An Ethical Dilemma

For all you budding moral ethicists out there, help!

When we moved in our neighbors to the right were an old Lithuanian dancer from the forties (upper apartment) and his renter, an elderly ballerina and choreographer (lower apartment). They are real old Hollywood. Ed had danced in Mary Poppins as a leaping chimney sweep (the longest dance sequence ever in a movie) and Patricia had dated Bobby Darrin. Now they were just our sweet (mostly) elderly neighbors. Patricia was chatty and had a lot of cats (before the coyotes ate them) and Ed was curmudgeonly and whip smart. He kept a good eye on all the neighbors and their predatory practices and always let us know what was going on.

He was getting older. He had AIDS. He had trouble going up and down the stairs. He started having heart trouble. Once Jonathan saved his life. Patricia called him in a panic and said Ed was on the floor in the bathroom and needed help. Jonathan called 9-1-1 and stayed with him when the paramedics and fire engines crowded onto our street. He was gone for a long time. Then he returned. He never acknowledged that he knew Jonathan again. Jonathan thought he was addled. I thought he was deeply ashamed.

Then he ran into our neighbor's gate and crushed it so she couldn't get out of her house and then he crashed his replacement rental car. We wondered if we should report him to the DMV. He was about to pull a Santa Monica Farmer's Market on us, and we would be responsible.

Every neighbor on every side wanted Ed's house. It had two garages and was a sweet little pad. A guy on the corner tried to buy it and was rebuffed. But that didn't stop him from erecting a fence, and then putting doors into the fence so that when he owned it his mother-in-law could walk through. Ed was in the final years of his life and the real-estate vultures were circling.

But the people who always wanted Ed's house most of all were our uphill neighbors. They have 99 steps to their front door and no garage in a neighborhood with a serious parking shortage. It can drive a man mad. And it has. (That neighbor left for a flat place in Palm Springs)

A couple of years ago a new guy bought the house. We like him. He befriended Ed. He helped him out. When Ed had health troubles he made calls for him and took care of him. He was really really good to him.

Here is where the story starts to get murky.

He helped Ed get better health coverage, find a place to stay. He straightened out his health care. He put in a lot of time. For some reason Ed--who never seemed to trust anyone--trusted him. Before we knew it (how did we know it?) he was Ed's power of attorney. Then Ed was out of the house in a nursing home. No scheduled date of return. Then rumors that he had bought the house. Then our lower neighbor was kicked out. Supposedly the 99 step neighbor with serious real-estate ambitions had told Patricia that Ed could no longer live upstairs, because the steps were too difficult (true) so he was going to move into the lower apartment (really? that has a lot of stairs, too). Acting as Ed's power of attorney, he kicked Patricia, who at this point was suffering from cancer, out of the lower apartment. She has an apartment in Bev Hills. Still. Jonathan confronted him. Did you buy the property? How much? Our 99 step neighbor would not answer. He said he would answer on Dec. 31.

By Jan. 15 there were two new couples installed in the apartments. They seem nice. Our 99 step neighbor said he bought the property. Real estate records show he purchased it for $250,000. You can't buy a garbage can stall in this neighborhood for that. But the idea was the he would take care of Ed for perpetuity. How do I know this? Am I filling this in? I no longer know. I have lost track of what I heard from the man himself, and what I heard from suspicious neighbors.

One thing I love about my husband is that though he seems mild mannered, he is the kind of guy who will stand up and speak out when a bully is around. He is not afraid. People always underestimate him, and I adore him for it. Once in Peru a single passenger on a train was bullying all the people around him. Jonathan stepped right in and stood up to him in Spanish.

So now we have witnessed this strange play next door. One elderly neighbor is installed in a rest home, never to return. Another has been kicked out, under a law that allows you to do that if the owner needs the space. And she got her money--per the housing laws. And our third neighbor, bought the property for what is probably a third to a quarter of the actual price. Yes. Even in this housing market.

So here is the question: are we compelled to act? Have we witnessed something unsavory? or something illegal? Was the whole transaction slimy, distasteful and slightly underhanded? Absolutely. But was it elder abuse?

I don't know.

What do you think?

Respond now, because I do not even know if I will leave this post up.