Reporter-News Archives Thursday, April 24, 1997 Morales pledges extra effort to protect elderly By ROY A. JONES II Senior Staff Writer Texas Attorney General Dan Morales pledged Wednesday to redouble efforts to protect the state's elderly from physical abuse and from a more common problem - telemarketing scams. Speaking to one of the final sessions of the four-day Texas Joint Conference on Aging at the Abilene Civic Center, Morales said "victimization" has become much more prevalent against senior citizens than headline crimes like nursing home abuse and violence. "There is no more insidious crime than telemarketing fraud," Morales said. "There is nothing sadder than seeing a senior citizen who has lost everything they've worked for their whole lives in one of these scams. It has now emerged as the number one consumer crime directed against our senior citizens in America," causing losses of $40 billion a year, he said. "We'll continue to make it as hard on them as we can on the prosecution side, but it would be much better if we could prevent it from happening. Every resource we can direct at prevention will be well spent." Morales said today's senior citizens "are the reasons we have a great state today - not because of me and my generation. "They worked to earn us the blessings we enjoy. The best we can do for them is assure that they don't have to worry about every single move they make," he said. To help inform and protect senior citizens, Morales' office has helped more than 60 of Texas' 254 counties set up a program called TRIAD in which law enforcement agencies, senior citizens and helping organizations work together. Within the TRIADs there are organizations called SALT - Seniors And Lawmen Together - in which the groups share information and head off some potential problems, such as marketing scams. Morales said his office has created videos on telemarketing fraud that any organizations working with the elderly can use to educate senior citizens. "I think our next video (designed for senior citizens) will be on fraudulent auto repairs," he said. Morales called a nursing home reform bill passed by the House on Monday "a pretty darn good bill." He said lobbyists for some for-profit nursing homes attempted to get fines for infractions lowered from up to $2,000 to no more than $100, but "all efforts to take the punch out of the bill were voted down," thanks to efforts of the American Association of Retired Persons and others. "We all have cause to be grateful for what the Legislature has done to date for our senior citizens," he said. The House bill now goes back to the Senate to either adopt the amendments or send the bill to a conference committee, he said. Send a Letter to the Editor about This Story | Start or Join A Discussion about This Story Send the URL (Address) of This Story to A Friend: Enter their email address below: texnews.com Reporter OnLine Local Sports Texas Sports Copyright ©1997, Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications