay without the benefit of evidence, and nothing short of legal thievery.  The families fight back at great personal cost and suffer at the hands of the courts in ways most citizens would never believe…until you see it for yourself.

There is a storm building of moral outrage.  Families being torn apart, lives shattered, and the best laid plans of loving and caring spouses, parents, and children being ignored.  The collusion that is taking place between the courts/judges, the fiduciary agents, and probate attorneys could make organized crime syndicates look weak in comparison.

This coming storm is not to be ignored.  Here is one story…the first of many.

If EstateofDenial.com were to have an Arizona soul mate, we might have found them.

A recent CBS national broadcast on the case of Marie Long, a woman whose $1.3 million estate was largely depleted by guardians and associated parties in four years, has added to coverage of Arizona’s growing reform movement.  Before this, however, the Arizona media was seriously covering the subject highlighting both governmental and private enterprise aspects of the issue.

From a broadcast standpoint, KNXV-TV/ABC15 established a Greed v. Guardianship “Isolate, Medicate, Liquidate” web site “exposing serious flaws surrounding Maricopa County Probate Court.”  Arizona Republic columnist Laurie Roberts has followed cases detailing the estate looting process including victim recourse efforts and government’s often dismal response.  At their web site Probate Court:  A Troubled System, The Arizona Republic has investigated and reported on a broad range of probate abuse topics.

This week The Republic ran a series (Posting #1, Posting #2) identifying peripheral players in the probate racket.  While not new information, these articles importantly illustrate the incestuous network of legal, medical, financial and social service professionals who coordinate efforts for what too often becomes an estate looting effort.  Some of these folks may operate in good faith and with clients’ best interests as a priority, but too many don’t.

Some folks who have gained prominence in the “questionable professional conduct” category are the operators of Sun Valley Group, “a Licensed Professional Fiduciary Service designed to meet the needs of  the incapacitated population.”  Outrage over Sun Valley’s fiduciary management record has prompted a Force Sun Valley Out of Business Facebook page.

While cautious of encouraging such action on the part of government, an independent, public investigation needs to take place into this company. Improprieties seem to abound with complicity on the part of the legal industry (lawyers, judges and court-associated personnel).  If Sun Valley’s apparent ongoing court-assisted assault on their wards is verified, activists – hopefully assisted by the media – need to publicize every step of the process/findings so that this company is shut down by free market forces.  Probate watchers must, however, watch that the same players don’t regroup under a different name or that new, equally unscrupulous parties don’t move in to fill the void created.

Like many other states, the Arizona State Legislature will convene on Tuesday, Jan. 11.  Unlike other states, upcoming discussions seem destined to focus on the practices of a predatory probate system that betrays public trust for the enrichment of a select few individuals.

Go get ‘em, Arizona!