ROCKLAND, Maine — Both the state and representatives of a Rockland man whose home was sold for well below its assessed value while he was in state care are appealing a judge’s rulings in a pair of lawsuits.
In early December, Justice Andrew Horton of the Maine Business and Consumer Court in Portland ruled that two lawsuits filed by William Dean Jr.’s conservator and his sister over the actions of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services could go forward. Horton also dismissed several claims made against state officials in the case involving the sale of Dean’s Owls Head waterfront home while he was hospitalized and under state care.
Attorneys for DHHS and Dean have since filed notices of appeal with the Maine Supreme Judicial Court.
Dean’s attorney, David Jenny, said he expects it will take most of 2016 for the supreme court to act on the appeals. He said he expects it will be a year before a trial date is even scheduled.
One of the points of appeal by Jenny on behalf of Dean is whether the Business and Consumer Court judge erred in denying his motion to void the deed to the waterfront property sold to James Taylor by the state when it was the conservator for Dean.
In the state’s appeal by Assistant Attorney General Christopher Traub, the attorney is asking the high court whether the judge erred in determining that the state probate code waives the state’s immunity from lawsuits when it serves as a conservator.
DHHS had been appointed temporary conservator and had taken control of Dean’s finances and properties in September 2012 after he had been hospitalized for mental health problems in May 2012.
The state argued it needed to become conservator because Dean, who had never lived independently, was not capable of managing his finances, stating in its petition to the probate court that he misspent more than $200,000 from a family trust, that there were tax liens on properties in Owls Head and Rockland he inherited and that he had other unpaid bills.
After being awarded temporary conservatorship, DHHS sold Dean’s waterfront cottage on Castlewood Lane in Owls Head to James Taylor of Massachusetts in January 2013 for $205,000, even though the town had the property assessed at $476,840. The property consisted of 1 acre with 100 feet of shore frontage and a two-story, 1,000-square-foot cottage.
The state also euthanized Dean’s 10-year-old Himalayan cat, Caterpillar, saying there were no family members willing to care for the pet. DHHS tried to sell the Rockland home on Broadway, but a pipe broke during the winter when there was no heat and caused major flooding, which then led to an outbreak of mold throughout the home, making it uninhabitable, according to court filings.
Relatives of Dean challenged the state in 2013, and a cousin of his, Pamela Vose, is now his conservator. Dean has since been released from the Dorothea Dix Psychiatric Center and lives in an apartment in Rockland.
Justice Horton stated in his December ruling that “in the span of six months, most of what Mr. Dean owned and valued wound up being sold off, flooded or euthanized, as a result of DHHS’s intervention on his behalf.
“It seems clear that, had DHHS as Mr. Dean’s public conservator pursued a strategy aimed more at conserving his assets temporarily (and winterizing them effectively) rather than liquidating them permanently, Mr. Dean would be much better off today.”