Whether a court-appointed guardian and attorney acting under color of state law are immune from liability under 42 USC §1983 for actions that allegedly deprive an individual of civil and constitutional rights

The questions presented are: 1. Whether a court -appointed guardian for an adult, acting under color of state law, is immune from liability under 42 USC §1983 for forcing his ward into a nursing -home against her will without authority to do so. 2. Whether a court -appointed attorney for an “alleged incapacitated person”, employed by the State and acting under color of state law, is immune from liability under 42 USC §1983 for her intentional acts intended to have her client deemed incapacitated against her client’s wishes, and to have the power -ofattorney held by her client’s son annulled, thereby allowing the court to strip her client of all her civil and constitutional rights and property agains t her client’s wishes. 3. Whether a court -appointed guardian, acting under color of state law, is immune from liability under 42 USC §1983 for orchestrating a scheme to procure a guardianship by fraud. “America ’s guardianship system was designed as a last resort to be used only in the rare and drastic event that someone is totally incapacitated by mental or physical disability. In those cases, conscientious guardians can provide vital support, often in complex and distressing circumstances. … [T]he system has grown into a vast, lucrative, and poorly regulated industry that has subsumed more than a million people, many of whom insist they are capable of making their own decisions, and placed them at risk o f abuse, theft, and even death. ” Blake, H. et al. , 2022. ii “Beyond Britney: Abuse, Exploitation, and Death Inside America ’s Guardianship Industry. ” BuzzFeed News (Sept. 17, 2021), in Best American Magazine Writing 2022 (pp. 277–298). Columbia Press. The case at bar is an egregious, yet in many ways all too common, example of how guardianship courts wrongfully deprive citizens of their civil and constitutional rights, their property, and, as here, their lives. The Complaint alleges that during the proceeding under New York State’ s Mental Hygiene Law Art. 81 to determine whether decedent Dr. Judith Brook should have a permanent guardian appointed, the court -appointed temporary guardian, Joseph Ruotolo, engaged in numerous acts of misconduct that led to J udith ’s premature death and damage to Judith’ s Estate. Inter alia , Ruotolo forced Judith into a nursing -home against her will without a court order required under New York Mental Hygiene Law Art. 81 for him to do so, and engaged in unauthorized financial transactions, intended to run up his commissions, that caused hund reds-of-thousands of dollars of financial damage to Judith ’s Estate. Ruotolo’ s scheme was facilitated by Judith ’s courtappointed attorney Diana Rosenthal ’s intentional acts intended to have the guardianship court find Judith incapacitated and annul her son Dr. Adam Brook ’s power -of-attorney and healthcare -proxy. Rosenthal waived Judith’ s appearance at the guardianship trial even though Judith stated, in an audio -recorded statement, that she wanted the trial postponed so that she could be present (Judith had been discharged from the hospital the night before trial and was to o tired to go to court). Rosenthal also successfully objected to Adam ’s attorney James Kaplan’ s proffer of documentary evidence that Adam had diligently paid $235,316 for homecare -services for his mother over the iii preceding 7 months, evidence which refuted Ruotolo’ s perjured testimony that Adam was two months in arrears for payments for homecare -services. Upon being forced into the nursing -home, Judith was not permitted to walk to the bathroom but was forced to lie in her own stool 24 hours a day. The nursing -home did not administer to Judith any of her medications, including pantoprazole, which her gastro enterologist Dr. SriHari Mahadev had prescribed to prevent gastrointestinal bleeding. When Judith then developed gastrointestinal bleeding, she was not taken to a hospital but allowed to bleed until she fainted. CPR was initiated, causing a rib fracture that cau