Many Miami residents have come us here at The Law Offices of Frye & Vazquez, P.L. after having had a loved one committed to a guardianship convinced that those parties will become the targets of financial exploitation and abuse. If you share this same concern, your fears likely rise from the assumption that when one is determined to be incapacitated, all of his or her rights and decision-making powers are essentially revoked. Yet even when one becomes the ward of a guardian, he or she does still retain basic freedoms.
Those freedoms can be found in Section 744.3215(1) of the Florida’s state statutes. One of the most basic is the right to remain as independent as possible, including the freedom to choose where and how he or she lives (insofar as it it reasonable). Your loved one will also retain his or her right to privacy as well as to continue to communicate and receive visits from you and other family members and friends. He or she also has the right to counsel independent of his or her guardian and to have access to the courts. Your loved one must also be notified any pending proceedings or rulings in relation to his or her determination of capacity.
In relation to his or her guardianship, the law grants your loved one the right to:
- Have an annual review of his or her guardianship plan
- Have continuous reviews of the need to maintain restrictions on his or her rights
- Have the chance to be restored to capacity as soon as possible
Restoring capacity may require continued recuperative or rehabilitative services. Thus, these rights are retained by your loved one even after having been made a ward. More information on these and other retained rights as a ward can be found here on our site.
