My sister and I have been jointly appointed as both Guardian and Trustee of our mom's person and estate. Mom is now in assisted care due to dementia. She is 88 and otherwise in good health. Her assets are in a trust account that she and Dad set up years ago before his death. She not in danger of running out of money anytime soon. We have siblings who could use financial help and are requesting distributions from mom's trust. One of the in-laws, (or perhaps outlaw), has suggested removing her from her "revocable" trust in order to put her on Medicaid, moving her to an AL facility that accepts medicaid in order to greatly reduce her expenses, and distributing the max sum allowed tax-free to each sibling every year from her trust account. His lawyer says the distributions can be legally done. My lawyer says there's a conflict of interest with my sister and I being Mom's guardians, vowing in court to act on her behalf to protect and provide for her, and then using our position as trustees to begin distributing her assets before she's deceased - even before she's sick. Wording in the trust document provides for changes to the account only such as that will benefit the trust beneficiaries: the four siblings AND Mom since she is still alive. This issue seems to be coming dreadfully close to fracturing the family.
1. The trust gave me permission to pass out money to whomever and
2. If the trustee still had enough money after the bequeaths were met that they would never need Medicaid's assistance should they need a nursing home or assisted living.
Only then would I feel I did right by my loved one, both morally and legally.
Otherwise, NO, don't do it. Let your loved ones know you feel for their pain, and you understand how hard it must be to wait in their circumstance, but wait you all must, for the sake of all (especially your mom). It's the law as well as the right thing to do.
And I say Kuddo's for you for looking for guidance from this forum. It shows you really wanted to do the right thing by your mom.