Katherine C. Pearson, of Penn State’s Dickinson Law, has made available for download her article, “Filial Friday? Court Holds Son Liable for Attorneys Fees Incurred While Securing Medicaid Coverage for Father’s NH Care”, published on the Elder Law Prof Blog. The abstract is as follows:
Pennsylvania courts use “filial” responsibility laws in, shall we say, creative ways, especially when they catch any whiff that children helped themselves to their parent’s money rather than using that money to pay for their parents’ nursing home care. One of the key modern-era cases for filial support law in Pennsylvania is Presbyterian Med. Ctr. v. Budd, 832 A.2d 1066 (Pa. Superior Ct, 2003), where the court remanded a case for decision on filial support law grounds, in the absence of other viable theories, in order to hold a daughter liable for her mother’s costs of nursing home care. The court was clearly annoyed by the evidence the daughter had transferred some $100k of her mother’s funds to herself using a “valid” power of attorney, instead of paying the nursing home.
It probably doesn’t make the court any happier if the defendant/child is also a lawyer.
Posted by Marin Larkin, Associate Editor, Wealth Strategies Journal.
Wealth Strategies Journal 