Our first step was a comprehensive evaluation by Dr. Reyes, a respected geriatric neurologist whose conclusions would carry weight in court. He spent an entire day testing my memory, reasoning, judgment, and cognitive function before concluding that my results were not simply normal for a seventy-two-year-old man, but exceptional for my age.
“There is no evidence here of cognitive decline.”
I asked him to put that conclusion in writing, and he gave me four copies of his report. With the central accusation against me professionally challenged, Patricia and I shifted our attention to the financial evidence.
I arranged three years of bank records into a detailed timeline, matching every $8,000 deposit from Jared’s trust with the $7,800 withdrawal that followed. Every trail led to Meridian Care Solutions, the company controlled by Lauren’s brother, Gregory Honce. Further investigation showed that the business had no employees, no actual office, no other clients, and no senior-care operation whatsoever.
The power of attorney was our next focus. Patricia’s investigator located the notary who had stamped it, and when confronted with the document, he admitted that Lauren had brought it to him already signed and claimed I was waiting outside because I was too frail to enter the building.
I had never been there.
The notary had violated the basic requirements of his commission by authenticating a signature he had never witnessed, and that error made him extremely willing to cooperate with our investigation. His testimony established that Lauren had personally delivered the document and provided the false explanation that allowed it to be notarized.
Then we examined the signature itself, and that was where forty years of personal history became evidence. Diane had kept boxes of our canceled checks, and when I retrieved them from storage, we found hundreds of genuine examples of my signature dating back decades.
