At the beginning of 2016 my aunt, who was living in an assisted living facility, was getting very frustrated with a relative who was handling her funds but not providing any accounting of her assets. Not knowing how to proceed to help my aunt, I asked the facility where she resides for a recommendation of an attorney who might have experience in a situation like ours. They recommended Hale Ball and we are so happy they did.
After an initial consultation with my aunt and I, lawyer Samantha Fredieu gave us a plan on how to try and get an accounting of the assets. Thanks to Samantha’s quick actions, we immediately gained control of my aunt’s assets but discovered our worst fears; the relative had misappropriated a large sum of money from my aunt.
Samantha suggested ( and we agreed) to file a lawsuit to recover the funds. Samantha guided us through all of our choices, explaining in detail which venue was better for our case, state or federal court. After carefully weighing all our options with Samantha, we chose to file our lawsuit in Virginia federal court. Samantha and her firm jumped right into the case and quickly filed an action. Samantha litigated very professionally and always worked with us to keep expenses as low as possible. The relative fought back hard and made the case unnecessarily complicated, but Samantha and her firm thwarted every attempt by the relative to try to get the case dismissed.
After a year of very hard work and multiple appearances before the judge, we won our case with summary judgment and not having to go to trial. We succeeded at every level we had hoped and thanks to Samantha’s efforts, we didn’t have to have my aunt exposed to a potentially exhausting trial. Samantha also got the court to award punitive damages and also got the judge to order that our legal fees had to be reimbursed by the relative who misappropriated the funds.
Throughout the case Samantha kept us continually up to date with every development as it happened. On numerous occasions Samantha consulted directly with my aunt with showing great patience, love and respect to her, even though my 82 year old aunt can be a handful. Samantha went above and beyond all our expectations. If you ever find yourself in need of an elder care specialist, Samantha Fredieu and Hale Ball law firm is the place to go.