The Armenian Bar Association has partnered with the City of Glendale on elder abuse prevention
GLENDALE—In late 2017, the administration of a prominent Los Angeles-area Armenian high school alerted the public that a group of youths, pretending to be students from the school, had entered apartment buildings and approached homes with the intent to target and swindle the elderly. These young impostors claimed to be Armenian school students and concocted a scheme of abject dishonesty in which they fabricated a sales pitch that they were collecting much-need funds for the betterment of their school library.
Understandably, many elderly Armenians responded to what they believed to be genuine calls for financial assistance and handed over their money for what they thought was a good cause. To help bring these deceitful acts to an end, the Armenian Bar Association moved swiftly and contacted Onnig Bulanikian, Director of the City of Glendale’s Community Services and Parks Department. The Armenian Bar proposed partnering with the Department’s Senior Services Division to present to the senior-citizen community a series of “Know Your Rights” lectures so that they may be made aware of and in a better position to protect themselves from such and other deplorable attempts of abuse.
“The elderly members in our community are an especially vulnerable segment of the population who, unfortunately, sometimes find themselves to be the victims of abuse and financial scams designed to take advantage of them,â€
