By Laurie Roberts Republic columnist Aug. 03, 2002 12:00:00

Everything was handled according to law and, more importantly, in strict compliance with those oh so sacred covenants, conditions and restrictions that come with living in a ne ighborhood such as hers.

Everything was fair and square. Everything that could be done was done.

Or so I'm told.

So why do I feel as if somebody bilked an old lady out of her home?

Somehow, I can't get that picture out of my head: the image of a 77-year-old Peoria widow rolled away on a gurney, kicked out of her home of 17 years while neighbors look on from lawn chairs.

A day later, she was undergoing an examination to determine her mental state.

Oh, now she gets checked for mental problems? Now, after her house is taken away, someone wants to find out if she's able to fend for herself?

Clearly, something is wrong with this picture.

You know the story. Old reclusive woman tangles with her homeowner association because of overgrown trees and bushy bougainvillea. What follows is a series of legal missives and ultimately a judge's demand that she trim her trees. Old lady gets mad and begins refusing to pay the dues that come with living in Westbrook Village.

Old lady's home is sold out from under her for less than half of what it's worth so that Westbrook Village can collect its due, which by this time has rocketed to $25,000. And the Glendale man who bought the house for a song gets a court order to evict her.

Marie Brown is not exactly the most sympathetic character. This is a woman who, by all accounts, can be rude, stubborn and paranoid.

This is a woman who lived in squalor, who at one time could have settled the dispute for $1,500 and refused.

This is a woman who clearly needed help.

"I begged and pleaded with her over and over to please just comply, to please hire an attorney, please contact family members to help her, please just do what the association is requesting you to do, and she didn't want to do it," said Penny Koepke, Westbrook Village's attorney. "We would spend, I'm not kidding, hours on the phone and she would go on these tangents about things that happened five or six years ago."

Koepke said Adult Protective Services was called in May 2000 and determined Brown was mentally fit.

"I still felt uncomfortable, but that was their determination," Koepke said. "I thought, they're not stepping in, so I've got to move forward."

Brown was rousted out on Wednesday. Three days later, I'm still wondering how the system that so easily took away her house couldn't first have taken steps to make sure she had an advocate and knew what she was doing.

It doesn't sound rational that someone would willingly live as she did. Peoria Constable Ron Myers said she had sores on her arms from the filth. "I've been in houses with dead bodies that didn't smell as bad," he said.

It doesn't sound rational that a 77-year-old woman would forfeit her house and everything she had invested in it because of a dispute over tree trimming.

It doesn't sound rational, but apparently there's nothing the courts could do, other than take away her home.

Henry Blanco, who oversees Adult Protective Services, says the law makes it difficult to force an adult to accept help.

"There's not much you can do," he said. "A person has the right to refuse services."

And so an old lady is out on the street today. I can't help but think that this was a woman who clearly needed help. What she got instead was evicted.

Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com or (602)444-8635.