Conservatorship of Joanetta Hanson

Previous note The accounting period is not useful and suspiciously lacks transparency, because the accounting period ignores what appears to be at least seven months of billable work performed by the Trustee's, then, attorney (Lori Lewis), two months of billable work from the Conservator, and an unknown amount of billable work by the Trustee. There is no logical reason to start the accounting period on January 1st of 2022, when a Private Professional Fiduciary--with no prior relation to the Conservatee--petitioned the Court for appointment on the 19 th of October, 2021, and the attorney for the trustee billed as far back as May of 2021. This is especially specious when the Trustee alleges via Declaration that Lori Lewis was retained to represent the Trustee in February 2022, when Ms. Lewis was clearly working on the matter in May of 2021.

A massive amount of fees ($275,208.83) [1] have already been documented as having been paid to two attorneys, the Conservator and Trustee in this case, as well as presumed but not reported fees paid to attorney Michelon Vasquez. [2] Therefore, the Court should order the Accounting to be amended to include an Accounting period extending back to the date of the first billable hour (fiduciary or attorney) expended in the conservatorship and trust case, the least of which should be May 1, 2021. The Court should specifically order Ms. Michelon Vasquez to account for all fees she has been paid by the trust.

Recommendation re: resolution to Discrepancy no. 1 - Surcharge the trustee the total amount of fees paid to Lori Lewis that are unaccounted for ($81,818.41).

Discrepancy no. 2 - Unresolved by fifth supplement. Probate Code section 1063 is clear: Market values of ALL property in the schedule showing the Estate on Hand at End of Account must be split into carry and market value. Please review Fiduciary Accounting Handbook (2023 Cont. Ed. of the Bar) §10.10 and 10.11.

Previous Note Estate on hand at end of account not supported by schedule showing market value. (Prob. Code, §1063(a).) This is still an unresolved issue, and the email from Sherry Thore does not solve the problem.

Recommendation re: resolution to Discrepancy no. 2 - Surcharge trustee and attorney $2,000 for failure to follow Probate Code accounting procedures and order the schedule corrected without fees, submitted by supplement.

Discrepancy no. 4 - Unresolved by fifth supplement. Petitioner admits to comingling funds from the conservatorship estate in order to pay for what appears to be mismanagement by the trustee of trust funds. This violates several fiduciary duties. (See Prob. Code, §§ 16000, 16004, 16006, 16007, 16009, 16011, etc. etc.)

Previous Note Several transactions appear unusual: Transfers from "Estate of Joanetta Janee Hansen" totaling $285,114.84: DATE PAYEE AMOUNT PAID 1/16/25 Wire from Estate of Joanetta Jonee Hansen $36,000 2/14/25 Wire from Estate of Joanetta Jonee Hansen $50,000 3/20/25 Wire from Estate of Joanetta Jonee Hansen $30,000 4/18/2025 Wire from Estate of Joanetta Jonee Hansen $75,000 6/24/25 Wire from Estate of Joanetta Jonee Hansen $3,404.64 6/27/25 Wire from Estate of Joanetta Jonee Hansen $10,000 These payments are accounted for in the Second Conservatorship accounting, but there is no explanation why the trust is being paid from the conservatorship, or needs to be.

7/27/22 Montecito Bank & Trust HELOC $180,687.88 The trustee must explain why a HELOC exists when there appeared to be sufficient funds in the trust and conservatorship estate. Trustee must include facts related to when the HELOC was established/incurred, and whether the Conservatee had capacity to contract for that HELOC on the date it was established/incurred.

3/10/2022 Montecito Bank & Trust (Overdraft) $5,000 8/16/2022 Montecito Bank & Trust (Overdraft) $500 Various Montecito Bank & Trust Rounded number "mortgage payments" that vary 9/27/23 Montecito Bank & Trust (Overdraft) $200 11/30/23 Montecito Bank & Trust (Overdraft) $10.00 In addition to overdraft fees, the mortgage payments to Montecito Bank appear to be arbitrary and sporadic, paid in rounded numbers that do not indicate actual mortgage business practices. Overdraft is a breach of fiduciary duty, and any loss to the trust should be paid by the trustee, deducted from fees, and trustee must explain why the mortgage was paid in the questionable way it was, incurring overdrafts as a result.

