My father was living in SC, until the last hospital stay this month. He revoked the POA from my stepsister's husband and said he wanted to come home with me so I could take care of him. After looking into his situation, he had been manipulated into putting my brother-in-law on the title to his vehicles along with himself with the understanding that it was in case something happened to him the vehicles could be sold, and the money put into the estate. The day before our move to Texas the Sheriff came and said my father could not take his vehicles as they had been given away. I handed him the titles and he showed me the new titles that had been changed by my brother-in-law as he had my father's name or his on the title so both signatures were not needed. I have the canceled checks from the purchase of the vehicles, the checks where my father paid the insurance yet the law in SC says this is perfectly legal. My brother-in-law was a joint account holder on my father's checking accounts so the bank in looking at a few large checks that are not my father's signature and he was able to open new accounts. However, my father cannot find an attorney that will file a suit as it is an elder case, APS in SC can't help because we are in Texas, Texas APS can't help because my father cannot be contacted by the other party. My dad is very upset that his things were stolen from him and no one will help him. I don't know where else to turn. Does anyone know how to get help. Any advise would be apprecialted.
The first thing to do is to make sure that step-brother’s name is no longer on ANYTHING. Anything it might have been on needs to be contacted and his name cancelled on any register or bank account.
The problem with the vehicles is that your father made it legally possible for SB to do what he did. There is the same problem with the checks, because father made it a joint account and SB was able to write checks on it. It sounds that he took the money from the joint account and put it into new accounts in his own sole name. It’s just possible that the bank may help, if the accounts are in the same bank.
The only person who might have some liability is your stepsister's husband, for any action that he did or knew about while he had your father’s Power of Attorney. It isn’t clear if this man is the same person that you are referring to as your brother-in-law. The legal requirement to act in your father’s best interests is the POA requirement, whoever it is. The vehicle and check transactions are the evidence that BIL WASN’T acting in your father’s best interests. If he was not the POA himself, the POA should have known what was going on.
After cancelling any references to the POA and BIL on any paperwork, it might be worth talking to anyone else who might help in the step family (your step mother?). Or have the relationships all fallen apart?
Chasing the vehicles is not the way to go, because it was all done legally. You should be looking for a lawyer to take on the POA breaches of responsibility, with the vehicles and the checks as evidence of damages rather than what you are suing about. Depending on how the POA was written, it might be possible to say that it hadn’t yet come into effect, but that is a long shot.
There is a dreadful message here about being very very careful before giving people power over money. It doesn’t help, but so many many people are finding that adult children with drug habits have stolen large sums from them, and this is in a similar problem.
To repeat, your father's possible legal action is for breaches of the POA responsibility to act in the interests of your father. NOT to get the Motor Vehicles Department to transfer the vehicle titles back.