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HBH36674
Guest
I live in North Carolina. I am currently 27 years old. When I was 5 years old, my father was killed in an accident at home. After his death, both my brother and I received Social Security payments over the course of 14 years for me and 18 years for him. He also had a fairly sizable life insurance policy. He left no will. Over the years, my mother remarried twice. She allegedly paid for the new house we moved into after his death with my brother's and my Social Security benefits. However, when confronted about this, she changes her story that she paid for it with his insurance settlement. From what I have read regarding her responsibilities as our representative payee, she should have spent only what was necessary and customary (i.e., clothing, food, shelter, etc.) for us. In several of these documents it also states that if our money was used to purchase a home, then the deed should have our names on it as well as hers, being that it was our benefits that allowed that purchase. These government documents also stated that she was to file reports stating what the money was spent on and what was left over. Any remainder was to have been put in an account in my brothers and my names, separately, as owners. During this time, my mother and her various husbands both had well paying jobs, earned military retirement income, leased land, and rented their other home. They also quite frequently took numerous long vacations, which my brother and I were not allowed on, to Minnesota, Charlotte, NC, Las Vegas, NV, Atlantic City, NJ, Florida, etc. If they were both employed, she received a sizable insurance settlement, and they both had good incomes, where did our money go? She says there is nothing left. She says she has to prove nothing to us and that she did nothing wrong. Yet, when I read what her responsibilities were, she did very little right. This long after the fact, what can be done? Her not acting responsibly with our money, and then putting us out of the house after completion of high school and not helping pay for college (which the remainder of the money would have helped with) has left both my brother and me in bad situations while she and her third husband are still living it up. She put the house that money from our father's death bought in both her current husband's and her name only. She also has told us that she will not give us things that were in my father's family that were passed on to him before they got married. In her current husband's and her joint will, if one spouse dies, the other gets all real and personal property. At that point, heirlooms from my fathers side could be sold by my step-father, should my mother pass away first, or given to his son by another marriage, should he will it that way. I NEED HELP!!! WHAT CAN WE DO??? I have only learned of this deceit over the past couple of years. I was ignorant to it when it was taking place. Is it too late to rectify the situation? Is she responsible for the "missing" or unaccounted for Social Security benefits? Being that my father died intestate, can she legally keep what was his and his ancestors before their marriage? My paternal grandmother recently died, and though her only living heirs were my brother and me, my mother will not give us my grandmothers possessions. HELP PLEASE!!!