9/28/2023 Montecito Bank & Trust ("operating cash") $2,046 The supplement actually accounts for this as a receipt, not a disbursement. Exhibit E to a previous Supplement shows that the amount is rent received by the Trust, minus management fees. This was not corrected in the most recent supplement, should have been included in receipts, not disbursements, and throws off the entire accounting.

Various SES INS Brokerage Svc $69,982.05 The explanation in the supplement raises more questions, now that the disbursement is identified. The question now is "why does it cost $69,982.05 for insurance on the "properties" for the bank's insurance, when the properties themselves have homeowner's insurance being paid according to other disbursements in the accounting?"

Various Smitty's Towing $7,700 This explanation raises the question as to why vehicles are being stored for the Conservatee that she can arguably never drive again?

If the Court is unsatisfied with the explanations above, it appears that many of the disbursements are not a necessity, and could be surcharged. (Prob. Code, § 1064(a)(2).)

Recommendation re: resolution to Discrepancy no. 4 - Surcharge trustee all amounts paid from the conservatorship account. Order all transaction information from the HELOC account submitted via supplement for further review and adjudication by the court.

Discrepancy no. 5. - Unresolved by fifth supplement. The trustee admits that it paid conservatorship fees without court order. It cannot now shirk its fiduciary duty of loyalty (Prob. Code, §16002, 16004), and due diligence (Prob. Code, §16006, 16007, 16010, 16013) by now saying any questionable billing practice is a conservatorship issue.

Previous Note Conservator fees were paid out of the trust without prior court authorization. The amount paid over the accounting period (30 months) was $49,150.33. This amounts to ~$1,638 per month. This is objectively unreasonable without further proof that the services provided were justified by the conservatee's needs. Close scrutiny of the billing statements previously submitted (which are now incomplete due to longer accounting period and far more conservatorship fees paid than previously reported) reveals $150 per hour was being charged for clerical work, and several entries for "Digital File Management" are likely overcharge for clerical work.

As a general principle, billing hours by a private fiduciary should be low when that fiduciary employs others to do their job. In this case, the fiduciary employed what appears to be 24 hour caregivers to tend to the needs of the conservatee, and billed primarily for work labeled "digital file management" (a nebulous term that tells the Court nothing about what kind of work was being performed), and answering emails and phone calls related to the conservatorship. In that light, the billing is excessive and should be reduced.

Recommendation re: resolution to Discrepancy no. 5 - Surcharge the trustee the entire amount paid to the conservator without court approval, and surcharge the conservator $24,321 for fee seeking in the trust to avoid court oversight.

Discrepancy no. 6 - Unresolved by fifth supplement. Despite clear caselaw precedent proscribing the use of a posted corporate trustee fee schedule as the justification, trustee did NOTHING to justify their incredible fees. There are not billing schedules provided showing the reasonableness of the work performed, nor the necessity of the task.

Previous notes Trustees paid themselves $54,193.90 (Union Bank) and $84,275.50 (US Bank) fees during the accounting period, which is 30 months. That amounts to an unbelievable $4,615.64 per month; an objectively egregious amount. Many of the trustee fees appear to be duplicates. Even if these duplicates are scrivener's errors, the errors were not corrected in supplement. This amount is completely unjustifiable under the circumstances. The trustee fee schedule that was previously produced is not remedial. The appropriateness of trustee fees are tempered by Rules of Court, Rule 7.776, which contains factors the Court must look to in order to determine the reasonableness of the request. As such, trustees may not rely alone upon a flat percentage of the trust to calculate fees, but must submit documentation of the hours spent, nature of work performed, rate charged, etc.

Corporate trustees in the Los Angeles area customarily charge for their services amounts calculated from a schedule of percentages of the value of various trust assets. [Citation.] The compensation sought by petitioner as trustee was calculated from such a schedule. But the custom in the community as to charges by corporate trustees is only one of many factors which the Supreme Court has said that a judge must consider. Among the other factors, the routine character of the work done stands out clearly.

As to the factor of time actually spent by the trustee, the trustee chose not to apprise the court concerning this matter. It appears, however, that what the trustee did would have consumed very few hours. Petitioner seems to feel that if a corporate trustee had been asking for compensation, allowance would have been made on the basis of its schedule of fees. We do not share that assumption. On the contrary, there is no basis in the record for inferring that the trial court would have acted any differently had the trustee been a bank or trust company rather than an individual.

