Tohbii Beans

State of Michigan

The “Protected” Life

An Introduction To Probate

Aug 16, 2026

When my mother created a special needs trust for me before passing away, she intended to leave a safety net that would protect her disabled child for life. Instead, that trust became an inescapable legal trap.

I am an adult living with documented neurological disabilities, including autism and a stress-induced seizure disorder. In the fields of criminology and victimology, vulnerable adult exploitation rarely looks like simple cut and dry sudden large value losses, it is an opportunistic, systemic process. It thrives on structural power imbalances, administrative opacity, and an assumption that a neurodivergent person lacks the cognitive endurance or executive capacity to question the record.

In simple terms, those that exploit the vulnerable wait until no one is looking and everyone left trusts them completely. That is when they are most dangerous, and can do the most damage.

Anatomy of Systemic Exploitation

The progression of my case illustrates classic institutional vulnerabilities:

I chose the top result on Google and believed that the representation I had found was a blessing. Not long into things, they took over and suddenly I was shut out of everything and left more confused and isolated than ever. My best interests were certainly not a consideration, and the house was sold for over $500,000.

I’m one of the lucky ones. I got a mortgage and a house and I haven’t lost it yet. Many people stay trapped in facilities or the vicious cycle of homelessness. This still took me 4 years. I had no idea about any money until after I had signed the papers and triggered a DHS audit of the trust and my DHS agent was kind enough to finally provide me with my first bank document that demonstrated the dollar value available. At that point, tens of thousands were already gone from administrative fees from when I was homeless and had no contact nor benefit.

Even after I did everything on my own and just asked for some simple support following domestic violence, they tried to take my house! Now I’ve even lost some of my state benefits and I have to fight for my rights in the Court of Appeals all by myself.

When Courtrooms Fail the People They Campaign to Protect

The probate court is legally designated to supervise fiduciaries and safeguard beneficiaries. Instead, self-represented disabled individuals face deep implicit bias:

Despite formal disability accommodations approved on record, the Judge in my case disregarded my written structures, demanded oral argument during high-stress hearings, and threatened contempt when trauma and neurological symptoms manifested.

This particular judge presented themself publicly as an advocate for vulnerable populations during campaigns, yet enforced a rigid, paternalistic courtroom environment that penalized a disabled litigant and granted unchecked leeway to institutional law firms.

Beneficiaries are often forced into an impossible economic dynamic where trust assets are spent defending the fiduciary against the sole beneficiary, while the disabled individual must represent themselves ‘pro se’ (for oneself)in appellate courts. All of that is sometimes necessary to avoid severe lifelong damages, often death or severe medical trauma.

Exposing the Entire Record

I am taking this fight directly to the Court of Appeals and will be sharing every document, hearing transcript, and accounting failure on my Substack.

This is more than just my personal story. It is an ongoing public record of how easily probate systems can be weaponized against the very people they are mandated to protect. I will continue to document the reality of self-representation, expose the mechanics of fiduciary overreach, and challenge the implicit bias entrenched in our local courts.