Although conceptualizations of what elder abuse encompasses vary considerably, the National Center on Elder Abuse (200) identifies six main categories of elder abuse. They include physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional or psychological abuse, neglect, abandonment and financial abuse. Among these categories, financial abuse has received limited attention and is often not evaluated in studies of elder abuse (Choi et al. However, financial abuse is increasingly seen as important enough to require inclusion in studies of elder abuse in general and differentiated enough to justify addressing it separately (Choi and Mayer, 2000).
Criminals know that older people are particularly vulnerable to scams due to decreased hearing and increased confusion. Grandparent scams have been popular in recent years, in which a perpetrator calls an elderly person on the phone, claiming to be a struggling grandchild or granddaughter and needing an immediate bank transfer. In another type of scam, the lottery scam, a perpetrator tells the old man that he has won a non-existent lottery or prize, and financial information is required just to pay for shipping. Telemarketing scams convince the elderly to invest capital in fake charities, non-existent products, fake companies or megachurch.
Internet scams often stem from foreigners requesting to participate in a “business opportunity”. Service fraud involves taking money for work that is done incorrectly, partially, or sometimes not done at all; this type of fraud is common, for example, with roof replacement after a natural disaster. Abuse of legal documents occurs when caregivers or others trick an elder into signing a power of attorney when the elder lacks the mental capacity to understand what is happening. Wills made when the elder is not mentally healthy are a form of abuse.
Elders are often tricked into signing documents that remove them from their title deeds or add the names of caregivers to property and bank accounts. The elder can inadvertently make a dramatic and hasty change to a will, trust, or transfer deed in the event of death. It's illegal in Texas to financially exploit the elderly, but what types of actions constitute financial abuse?. It has also been observed that little is known about the close links that naturally develop between older people and their caregivers, particularly when services are provided to older people within their homes, and what leads to financial abuse (Quinn, 2000).
Similarly, some states limit financial abuse to intentional misuse of elder resources, while other states include negligent, or at least reckless, advice or conduct such as not using income effectively for the care of the elderly (Dessin, 2000; Roby and Sullivan, 2000). Other factors identified as the increased likelihood of financial abuse focus on the social status of the elderly person. As a result of the differences between child abuse and financial abuse of elders, models to correct financial abuse of elders may need to take a different approach from that used in models of child abuse. A Massachusetts study found that nearly half of elder abuse cases serious enough to require reporting to a district attorney involved financial exploitation (Dessin, 2000).
Michigan enacted a bill to allow a law enforcement officer to investigate for neglect, abuse, or financial harm after responding to an incident involving alleged physical abuse of a vulnerable adult or older adult. However, while a state can achieve some degree of efficiency when it relies on existing service delivery models and systems, as will be discussed, important distinctions warn against large-scale adoption of a child abuse model (AARP, 1993; Anetzberger, 2000; Brandl, 2000; Kapp, 1995; Kleinschmidt, 1997; Macolini, 1995; Vinton, 1991; Wolf, 2000), particularly in addressing financial abuse of the elderly. Examples of elder abuse provided in government reports often show a combination of financial abuse and physical or psychological abuse or neglect (County Welfare Directors Association, 1988; U. Alternatively, financial abuse can cause older people to become dependent on social welfare agencies, with a significant decline in their quality of life (Coker and Little, 199. If research shows that most older people resist or resent intrusion into their financial affairs, that most older persons have good faith reasons for their resistance or resentment, or that most complaints are not subsequently confirmed, arguably the criteria for reporting or undertaking an investigation of reported abuse should be reduced from those applied to complaints of child abuse.
National Research Council (EE) panel. Department of Education) to review the risk and prevalence of elder abuse and neglect; Bonnie RJ, Wallace RB, editors. But see Heisler (2000), “Because elder abuse was rarely considered criminal conduct, litigation has historically been filed in civil courts (p. It has been stated that financial abuse often occurs in conjunction with other forms of elder abuse (Choi et al.
The NEAIS report found that 60.4 percent of the 1996 APS corroborated financial abuse cases involved an adult child (compared to 47.3 percent for all forms of elder abuse) and only 4.9 percent involved a spouse (versus 19.3 percent for all forms of elder abuse). However, others believe that exceptions within state and federal laws allow financial institutions to contact government entities and release private client records and information about alleged violations of the law, and that this would cover complaints of elder abuse (U. They reasoned that the higher proportion of elder abuse committed by spouses reflected the fact that many more elderly people live with their spouses than with their children. .
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