The Legislature has made it clear that it is the responsibility of a judge of the superior court to fix the compensation of a trustee. That responsibility is not met by unquestioning acceptance of a schedule used by a corporate trustee. (Estate of Nazro (1971) 15 Cal.App.3d 218, 221-222.)

Recommendation re: resolution to Discrepancy no. 6 - Surcharge the trustee their entire fee of $138,468.

Discrepancy no. 7 - Unresolved by fifth supplement. Like trustee's response to Discrepancy no. 5, trustee did NOTHING to justify the attorney's fees it paid. This is a breach of fiduciary duty.

Previous Notes Attorney's fees equaled $97,495.11 for the accounting period, or $3,249.83 per month. That monthly amount is tempered by the current attorney for trustee's fairly modest fees, compared to those paid to Lori Lewis over a far shorter period of time, all of which are not even accounted for because the accounting period is not far enough back into 2021. There is no explanation why a trust not involved in heavy litigation would need to pay attorney's fees of that magnitude. The fees appear objectively unreasonable on their face, and supplemented billing statements reveal several problems.

Recommendation re: resolution to Discrepancy no. 7 - Surcharge the trustee the entire amount paid to attorney Lori Lewis ($81,818.41).

Conflict of Interest and Ethics Violations. Trustee makes two admissions that conflict with the billing states submitted by Mullen and Henzell, LLP, and raise ethics questions as a result. The Trustee admits 1) that Trustee did not accept the trustee position until February 3, 2022, and 2) that Ms. Lewis was not retained until "February of 2022." Contrary to those admissions, Ms. Lewis began billing for the issues related to this case as early as May 20, 2021. It is not only apparent from the record that Ms. Lewis and the Trustee were coordinating about the Trust that early in the case, but it is also apparent from the record that the Conservatee lacked the capacity to contract far earlier than that date.

It is also apparent from the evidence before the Court that Ms. Lewis was actively advocating to be appointed counsel for the Conservatee, going so far as opposing court appointment of Ms. Hoffman King, all while acting as the attorney for the trustee before February 2022, and even doing so after that date. An attorney representing both a trustee, and an beneficiary lacking legal capacity, violates Rule 1.7 of the Rules of Professional Responsibility, and also violates the duty of loyalty and confidentiality to both.

In addition to the ethical issues above, Ms. Lewis' rates are higher than any approved in the Santa Maria venue of this Court, and her billing statements reveal inappropriate billing practices. For example, her billing statements: Include a "4% administrative charge" that totals thousands of dollars. Include interest charges. Fees for "legal research." Thus, at minimum, Ms. Lewis should be ordered to return all fees she was paid from the trust before February 2022, and for any effort to represent the Conservatee. At maximum, Ms. Lewis should also be ordered to return payments made for the above listed inappropriate billing practices, and hourly rates over $400 per hour for herself, and over $150 per hour for her paralegal.

Missing Attorney's Fees to Michelon Vasquez. At Paragraph 14 of the petition to approve the first account of the conservator, "Petitioner and her counsel do not request fees from the Conservatorship estate." From the accounting of the trust, it appears that Conservator was paid, but nowhere in the accounting does it show that Michelon Vasquez was paid for her representation of the Conservator. At the hearing on December 1, 2025, it was revealed that Michelon Vasquez has not yet submitted billing statements to the trust for payment, and does not believe she is accountable to the court for work paid out by the trust. This is legally incorrect, and unjustified by statute, and a century of caselaw.

Schedule E - Resolved. This matter, upon further review, is resolved. Schedule E shows a total loss on sale of several securities as $23,689.87, but contains no difference between the proceeds and carry values.

[1] Fiduciary was paid $49,150.33, Trustee was paid $54,193.90 (Union Bank) and $84,275.50 (US Bank), Attorneys were paid $15,676.70 (Hussey Dehahn), and $81,818.41 (Lewis/Mullen & Henzel).

[2] There are conspicuously no fees in the accounting paid to Conservator's attorney (Michelon Vasquez), and it is unknown what fees have been paid, or will be requested by her at a future date for the accounting period.

Appearances: The court is open to the public for court business. The court is also conducting hearings via Zoom videoconference. Meeting ID: 161 797 5412 Passcode: 8749009

Tentative Ruling: Estate of Ursula Elisabeth Benham

Tentative Ruling: Estate of Ursula Elisabeth Benham