Case Overview

This case involved a nonverbal limited conservatee with profound disabilities who required significant care and protection. She had the most radiant smile, autism, and the cognitive ability of a toddler. And once she reached the age of majority, she was incapable of caring for her own person and required a limited conservator.

When the limited conservatee turned eighteen, her long-divorced parents were appointed as co-conservators. For more than a decade, her mother attempted to work collaboratively with the father to secure the medical, therapeutic, and behavioral support their daughter needed. Despite overwhelming evidence of her diagnoses, limitations, and care requirements, the father refused to acknowledge any of it. Rather, he insisted that he alone knew how to care for the limited conservatee and repeatedly isolated her in his home during his limited visitation periods. After each visit with him, the conservatee returned with alarming new behaviors, serious medical issues, and, on multiple occasions, required hospitalization for dehydration or other preventable conditions. The growing pattern raised urgent concerns for her health and safety.

The father disagreed so vehemently with the mother's and all of their daughters' providers that he sought to remove the mother as co-conservator. We filed a competing petition to remove the father. Despite multiple creative attempts to find common ground, no possible resolution could be achieved.

The Probate Court had to adjudicate this dispute at an evidentiary hearing, also called a bench trial. To prepare we assembled a team of professionals who specialized in caring for adults with autism and significant developmental disabilities to help the Court digest the thousands of pages of evidence and contextualize the severity of the limited conservatee's plight. While this limited conservatee could literally not speak for herself, and lacked the cognitive ability to advocate for her own needs, her behavior and health declines became her voice.

We won. The conservatee is no longer forced into unsafe visits, her health has stabilized, and she is now thriving to enjoy her best life.

The impact of this ruling cannot be overstated. It exemplifies the essential purpose of protective proceedings.