Power of attorney for woman with dementia sold her Iowa home and gambled, feds say
The power of attorney for a woman with dementia stole the Iowa woman’s money and used it to gamble and buy her own house, according to federal authorities.
Shanan Smith, 56, from Waterloo, Iowa, was recently sentenced to more than three years in prison, authorities said in a Dec. 16 news release. She was also ordered to pay $51,000 in restitution to the woman’s relatives.
Smith was appointed at the woman’s power of attorney in 2009, about four years after the woman began showing signs of dementia, according to court records. As the power of attorney, she had legal authorization over the woman’s affairs and was not allowed any compensation.
Starting in July 2012 — about three months before the woman was admitted into a nursing home with severe dementia — Smith began defrauding her, prosecutors said. From then until about November 2017, authorities said Smith schemed the woman out of at least $54,018. The woman died in March 2019.
The defense attorney representing Smith did not immediately respond to a request for comment from McClatchy News on Dec. 19.
In court records, authorities said Smith refinanced the woman’s home in July 2012. Smith used about $16,600 in the loan proceeds to pay her own debts and $20,000 of the proceeds to pay for a home in Sumner for her and her then-husband, officials said.
The woman with dementia was listed as a borrower on the Sumner house but relinquished ownership rights in November 2012, officials said. Her name remained on the property’s mortgage.
Between February and August 2017, authorities said Smith didn’t pay the woman’s nursing home bills. Smith then sold the woman’s home for $72,000 — using some of the proceeds to pay the nursing home and using some to gamble at a casino, officials said.
Smith was previously released on bond, but she’ll be required to surrender to the Bureau of Prisons, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Iowa. A surrender date has not been set.
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