Worried Money Was Taken From Your Parent Before Death?

If you’re trying to recover money taken from a parent before death in Florida, start with how the money moved. Family members who have concerns about how a trust or estate is being managed can raise those questions with an attorney to understand their options. The first steps are finding the transfers and collecting the records that show them.

Responsible lawyer: Leslie V. Marenco, Trust Counsel, PL, Coral Gables, Florida.

Why Missing Money From a Parent’s Accounts Is Hard to Untangle

Missing money is hard to untangle because a transfer can look legal on paper and still be open to challenge. A bank may have processed each withdrawal without question. That doesn’t show whether your parent chose it, or whether the person who moved it had the right to. You may be reviewing statements for a parent who is still living but declining, or for one who has already died. Either way, this situation landed on you. Courts look at the whole picture. They ask who had access to the accounts, what the parent’s health was, and what documents existed at the time.

How Money Typically Leaves a Parent’s Accounts Before Death

Money usually leaves a parent’s accounts through a few common paths. Each one raises different questions.

An agent under a power of attorney. A person named as agent can handle the parent’s money. Florida treats that agent as a fiduciary, meaning someone who owes duties to the parent. Unless the document says otherwise, the agent must also act loyally for the parent’s sole benefit.

Joint and payable-on-death accounts. A joint account holder can often withdraw money. That doesn’t always mean the money was theirs. The account agreement and the parent’s intent both matter.

Caregivers and household members. A person with a debit card, checkbook or online login may have paid themselves. Records of who had access often matter as much as the withdrawals.

Gifts during a parent’s decline. Large transfers made while a parent was ill or confused raise questions about capacity and pressure. A court examines those questions.

Altered checks and forged signatures. Forged signatures and changed beneficiary designations are conduct to be examined. They are not proof on their own.

Gather the Records That Show the Transfers

Collect records before you confront anyone. The paper trail is what gives your questions weight. Start with bank and brokerage statements for the period before death, especially the months before any decline. Add check images, transfer confirmations, signature cards and account agreements. Also find any power of attorney, will or trust, since these show who had authority.

A trustee must share trust information. Under Fla. Stat. § 736.0813, a trustee shall keep qualified beneficiaries reasonably informed of the trust and its administration, and while a trust is revocable, the trustee’s duties under this section extend only to the settlor. On reasonable request, the trustee must provide a complete copy of the trust instrument and relevant information about trust assets and administration.

Finally, keep a dated timeline. List each withdrawal, the account it came from, who had access, and what the parent’s health and living situation were at the time.

Who Has the Right to Act for the Parent’s Estate or Trust

The right to act depends on where the money sits: in a probate estate, in a trust, or in the parent’s own name with someone else in charge.

A personal representative (often called an executor) handles a probate estate. Florida’s official term is personal representative. Under Fla. Stat. § 733.602, a personal representative is a fiduciary who must observe the standards of care that apply to trustees. A trustee manages a trust under its terms. A guardian acts for a parent who can no longer manage their own affairs. Heirs and beneficiaries have interests that a transfer can affect.

Breach claims carry real consequences. Under Fla. Stat. § 733.609, a personal representative is liable to interested persons for damage or loss from a breach of duty. In those actions, the court shall award taxable costs as in chancery actions, including attorney’s fees.

Who can sue depends on the facts and on the document that created the estate or trust. Trust Counsel’s attorneys can serve individually as trustee or personal representative. The firm advises and represents trustees, personal representatives and beneficiaries.

Florida Legal Routes for Demanding an Accounting and Recovering Funds

The main routes are a petition asking a court to review an agent, a claim for repayment, and a written demand for records.

A petition about an agent. Under Fla. Stat. § 709.2116, a court may review an agent’s conduct, terminate the agent’s authority, remove the agent and grant other appropriate relief. The principal or the agent (including any nominated successor agent), a guardian, conservator, trustee or other fiduciary acting for the principal or the principal’s estate, a person authorized to make health care decisions for the principal if the principal’s health care is affected by the agent’s actions, any other interested person who demonstrates to the court’s satisfaction an interest in the principal’s welfare and a good faith belief that court intervention is necessary, a governmental agency with authority to protect the principal’s welfare, and a person asked to honor the power of attorney can petition. In challenges to an agent’s authority, the court shall award reasonable attorney fees and costs as in chancery actions.

In any proceeding commenced by filing a petition under Section 709.2116, including challenges to the proper exercise of authority by the agent, the court shall award reasonable attorney fees and costs as in chancery actions.

Other appropriate relief is one remedy among these.

A written demand. A letter that lists each transfer and asks for records can narrow the dispute before anyone files in court.

How These Claims Proceed in Probate or Trust Court

Most of these claims move through a demand, an exchange of documents, and then either negotiation or a court hearing.

The court reviews the transfers and decides what the agent or trustee must account for. The parent’s intent and capacity often matter, because they show whether a transfer was the parent’s own decision.

Mediation is a common middle step. The Florida State Courts System ADR handbook explains that mediation confidentiality rules may apply when a trust dispute is mediated. The American Arbitration Association describes mediation as a process that may offer a faster resolution than litigation.

Timelines vary with the court’s calendar and with whether the other side contests the claim. Some matters settle through a negotiated accounting. Others need a hearing. Each path moves at its own pace.

Mistakes That Can Weaken a Claim

The most damaging mistakes are confronting the relative too early, mixing money, and waiting too long.

Confronting too early. A heated conversation can lead to records being moved or more transfers. Gather the paperwork first, then decide how to raise the issue.

Mixing funds. A trustee or personal representative who uses estate or trust money for personal costs can face serious consequences. Under Fla. Stat. § 736.1001, a court can reduce or deny the trustee’s compensation.

Waiting too long. Trust disputes can carry short deadlines. Under Fla. Stat. § 736.1008, a trustee’s limitation notice can warn that a claim based on any matter adequately disclosed in a trust disclosure document may be barred unless filed within six months after the beneficiary receives the trust disclosure document or the limitation notice, whichever is later. Check the date you received any accounting. Under Fla. Stat. § 736.0604, a contest to a trust that was revocable at the settlor’s death is barred if not started within the earlier of the chapter 95 period or six months after the trustee sends the required notice.

Assuming ownership. Believing a joint account settles who owns the money, without reading the account agreement, is a common error.

Talk With a Florida Trust Litigation Attorney About Your Situation

If you’re dealing with a parent’s loss and this money question at the same time, you didn’t choose either one. You don’t have to sort through it alone.

Trust Counsel, PL’s only office is in Coral Gables, Florida. We serve clients in Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton.

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