I am POA for my mother, she has dementia/Alzheimer's and I feel for you. The scammers are endless that prey on these situations. Fortunately she is now in a care facility and isolated from having this happen to her now. It really depressed me when I started digging into her finances all the scams she had fallen for before I put a halt to all of it. I was pretty much told what you have been told here which is contact the state's attorney general etc. You are going to find that the true barriers are ahead when you have to deal with anything Federal, they don't recognize POA's so for Social Security etc. you will need to deal with their bureaucratic maze to get yourself declared as the person authorized to deal with her affairs. Oddly enough for taxes the POA is perfectly fine, go figure.
Thanks for the notes guys!
Regarding the SS / etc for POA, what was the process for you to get through on that part? I have no idea if that is something I should start working on now or when that will be important.
OP - other than this situation, what is your grandmother's financial situation like in general? I know this check on her main checking account bounced but that doesn't mean she's destitute. If she has the assets elsewhere, you just have a decision to make. The reality is that she owes the money - it's sad, but the thieves have already been paid and her creditors don't necessarily need to be punished for it and they will be paid by her estate when she passes.
If her assets are not sufficient to pay the debt comfortably, then Miramonti has some good advice about trying to negotiate the debt down. Assuming she won't need credit any more, then it really doesn't matter how bad they ding her credit. If her total debts outweigh her total assets, that strengthens your negotiation position as they would be happy to take pennies on the dollar now versus getting nothing ever.
Regarding her finances...
Once the dust settled and I became POA and started getting access to accounts I, like others have said, was totally shocked and sickened at the shit she had given money for...just a loss for words.
And the JUNK mail she gets on a daily basis is ridiculous, I am not lying when I say she gets a dozen magazines a day for shopping and at least 1 to 2 dozen mailers asking for money for some religious related organization...
I have what I believe is the majority of the stuff in front of me now.
Regarding this law suit, apparently the stupid debt consolidation company I am assuming has some legal POA because when I contacted the debt collector, he said he couldn't talk to me about negotiations even though I had a POA submitted to them because the company issued a letter saying not to deal with me on the matter!
I had contacted Discover about 3 weeks ago, and submitted a letter with the POA after the discussion. They wouldn't tell me anything because the account was closed and sent to collections. I don't know if I can still talk to them about this or if this truly is in the hands of the collection company. The collection company said they were in negotiations and that discover likes to get 70% of the bill, 80% if there is a home involved (which there is) but I chuckled and told the guy that the house is a dump, worth about 50-55 G and she owes about 43 G on the house so good luck getting money out of that if I can actually sell it.
One other note, it isn't just scammers that take advantage of the elderly. My grandmother has leased a car from the same dealer I am guessing for at least a decade or more. A toyota dealer. Never thought much of it, they were usually smaller cars, the recent car she has is a tiny Sion Xb, base model, no frills...they have her in a three year lease (not terrible) but the payment on the damn thing is 330 dollars...she could be leasing a BMW for that money!
There is one place she sent money to I have been trying to get it back for the last 2 months. It isn't much, it is a total sham though and now it is simply out of spite that I keep calling back every week asking for the money on a service she is never going to use and they insist they will send it but it never comes.
With all the other stuff going on I haven't dedicated enough time to harassing the place. It is a weird organization, the same elderly lady answers and EVERY time it is the same old story about a mix up or some other excuse.
http://www.catholicgoldenage.org/
IDK if anyone would have a recommendation on how I can put pressure on getting the money back by contacting "something" in their headquarters state PA.