Conservatorships 101
Is your loved one mentally incapable of handling their own financial and daily affairs? Are you trying to navigate the difficulties of probate court?
Personal injury attorney Bruce Hagen and criminal law attorney Ray Giudice discuss conservatorships in this mini clip from Episode 10 of Your Day In Court podcast.
What Is A Conservator?
A conservator is a person appointed by the court to take care of someone’s finances when he or she cannot make these types of decisions because of an illness, injury, or disability.
When Is A Conservatorship Necessary?
For somebody to have a conservator appointed they have to be mentally incapable of handling their own affairs. That can be based on a permanent condition like a TBI, mental health challenge, physical incapacity, for example if someone is injured, in a coma from a car accident or in metro Atlanta, a gunshot wound.
“We handle a lot of personal injury cases involving traumatic brain injuries and sometimes folks who have a TBI are still alive and are still functional but are not able to handle the complexities of day-to-day life or handle their financial affairs,” said Decatur personal injury lawyer, Bruce Hagen in Your Day in Court podcast.
If a medical doctor or a team of medical doctors comes to this conclusion then the probate court in Georgia would get involved. Probate court would make a determination on their own as to whether or not this person can make their own decisions for themselves and if necessary, appoint a conservator to handle financial matters and a guardian to handle personal matters.
Who Is Appointed As The Conservator?
“Sometimes it’s a family member and other times it’s a stranger because of the conflict that can come up when a family member gets involved with money,” said Bruce Hagen in his new podcast.
Many times, there are pre-approved lawyers who serve as either guardian ad-litems perhaps in child cases, adoption cases or other conservators, like a lawyer who is also a CPA and can take care of the finances of the individual or perhaps that person’s business.
Listen In
Listen to the entire discussion in Episode 10 of Bruce and Ray’s new podcast “Your Day in Court”, available in every major podcast platform and live on Saturdays 8-9 a.m. at Xtra 106.3.