Lawsuit filed over munchkin’s estate
By Michael Sorkin
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Four months before he died on Thursday, Mickey Carroll signed papers turning over control of all his assets to his caretaker, Linda Dodge.
Carroll, 89, was best known as a Munchkin, one of the little people in the movie “Wizard of Oz.”
Relatives estimate he left an estate of more than $1 million. They filed a suit in Clayton claiming that “unscrupulous agents” have taken control of the assets and put them “in imminent danger of continued dissipation, waste and theft.”
The heirs — there are eight — also maintain that Carroll suffered from dementia and was mentally incompetent to sign the legal papers.
Dodge calls the allegations “foolish.”
In an interview Friday, she said: “If I were taking so much money, why are we still making car payments” on two cars “And payments on my credit cards“
She also pooh-poohed the idea that Carroll was rich.
“I took care of a friend,” she added. “That I treated like a family member.”
A probate judge in St. Louis County Circuit Court will decide who’s right.
The controversy pits the relatives, including niece Janet L. Finocchiaro of Dallas, against Dodge, who says she and Carroll had been friends for 20 years. They met when they sat at the same table at a Backstoppers’ fundraiser at the Adam’s Mark Hotel, she recalled.
Carroll lived for more than 60 years in Bel-Nor in north St. Louis County.
Dodge says she became his caretaker on Jan. 2, when he needed help, and moved him into the home in Crestwood where she lives with her husband. She also took in Frank Parenti, 54, Carroll’s nephew. He’s in a wheelchair with cerebral palsy and lived with Carroll. Dodge is still taking care of him.
On Jan. 7, five days after moving in with Dodge, Carroll — whose real name was Michael Finocchiaro — signed a durable power of attorney transferring control of his investments and assets to Dodge.
He signed a second durable power of attorney for health care, giving Dodge authority to make medical decisions if he became incapacitated.
In the suit, Janet Finocchiaro says she was concerned about her uncle’s health. In a recent hot line complaint to the state of Missouri, she said her uncle was the victim of “elder abuse.”
Abridged
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