Emma France recalls events that prompted lawsuit against county

By Susan Redden

sredden@joplinglobe.com

Emma France wants to be out from under the supervision of Rita Hunter, Jasper County public administrator.

In fact France, who is 95, doesn’t want a guardian at all, including her daughter, Delores Forste.

“We’re just going to be mother and daughter,” France said in her first interview since her case became public. She spoke recently at her attorney’s office in Springfield.

France said she just wants to go “home,” referring to the senior citizens complex in Needles, Calif., near Delores and her husband, Steve Forste.

“I like it. There’s lots of rocks and sand and places to walk around,” France said. “I can walk all over and I can walk to the (senior) center and eat if I’m too lazy to cook.”

France answered questions in detail about being hospitalized and made a ward of the county — she alleges against her will and without her participation — and then accompanying her daughter and son-in-law to California. That’s where Delores Forste was arrested and jailed for two weeks before being returned to Jasper County on charges she kidnapped her own mother.

When Delores Forste, 67, was arrested on Nov. 20, France left Needles for a while with Steve, 71. The county issued an arrest warrant for Steve as well, charging him with kidnapping, too. The couple also were charged with financial exploitation of the elderly and interference with custody.

After being returned to the county via a three-day cross-country trip in a prison van, Delores Forste didn’t have to appear for a Feb. 21 preliminary because the county elected to defer prosecution. Delores bonded out on Dec. 8 and spent Christmas with Steve’s relatives, who live in Golden City, while Steve and Emma remained behind in California. Steve never was arrested.

France and the Forstes have been back together about a month.

Asked if the experience had shaken her confidence in government, France giggled and answered, “Don’t ask me, I’m incompetent.”

France was referring to the probate court decision that made her a county ward.

France and Delores Forste have filed lawsuits against the public administrator and the office’s attorney. Motions also were filed this week asking the court to set aside a ruling that made France a ward of Hunter.

France is spending some of her time in her former home in Carthage, but the law firm representing her and Forste also is seeking an order that would allow France to stay in Golden City until the guardianship issue is settled. That request is to be heard March 26.

Rita Hunter, the public administrator, has refused comment on the lawsuits and did not return telephone calls for this story.

‘I wasn’t sick’

France said she was walking near her apartment in Carthage last May when she was stopped by Hunter, along with an office worker and two Carthage police officers.

“She said we’re going to the hospital for a checkup, but I told her I wasn’t sick,” France said.

She said they put her in the van against her will and took her to McCune-Brooks Hospital in Carthage, where she stayed for two weeks. France was taken to McCune-Brooks just after a May 16, 2007, court action that resulted in Hunter being appointed her guardian.

A temporary order had been approved April 26 after Hunter said she had been asked to serve as France’s guardian by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services because France was “unable to care for herself physically or financially.”

France also had been hospitalized at Freeman Health System in Joplin for two days in December 2006 at the request of the state.

“The hospital (in December) found her healthy and well-nourished, but a little depressed,” said Lynn Myers, an attorney for the firm representing France and Forste. “She scored 28 of 30 in questions about how oriented she was; that’s why they said she was depressed, but didn’t say anything about dementia.”

France said she had to pay a cab $35 to get back to Carthage after she was released from Freeman.

Forste said she had difficulty tracking her mother down during that brief hospitalization in December.

“When I called the hospital trying to find her, they told me she volunteered to go because she was depressed,” Delores said.

But France said she never agreed to go to the hospital either time and Myers said the physician specified on a report from the December visit that the admission was “involuntary.”

Lottery scams

In addition to dementia, county filings cite monetary losses of more than $40,000 as a result of France falling victim “to lottery scams.”

Those losses were noted in a report by the Missouri Division of Senior Services filed with the probate court on April 16, 2007. That report recommended “guardianship” for France. The state report cited what it described as “impaired judgment” and depression in France as a result of the losses.

It also was in that report that France and her daughter, Delores, were labeled “estranged,” noting that “visits are rare and the daughter has taken financial advantage of Ms. France in the past.”

Both mother and daughter have consistently denied since the beginning that they were estranged. In fact, Delores Forste said she spoke weekly with her mother over the phone and visited several times a year, statements that France confirmed.

The report does not specify how Delores was allegedly taking financial advantage of her mother, and, in fact, France also said that was not the case, either.

A spokesman for the state declined to speak about the details of the France case, but said the department “is charged to protect seniors and adults with disabilities.

“If we identify someone at risk, we’d pursue that and work with any other resource to protect that individual. One of the resources we well could use would be the public administrator,” said Mary Wehrle, director for the Division of Senior and Disability Services.

Delores Forste said she spoke with Carthage police concerning the lottery losses, but noted “the money she spent was not the money she was using to live on,” and she wasn’t worried that her mother was impaired.

“It was her money and I felt like she had a right to do what she wanted with it. A lot of it she felt was going to charity, even if it ended up being a scam,” Forste said. “She sent some money for (Hurricane) Katrina and there’s an Indian tribe in Ashland, Mont., she’s always sent money to.

“You’re supposed to give, and I wanted to give to people who needed it,” France said.

Self sufficient

Myers, the Springfield attorney, also said DHHS statements that France wasn’t buying food and medicine have “not been borne out by doctor’s reports (in December) that found her healthy and well-nourished.”

That report from the state also said France did not follow through with doctor’s instructions, including medication, after she was released.

Shannon McKinney, the attorney appointed by the court to represent France’s interests in probate court, interviewed France and called her “fairly self-sufficient.”

McKinney said an emergency guardianship order was not needed, but that oversight of France’s finances was needed due to her “dire financial situation.”

The Forstes returned to Carthage when France was hospitalized again in May 2007 for two weeks, but France had already been made a ward of the public administrator by the time they arrived.

Delores Forste said they didn’t know where France was after she was taken to the hospital in May and couldn’t reach her by phone, so they drove to Carthage from California. They found France at McCune-Brooks, and visited with her and with Hunter.

Although state law requires relatives to be notified when there is a guardianship hearing, Forste said they were never told of the hearing in May, but didn’t raise objections when they learned about it “because we didn’t think we could do anything about it and Rita Hunter assured us mom would get good care.”

The Forstes left for California but soon turned around and came back after Delores called her mother en route. Delores said France was “very upset” by actions of the public administrator, including taking part of the cash she had in her billfold and taking her mail.

“They had the key to my mailbox and they took all my mail,” France said. “I even asked at the post office and they said I couldn’t have it.”

The Forstes said they decided to take France to Colorado to visit grandchildren after she was released from the hospital, and then took her on to their home in Needles when she said she did not want to return to Jasper County.

The arrest warrants against the Forstes were issued Sept. 19.

Both the mother and daughter wrote letters asking state officials in Missouri and California to intercede on their behalf. Delores Forste also wrote to Probate Judge David Mouton, contending the arrest warrant was issued only after she refused to sign over her mother’s investment account to the public administrator’s office.

France and the Forstes say they will stay in the area until the outcome of a hearing they hope will allow them to take France back with them to California.

Delores Forste hasn’t been home since her arrest Nov. 20. She could go home now, she said, since she was released from her bond after her sentence was deferred on Feb. 21.

“We’re not leaving until we can all leave together,” Steve said.

Transport costs

The Jasper County Sheriff’s Department is responsible for bringing back to the county fugitives who have been arrested in other states. The department paid $1,705 to bring Delores Forste back to the county, according to Sheriff Archie Dunn.

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