LOS ANGELES _ Last May, Eric Semel, the eldest child and only son of former Warner Bros. chief Terry Semel, filed a petition in Los Angeles County Superior Court to appoint a temporary conservator for his father. Semel had been a lion of Hollywood during his heyday, winning admiration for the way he revolutionized the movie business during two decades at the top _ and for the finesse with which he'd conducted himself while doing so. But by last year Semel, then 75 and suffering the ravages of Alzheimer's, had for some time been unable to manage his personal or financial affairs.
Two years earlier, Semel's wife, Jane, had put him in a nursing facility. Now Eric was claiming that his stepmother "was in serious breach of her fiduciary duties" and "causing serious harm to Terry's health and safety, potentially rising to elder abuse and neglect."
The allegations were as numerous as they were disturbing. In the filings, Jane is accused of instructing Semel's private caregivers to change the dosages of his prescriptions or eliminate them altogether; ignoring repeated requests to take her husband, who also suffered from high blood pressure, for regular physical examinations; and refusing to allow him to leave the facility, curtailing his social activities. Semel, his son claimed, had been reduced to living in a 500-square-foot bedroom at the Motion Picture & Television Fund retirement community in Woodland Hills, against his expressed wish to remain at his home, a 13,000-square-foot Bel-Air mansion.
Jane Semel said in court filings that she moved her husband to the Motion Picture home on the advice of doctors. Before the warring factions reached a confidential agreement last fall, Jane refuted her stepson's characterization of Semel as a "man dumped by his wife in a substandard facility and denied necessary medical care capriciously and against the advice of his doctors." Her husband, she stated in a court filing, "is not the man he once was. He is sometimes confused and sometimes upset, but those are functions of his disease, not anything that anyone has done to him." (Through his attorney, Eric Semel declined to comment.)
Eric Semel's extraordinary campaign to revoke his stepmother's authority over his father's care set off a divisive family crisis while opening a window into Terry Semel's well-being and treatment, which had been the subject of long-running speculation among friends and associates. How did one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in Hollywood _ a man with considerable resources and influence, who had given millions to various philanthropic causes and owned homes in Los Angeles, New York City, the Hamptons and London _ end up in a two-room unit in a home for the aged in the Valley?
The family's probate fight also raised broader questions about the legal, financial and personal challenges of caring for someone with Alzheimer's, a disease with no cure or treatment able to arrest its progression.
"The person that you designate as trustee can make decisions that can be completely contrary to your wishes," said Martin Neumann, director at Weinstock Manion, a Los Angeles law firm specializing in trust and estates. If they do, "you're out of luck," said Neumann, who is not involved in the Semel case.
Semel married Jane, his second wife, in 1977. Together, they have three daughters. In her court filings, Jane noted that she had taken care of Semel for 41 years "with love and devotion" and made the case that she should continue to do so. Jane also asserted that she was authorized to exercise full control over her husband's financial and personal affairs, including his health care. And she supplied proof: Semel had signed documents giving his wife power of attorney and making her his health care agent.
"The case to which you refer was settled to the satisfaction of all parties," said Patricia Glaser, an attorney representing Jane Semel. "There was no finding of any breach of fiduciary duty by Jane. The 'allegations' against Jane were just that, mere allegations, and were abandoned. Jane has done and continues to do everything in her power to make Terry's life the best that it can be with the help of highly trained professionals at every turn ... . Terry is receiving wonderful care at the MPTF."
