Police are investigating a family’s claims that their father had more than $500,000 siphoned from his accounts by a woman he met and moved in with. For 18 months Amy Ridout has investigated the plight of Athol Brown who was once a wealthy man, but now lives off the pension.
In March, Katie Brown climbed over a fence and rescued her father.
For three years, 92-year-old Athol Brown had lived in a sleepout behind Sharron “Sharn” Potroz’s Feilding home. During that time, Athol Brown dropped out of sight. His phone was disconnected, and visitors weren’t admitted through the electric gates. Instead, Potroz told them through the intercom that the elderly man was out.
When money began to leave Brown’s account, his friends and family began to make a noise. They contacted police, health professionals and advocates. They gathered evidence, collecting paperwork and taping phone calls and conversations.
But their efforts led them nowhere. Brown’s family estimates he has lost more than $700,000 and says the once-wealthy man is penniless.
The family has complained to police, who have interviewed Brown and are taking statements from his children.
When Stuff visited her home in late 2019, Potroz was pleasant and softly spoken. Standing on the doorstep of her Feilding villa, she expressed surprise when Stuff said Brown’s son, Rob, had concerns.
"Why is his son so worried?" she asked.
The transfers could be explained, Potroz said.
"Oh yes, I know what it's all about. It's a really long-winded story."
She was too busy to go into details, and Brown was out, Potroz said. She promised to call Stuff later.
She never got in touch, but Brown’s lawyer swiftly trespassed Stuff from Potroz’s residence and Brown’s properties. The lawyer denied "allegations", and asked for enquiries to be directed to him.
He did not respond to questions, but said the claims were “defamatory” of his “client’s caregiver” (Potroz) and that Brown’s son had been “trying to manipulate the bank accounts”. The lawyer said Brown had been assessed by experienced geriatricians and found to have full capacity to make his own financial decisions.
Despite calls, letters and emails, Potroz, who has also used the surnames Henderson, McKay and Brown, has never responded to questions.
The rescue
Brown’s son Rob, who lives in Nelson, had long been suspicious of Potroz.
His sister Katie said she was wary, too. But Rob’s persistent questions about finances had shut him out of Potroz’s house, and soured his relationship with his father.
As the only person who still had access to her father, Katie treaded carefully. “I kept that channel open.”
Each time she travelled to Feilding from her Bay of Plenty home, she’d tell Potroz she was coming. “She would have him ready for me,” Katie said.
But on her last trip down, she believed Brown smelled strongly of urine.
Katie’s next visit was unannounced. Not pausing to buzz the intercom, she climbed over the fence and let herself in, meeting a “shocked” Charlie Ruane. An old friend of Potroz, Ruane was a regular visitor. The 72-year-old Palmerston North man runs errands for Potroz, including driving her to medical appointments, and assisted with Brown’s care.
Katie found her dad sitting on the toilet. Hunched over, he wore trackpants and nothing else.
“He looked miserable, his spine was sticking out. He was sitting in his own s....”
The sleepout was thick with flies, and Katie retched at the smell.
She called an ambulance and looked for some clothes for her dad. Finding none, she asked Ruane for help.
“He said, ‘oh I don’t know what [Brown] has done with [the clothes].’ Then he told me they’d been burned.”
Brown was treated at the hospital, then taken to the resthome where he now lives. Furious, Katie called Potroz and “tore strips off her” about her father’s condition. Potroz did not say much on the phone, and Katie has had no contact with her since, she said.
Trapped
Athol Brown, a former property developer and pilot, met Potroz some time in 2017 through his ex partner of 39 years, Evelyn Strugnell.
Strugnell and Potroz had met at a country music club and hit it off.
“I didn't know her very well, but I liked her,” Strugnell told Stuff. “One of those girls you think, she's a nice person."
When Potroz came round to visit, she'd "chat away" to Brown, Strugnell said.
"Then Athol suddenly started saying, ‘I'm going to live with Sharn’. Then he said, ‘I'm packing my things, I'm going to live with Sharn.’”
Strugnell said the pair had had their ups and downs and in later years, had lived together as friends. However, she was surprised by the move.
"I was blown away. I said, ‘this is ridiculous, this is your home.’"
Things quickly went wrong at Potroz’s house, the elderly man told Stuff from his resthome. Initially, attempts by Stuff to speak with Brown resulted in cease and desist letters from lawyers. However, he agreed to talk after leaving Potroz’s home.
"I left a plate out in the sleepout; I'd been sitting out and eating in the sun. [Potroz] went round the bend, [saying] 'bring it inside’."
Over the phone, Charlie Ruane described Brown as “difficult”.
“He’s a stubborn old man. He could be very difficult to deal with, he wouldn’t co-operate.”
Potroz employed three carers for Brown, Ruane said. However, when Stuff asked why Brown’s daughter found the elderly man in an uncared for state, Ruane said Brown liked to be dirty.
“He wasn’t taking care of himself. He was just a filthy old man.”
