Couple fail to comply with deal to avoid prison

The case, on charges of exploiting the elderly, will go to trial May 5 if conditions aren't met.

By Jamal Thalji, Times Staff Writer
Published February 12, 2008

ADVERTISEMENT Joseph Clancy, 52, would get probation under the deal. The pair would keep the disputed home. Cynthia Clancy, 45, could get her charges dismissed if she completed a pretrial intervention program.

NEW PORT RICHEY - The couple moved in with the lonely 83-year-old widow back in 2001.

Authorities say that's when they started exploiting the elderly woman, taking over power of attorney, transferring her home to them, burning through thousands of her dollars, even deciding what food and medicine she got.

Then they moved her into a facility.

The couple, though, still lives in the home - even after their 2005 arrest on charges of exploitation of the elderly and grand theft.

Joseph and Cynthia Clancy could get to stay there, too, and avoid up to 30 years in prison thanks to a tentative deal their lawyers reached with prosecutors.

All they have to do, according to the Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney's Office, is return some personal possessions along with a chunk of land for the victim, now age 90, to sell so she can pay for her care, now in another private home.

But the Clancys have done neither, the prosecutor in the case said Monday, endangering that deal.

"The arrangements that we have made didn't quite get done by them," said Assistant State Attorney Mary Handsel. "The judge said either you'll get it done before the next trial date or we'll go to trial."

That would be May 5. The Clancys could not be reached for comment on Monday. They are represented by the Public Defender's Office, which traditionally does not comment on pending cases.

But their civil attorney vigorously denied the allegations soon after their arrest. Tampa lawyer Brett Geer told the Times the charges are "false," that the elderly woman had sold the Clancys her home, that it was a case of "seller's remorse." The Times is withholding the woman's identity because of the nature of the allegations.

The criminal case has led to a complicated tangle of civil cases, according to the victim's civil attorney Matthew Ellrod.

The Clancys sued the woman for $75,000 they said they put into her house and sued her new caretakers for defamation, among other allegations.

The victim sued the Clancys to try to void the documents that handed her home over to them. But those cases stalled as the criminal case crawled along.

A trial could exonerate the Clancys. But the plea deal could also spare Joseph Clancy, 52, and Cynthia Clancy, 45, from becoming felons. Under the deal, he could get probation and she could get her charges dismissed if she completed a pretrial intervention program.

Why would the state, and victim, bless a deal that would leave the elderly woman without her $300,000 New Port Richey home and keep the accused out of jail?

Handsel said the Clancys have squeezed the equity out of the house, saddling the 9510 Hilltop Drive home with "three times the mortgage that she had when they took it from her."

So the plan was to let the Clancys keep the debt and give the victim back some of the 5-acre property to sell for cash. The victim can no longer live on her own anyway, the prosecutor said.

Handsel said the victim is still waiting for the return of personal possessions like photo albums, crystal and china. But all the Clancys have returned so far, she said, are things like Christmas decorations.

Jamal Thalji can be reached at thalji@sptimes.com or 727 869-6236.

[Last modified February 11, 2008, 21:37:02]