In the 1970’s Hank and Mae purchased and refurbished a run-down single family home in Concord, and eventually purchased two more. They held all three as rental properties and their children would remember their parents spending countless weekends performing maintenance and repairs.

Hank and Mae’s retirement was cut short by Mae’s cancer diagnosis in 2007, and she died in 2008. Hank was despondent, and the children watched his health gradually decline. They encouraged him to get out more, and he gradually began walking to the Pleasant Hill Library a few times each week, meeting friends at a nearby coffee shop, and attending Sunday services and other events at Hank and Mae’s church.

Hank and his oldest daughter Kimberly met with Hank and Mae’s long-time estate planning attorney to get his affairs in order. The attorney explained that if Hank became incapacitated, Kimberly would serve as the successor trustee of his trust and his agent for health care and financial decisions. At Hank’s death, Hank and Mae’s estate would go to their four children in equal shares.

Hank suffered his first transient ischemic attack (TIA), or ministroke, in 2013, and they increased in frequency and severity thereafter. Hank could not drive, and Philomena stopped taking him to church and other social events. When the children would call, Philomena often said that Hank could not come to the phone because he was sleeping.

A mini-stroke in 2015 caused Hank to take a bad fall that required hospitalization. Kimberly and the other children arrived at the hospital, and Kimberly presented the Advance Health Care Directive in which Hank had nominated her to make health care decisions for him. A nurse informed the children that the hospital had a more recent directive on file.

In an awkward hospital room confrontation, Kimberly asked Philomena about the state of Hank’s estate planning. Philomena said “your father and I want to keep our affairs private,” and would say no more. That night, Kimberly and the other children sent Philomena an email demanding to see their father’s trust and other estate planning documents.

Philomena did not reply. One week later, Kimberly received a letter from an attorney whose name she did not recognize.

“Your father recently amended his estate planning documents and named my client, Philomena, as his successor trustee and agent for health care and financial decisions. As these are private documents, my client has no duty to provide you copies. Please address all further communications regarding your father’s financial affairs to my office.”