Someone is draining an elder’s money.

If the elder is alive, protect them first. That can mean a report to Adult Protective Services, a call to the bank's fraud department, a change of passwords, or, in serious cases, a conservatorship or a protective order. None of that recovers the money, but it stops the bleeding.

Then gather the records. Bank and brokerage statements, credit card statements, property records, and any powers of attorney the abuser was using. Note who had access, when it started, and what changed. Isolation is a pattern: missed calls, a caregiver who screens visitors, a phone number that changed.

The civil claim is filed in superior court, often in the probate court when it involves a trust or an estate, and it is usually paired with a section 850 petition to recover specific property, a trust or will contest if documents were changed, and a breach of fiduciary duty claim if the abuser was a trustee or agent under a power of attorney.

A financial elder abuse claim must be filed within four years of the date the abuse was discovered or reasonably should have been discovered, under Welfare and Institutions Code section 15657.7. That sounds like a long time, but two other clocks can cut it short. If the elder has died, claims against a person who has died must generally be filed within a year of their death. And if the abuse was carried out through a trust amendment, the 120-day trust contest deadline still applies to undoing the amendment.

The evidence also ages. Banks purge video and records, care agencies close, and the elder's own memory of what happened, which is often the best evidence, may not last.

We begin by identifying every account, every property, and every person who had access, and by getting the elder's medical picture for the period in question. Then we subpoena the records and trace the money. Legion, the AI litigation platform our founder co-founded, lets us follow transfers through years of statements in days, which is often the difference between a case that can be proven and one that cannot.

Where the elder is alive, we coordinate the civil case with whatever protection is needed. Where the elder has died, we bring the claim through the trustee or the estate, or as an heir where the law allows. Cases involving a trust or estate are filed in the probate court in San Jose; others in the civil court or in the county where the abuser or the property is.

We plead the fee statute and, where property can be traced, section 859 double damages. The abuser's exposure to fees and double recovery is what usually brings these cases to a settlement that actually returns the money.

• A caregiver was added to accounts, then the accounts were emptied. Access plus dependency plus withdrawals is the core financial elder abuse fact pattern. Bank records and the care agency's logs make the case.
• A relative with a power of attorney used it to pay themselves. An agent under a power of attorney is a fiduciary. Gifts to themselves are self-dealing and abuse unless the document expressly allows them.
• A new friend or romantic partner appeared late in life and now owns the house. The transfer can be undone through a section 850 petition and the abuse claim, and the undue influence definition was written for this situation.
• The elder says they wanted to give the money away. Sometimes that is true. The question is whether the choice was free, and an isolated, dependent elder saying what the abuser wants them to say is not the end of the inquiry.