Empty Mansions

step in. The topic was being discussed by every estate professional in the country: If a person died in 2008 or 2009, his or her estate faced a top tax rate of 45 percent. But if the person could hold out until 2010, the estate might pay nothing. That made 2010, or so the joke went, the perfect year to die. From the Web posting, it appeared that Kamsler had an idea how to put this joke into practice. The estate lawyer wrote:
    On that note, the other day I was talking to Irving Kamsler, a terrific CPA friend of mine, who shared some out-of-the-box thinking on a transaction he had done for a client.… My CPA friend had suggested that, as part of the planning process, the client should amend his health care directive/living will to provide that the client be kept alive by any artificial means necessary … thereby ensuring as much as possible that the appreciation on the assets would not be includible in his estate. As my friend and I continued talking, our thoughts turned to 2010, and the possibility of counseling clients to include similar language in their current health care directives instructionthat they be kept alive by any means necessary until January 1, 2010 (or maybe a few days later, just to be safe). This would effectively permit a client to achieve maximum estate tax savings, assuming the client might otherwise pass away before 2010.
    The Clark relatives were unsettled. What sort of financial adviser would suggest such a strategy? What would W. A. Clark think if he knew that his youngest child’s affairs were in the hands of such a man?
    They had just signed a card for their dear 102-year-old Tante Huguette. But now they wondered, what if she were brain dead and hooked to a machine just to “achieve maximum estate tax savings”?
“WE NEED NOT APOLOGIZE”

 
    T HE C LARK FAMILY BEGAN to mobilize. Some consulted a lawyer about cases of elder abuse. Others looked up property records. They learned that Huguette’s Connecticut home was on the market. As Carla wrote, “I feel like we are all playing CLUE!”
    They went back to Huguette’s attorney repeatedly, having different relatives make attempts to get information, but he maintained her privacy. Bock told them she was healthy and lucid, in “amazing” condition for 102. He said they could send letters or photos to him, or they could send mail to her Fifth Avenue address if they liked.
    Bock’s time logs back up his story that he was doing what Huguette wanted. “11/26/08: Telephone call from HMC re: letter about Carla Hall email. Will not call Carla. Doesn’t want to be involved with family at all. Handle as best I can. Verified with Hadassah and Chris.”
    The family by this time had figured out that Huguette was at Beth Israel, though they had no idea of the cancer that had originally caused her to go to the hospital. Her half-grandnephew André Baeyens had heard through Madame Pierre that she was at Doctors Hospital, which had become part of Beth Israel. One phone call to Beth Israel’s main hospital told them that she was on the third floor there. Not so hidden after all.
    Carla knew she was taking a risk going to the hospital. On December 6, she wrote to the Corcoran’s director, whom she was keeping informed, “I feel it is important to continue my relationship with Bock because the more we can interact, the more the information seeps out. To confront him right now would not serve our investigation. And it could alienate Huguette.”
    • • •
    The next day, Carla went down to Beth Israel anyway, along with her cousin Ian Devine. They had only recently realized they were cousins, after working together as marketing experts for the same corporate clients,even sending their children to the same school. Ian lived a mile away from Huguette but had never met her: A mile in crowded Manhattan can be a great distance. He recalled sending a couple of holiday cards to Huguette in the 1970s but said he got no reply. He is a wealth management consultant, describing his expertise as helping families “prepare for the responsibilities of wealth,” “create connections among the next generations,” and “build sustainable family structures for communication and collaboration.”
    At Beth Israel, the two amateur detectives naturally looked for Huguette first in the “deluxe patient care unit,” which offers luxury suites and gourmet meals for higher-paying patients. Huguette was not in this VIP section, which is named for the chairman