Permanent Guardians May Be Temporary

New York courts have the authority to appoint a legal guardian for an adult but only if the adult agrees to the appointment or if the adult doesn’t agree to the appointment but is found to be incapacitated and the incapacity is likely to result in some kind of harm.

For example, let’s talk about Jane. When Jane begins to display symptoms of dementia, she may wander off and forget where she is. She may forget to take important medications. And if Jane continually forgets to pay her utility bills, eventually the lights and the heat are cut off.

One solution to help Jane is a guardianship proceeding that is usually started by a close friend or family member. And if enough evidence is presented to show that Jane is going to end up harming herself, then a judge can appoint someone as Jane’s legal guardian to manage her affairs.

But what if Jane doesn’t really have dementia? What if two of Jane’s doctors prescribed medications that interact poorly so that they caused Jane to act in a way that everyone thought she was losing her short-term memory even though she was disoriented? Is Jane stuck with this new guardian forever?

Absolutely not. What a lot of people overlook is that a legally appointed permanent guardian is never permanent in the sense that the appointment can’t be undone.

The same law that gives a judge the authority to appoint a guardian for Jane gives anyone the right to ask that the guardianship be terminated. This includes Jane. If Jane eventually gets back on her feet and can show a judge that she no longer needs a guardian, that guardianship will be terminated and Jane can go back to conducting her affairs on her own.

Moreover, if someone thinks that a guardian is not living up to his or her responsibilities, that someone can also go to court, tell a judge what’s going on, and ask that the specific guardian be removed or replaced.

So despite how permanent a permanent guardianship may sound, there are concrete procedural safeguards in the law that protects Jane’s rights.