Brown told Stuff he was unable to contact anyone.
“I said to [Potroz] several times, ‘I’ve got to get a phone’, but it never happened. I did feel like I was trapped there."
Katie Brown said on her visits, her father never expressed that he was unhappy in the house.
“When I asked Dad if he was OK he always said yes, and never complained,” Katie said.
According to Ruane, Brown had asked for his phone to be disconnected. There was no landline at the house, but the elderly man was free to use Potroz’s cellphone, Ruane said.
The missing money
In May 2018, Rob Brown discovered his father had visited an out-of-town ANZ branch with Potroz. Suspicious, Rob contacted the bank, and the banking ombudsman. Months later, the bank called a meeting with Athol Brown.
An ANZ staff member told Rob his father was "visibly shocked" to find that instead of being thousands of dollars in credit, his account was $15 overdrawn.
The same day, ANZ sent Brown a letter signed by a branch manager, which Stuff has seen.
"We are worried for your financial wellbeing," the letter said.
The letter described how Potroz became a co-signatory on his account.
“Sharron refers to [Athol] as Pops or Grandpa, so it would be easy to see why we might assume there is a family relationship," the letter said.
The letter said Potroz had used Brown’s Eftpos cards, and transferred more than $36,000 from Athol's account to her own.
There were also "significant cash advances", and hundreds of dollars spent on groceries and fast food. Although Athol didn't have a phone, there were $300 monthly payments to Vodafone.
"...which may not match the sort of spending a 90-year-old customer would undertake," the letter said.
According to the letter, Potroz’s bank, BNZ, temporarily froze her accounts, and returned $27,000 to Brown.
An ANZ spokeswoman said the bank is obliged to follow a customer's instructions unless there are capacity issues, or a dispute between joint account holders.
"Our branch staff are trained to look for coercion, financial abuse and suspicious transactions... We have processes in place we follow when such events are detected."
Potroz then helped Athol Brown open an account at BNZ.
In June 2020, a BNZ spokesman told Stuff that since there was no power of attorney in place, their customer can access their account as they see fit. However, staff are trained to look for warning signs, and would be on the lookout, he said.
"In this case we have made a note on the account to indicate to staff members to pay extra attention to their interactions."
When Brown’s daughter Katie went through his accounts after he left Potroz’s the house, she found those transactions were the tip of the iceberg.
Last year, at least $500,000 left Brown’s account.
This included $300,000 in “rent”. The $1600 weekly payment was backdated to May 2017, a year before Brown moved into the house. In a lawyer’s letter seen by Stuff, the lawyer compared the cost of the rent to two nearby resthomes, where weekly care was $1200 and $1400.
The rest was swallowed by ATM withdrawals, at stores like Hunting and Fishing, The Baby Factory, Kmart and the Warehouse; at restaurants and in lump sum transfers. Days after Brown received $165,000 from a house sale, $40,000 was transferred to Potroz’s account, labelled “telephone bill payments”.
Charlie Ruane said he took Brown to the ATM, and sometimes used his Eftpos card at the elderly man’s request. However, he did not remember details of the amounts or balances, he said.
After the Covid-19 lockdown, Brown rarely left the house, Ruane said.
“He was at home most of the time. He walked up and down the driveway with his walker.”
Ruane had not seen Brown visit any stores, restaurants, or the other places listed on his bank statements.
“His health wouldn’t have allowed it.”
Ruane could not explain the transfers, but said Brown could not use Internet banking.
Property wrangles
Brown owned several rentals around Manawatū. Each was under trust, with appointed trustees who were friends and family members.
In November 2019, a property developer who had previously done business with Athol visited the elderly man with an offer for his two derelict properties.
Potroz and Charlie Ruane met him at the door.
"Athol came out on the doorstep, [Charlie] stood between Athol and me. I stepped to one side. I asked if [Athol] remembered me – he did, he had a smile on his face," said the developer, who did not want to be named. "But [Charlie] ...and Sharn came out and closed the door."
The developer approached Rob, as trustee of one of the properties, and the three men met in Feilding.
"We took him away from Sharn," Rob said. "We met in Feilding central. Dad looked at the offers and agreed and signed them."
The property developer said Brown was "lucid", and the relationship between father and son genuine.
"There was zero friction between father and son," the developer said. "Everyone was happy."
If he'd had any indication there was anything untoward going on, he would have walked away, the developer said.
After Athol moved in with Potroz, trustees began receiving what they described as "sabre-rattling, threatening letters" from Athol Brown’s lawyer asking for their resignation, Rob Brown said.
Other incidents put the trustees on alert. One received a sales agreement from Potroz, offering $140,000 for a property worth about three times that. Suspicious, the trustee did not sign.
Someone claiming to be Brown’s granddaughter called the Manawatū District Council, saying there was an error on a property title. And a letter on unheaded paper that Brown told his children was from a lawyer, requested their support to relinquish his assets.
