How can I find out who has Power of Attorney for my mother?

If you think a POA is failing to live up to their responsibilities, you most likely have to lawyer up and to go to court to have them removed. If a person is not legally competent, they should not be signing or changing POAs and guardianship may be needed. Proving a POA was not validly obtained could be very difficult to do, though.

Please be as sure as possible of the facts and confirm supsicions as best you can before starting a major proceeding though. It is not always out of line to use a skilled nursing faciilty for care, nor to decide about use of funds for care and caregiver supports. There have been cases of serious financial abuse by POAs, fraudulently obtained or not, and cases of unjustified complaints by non-caregivers about how the caregiver is seeing fit to handle things. sometimes based on wishful thinking that a loved one would be well if only the care was better, or that the loved one does not need to have money spent on care that is being spent by the person who is really closest to the stiuation.

Now if somone forged your signature on a POA document, that's beyond "interesting." You need to see that document, for sure!

If someone has a power of attorney over their grandmother because she got sick. An was put in a nursing home and the power of attorney person is letting her be neglected an making sure her grandmother isn't getting the right help the grandmother needs...what can be done about this ..

If someone has a power of attorney over their grandmother because she got sick. An was put in a nursing home and the power of attorney person is letting her be neglected an making sure her grandmother isn't getting the right help the grandmother needs...what can be done about this ..

Well this is interesting!

If you haven't agreed to accept DPOA for your sister, you can decline. You can't be obliged to take this responsibility.

Who told you about it?

I have been told that I am enduring power of attorney for my sister who has been admitted to a high dependency psychiatric ward. I have not sighted or signed any documentation. How can I find out and where do I stand?

check hall of records . if , a person has dementia it should go before a judge therefore it should be recorded . at least I have been told worth checking out I think .

My sister in law told my husband that she has power of attorney for my husband's parents. My Father in law recently passed away. How do we find out if she really has the power of attorney?

If you can't find out from your mother, another but very tedious way is to skim her and your father's checking account records, looking for unusual amounts that could signal payments to an attorney for document preparation.

FF is right; we never filed any DPOAs anywhere. It is required in Michigan and to me it's far too personal document to record or file if not mandatory.

Sherry, if you are caring for your Mother in her own home, is there any way you can ask your Mother? She may or may not even know what is a Power of Attorney or if she ever signed one. Did her husband and/or your father have one? Usually couples go together to this signing using the same attorney, depending on how many years ago that was.

If your Mother doesn't mind, maybe she will allow you to go through her paperwork to see if you can find any legal documents. Some folks keep neat records which makes it easy.... others just toss documents into a drawer... some hide the documents under some socks in a dresser. It can become a scavenger hunt.

Does Mom have a safe deposit box at a bank? I don't know if the bank will tell you if you were listed as a co-signer [you would have had to sign a bank card] or someone else is co-signer.

By the way, not everyone files a Will or Power of Attorney with the County Court House. I never did. Nor was it recommended by my Elder Law attorney.

how can i find out who has power of attorney for my mother she has dementia, i was on woodburycountyclerkofcourt but where do i go from there? or is there another way? also can you find out if she has a will?

I would go to the trouble of hiring a lawyer and pursuing Guardianship. No, you can't get the information, it is private and confidential. However, a Judge in the Surrogate's court will ask for it and get it.

The attorney is prohibited by lawyers' ethics rules from telling you who the agent is. It would be a breach of confidentiality. However, I don't think there are general privacy rules that prohibit the revealing of this information. Ask around in the family.

How can I find out who has poa for free

The only reason that I can think of for the lawyer wanting to hide behind such bogus privacy laws is he is protecting himself for being part of a bogus POA for your mother when she was not competent to sign such a document. Time to start asking family members if they have her POA or do they know who does. You may well need a lawyer yourself to deal with this. Something is not right about all of this.

Thanks for the great advice. It is believed that a family member may have the POA and that the POA was given when my mother was well into dementia/alzheimers. It is my personal concern that who and when should be known and not a big secret. In everyday life when you are involved with an able person, one who is not vulnerable, you know who you are dealing with, but, once there is a POA, that information becomes a big secret. Who really benefits from the big secret?

How about visit that atty again and create some questions on what I wrote above.

I've never heard that such is privileged information. Otherwise, why would a bank a business or a doctor be free to ask who has the durable or medical POA over this person? Very often a durable POA is registered with the clerk of court and can be looked up on line for free from the page on the county clerk of court page via doing a search using your mother's name. If you mother did not have advanced dementia, she could revoke the earlier POA and give it to you. Evidently, your mother's attorney knows, but just does not want to tell you for some reason other than privacy that in my opinion he is hiding behind because those are public documents.

Frustrating as this is, you may have to ask an elder law attorney for assistance. This could cost some money, but you could at least find out from another source if it's possible for you to get the information. Do you have siblings? Surely someone knows, so there must be a lack of communication in the family, unless she gave the POA to someone outside of the family. If that's the case, was she competent when she did so? Lots of questions. This is very sad. I do think your only choice is legal help.
Take care,
Carol