Cook County Court Tries to Jail Woman for Allegedly Purchasing a Plane Ticket for her Mom

By Janet Phelan

Barbara Musikar wants to return to New York. There doesn’t appear to be any dispute about this. So why is Cook County Court continuing to hold the eighty-year-old virtual hostage in Illinois, a state in which she does not wish to live? And why is her New Yorker daughter, Illana Musikar Kinzer, facing jail time?

The answer to these questions goes to the heart of the dilemma of the elderly and disabled who find themselves under a court authorized guardianship. It is appearing that those under guardianship are treated as mere property, to be moved around or not at the will of their owners, that is to say, their guardians. That is a strong statement, particularly given the human trafficking implications here. So let’s look at the facts and you decide.

Following the death of her husband, Sanford, in January of 2022, Barbara Musikar had been residing with her daughter, Illana, in New York. Following a medical procedure involving a small bowel obstruction, it was decided that Barbara would go to Illinois to stay with her other daughter, Lea Josephson, while she recuperated. So it was somewhat of a surprise that Barbara’s facility would not share information as to her medical status when Lea got Barbara to sign a medical power of attorney making Lea her medical attorney in fact, which simultaneously revoked the previous medical power of attorney that Barbara had executed years earlier, giving these powers to Illana.

A few months later, in August of 2022, Lea phoned Illana and informed her that Barbara had signed a financial power of attorney over to Lea. In the meantime, Lea had placed her mother into an assisted living facility, Gidwitz, which again was refusing to give any information to Illana.

According to Illana’s husband, Michael, when he and his family arrived at Gidwitz to visit Barbara, Lea tried to physically prevent the Kinzers from taking Barbara out to lunch. Illana called the police, who after questioning Barbara, prevented Lea from interfering and Barbara indeed lunched with her family. According to Michael, “It was obvious that Lea was desperately afraid that Illana would take Barbara back home to New York.”

It has been suggested that there is a financial motive here, as it has been stated that Lea’s husband, Mark, does not work and that Lea,who never graduated from college, is the family’s sole support. This reporter has reached out to Lea Josephson but has been unable to confirm this, as Lea does not return the phone calls. A review of AVVO shows that while Mark Josephson studied law and graduated from Law School at Northwestern University, he is “not authorized to practice.”  This is echoed by the Illinois ARDC website, which lists him as not authorized to practice law since 2016.

Without proper jurisdiction to do so, Cook County Court has appointed Lea Josephson to be guardian of the person of her mother Barbara, in face of the fact that Illinois court does not have the jurisdictional powers to detain Barbara in Illinois. According to attorney Michael Kinzer (both Illana and her husband Michael are practicing attorneys in New York ), the court has issued further orders to prohibit anyone from removing Barbara from Gidwitz, virtually making Barbara a de facto prisoner therein; prevented Barbara from retaining her own attorney; prohibited any parties other than the guardian ad litem and Barbara’s court appointed attorney from speaking with Barbara about the guardianship proceedings; prohibited Barbara from having any and all communication with Illana, Illana’s husband, Michael, and Barbara’s minor granddaughter and attempted to restrict her son’s communication and visitation.

Tellingly, the court has recognized its apparent lack of jurisdiction and also the fact that Barbara wants to return to New York. A settlement agreement was arrived at in November of 2023 in which the court itself states that…”when Barbara came to Illinois in January, 2022, to complete her recovery from abdominal surgery, it was neither her expressed nor implicit intention, nor her desire to remain in Illinois. She does not consider herself to be a resident of Illinois now and she does not wish to become a resident of the State of Illinois, either now or in the future.” This order, signed by Judge Aicha MacCarthy in November, 2023 concludes by stating that “the Guardian Ad Litem’s appointment is hereby extended for the specific purpose of facilitating…Barbara Musikar’s move to the State of New York.”

Which never happened.

Writes Michael Kinzer,

On January 3, 2023, in a desperate and valiant attempt to get back home to New York, Barbara left Gidwitz and managed to get herself to an airport where she was waiting to take a plane flight to New York. While waiting, Barbara used her cell phone and her location was traced. She was arrested at the airport and was forcibly returned to Gidwitz.

Illana was subsequently charged with criminal contempt of court and faces jail time for her involvement in Barbara’s attempt to return home.

Yep, Illana faces going to jail now for attempting to honor her mother’s wishes. Her hearing will take place this week in Cook County Court, Judge Aicha MacCarthy presiding. As so many of these probate court judges have been found to have “excessive” loan histories and as it is known that home loans are one way of funneling “extra” money to a sitting judge (we are talking about possible bribes and pay offs here) this reporter duly checked Aicha MacCarthy’s loan history on the Cook County Clerk’s website. The following conversation ensued with the Cook County Chief Judge’s office—

Mary,

I am wondering if the Chief Judge might comment on what appears to be excessive loan activity by Probate Judge Aicha MacCarthy. Ignoring for a moment the two most recent loans, totaling about a half million dollars but not yet reconveyed, she appears to have taken out nearly two million dollars in reconveyed loans since 09. One might reasonably question how she might be able to pay back these home loans on a judge’s salary. Even factoring in that her husband is also employed by the court, her loan activity is questionable.

Here is what I found on the County Clerk’s website. I would appreciate a prompt response to these concerns.

Janet Phelan
Contributing Reporter
Activist Post

MORT 2322325014 69,000 no release

MORT 2315741105 483,000 NO RELEASE

MORT 1614149078 FOR 377.500 REL 2316628256

MORT 1530356093 FOR $382,000 REL 1616146060

MORT 1121445031 FOR $25,000. REL 1530349013

MORT 1102004019 FOR $395,000.00 REL 1531455073

MORT 0930941012 FOR $398,000 REL 1103208132

MORT 0907605124 FOR $399,000.00 REL 0932304263

Mary replied as follows–

Dear Ms. Phelan,

As I have explained in the past, if you have a complaint about a judge’s conduct, the complaint should be directed to the Judicial Inquiry Board.

Sincerely,

Mary Wisniewski
Director of Communications
Office of the Chief Judge
Cook County Circuit Court

To which I replied—

Do you have any judges at all in Cook County that do not have questionable loan histories? What about those sitting on the JIB?

If the Chief Judge does not want to deal with his cesspool, that is his choice. But given the history of the JIB, it doesn’t seem likely that they will tackle this issue, either.

For the record, a JIB complaint about Judge Shauna Boliker disappeared into the bowels of JIB a few years back. Boliker’s activities in the Amy Sallas case were detailed here — I WANT YOUR HOUSE, I WANT YOUR WIFE, I WANT YOUR CAR, I WANT YOUR LIFE – Activist Post

Another Cook County Judge came under the microscope, with a controlled near-hysterical reaction on her part, as reported here.

At another juncture, Cook County Judge Edward Robles’s finances were scrutinized and reported here — Police Enable Attack on Elderly Woman’s Civil Rights – Activist Post

So the query to Mary was made in all sincerity. To reiterate, is there a single judicial officer in Cook County who is not ostensibly on the take?

The tendency of judges to jail concerned and proactive family members can be seen in the imprisonment of Barbara Stone, whose crime against humanity was taking her guardianized Mom to lunch and in the saga of Roger Hillygus and former Sheriff Stewart Handte, who spent time in jail after taking Hillygus’s mother out of a facility in Nevada.

Several guardianship victims have now fled the US due to the aggressive nature of law enforcement and judges surrounding the guardianized.

Illana’s criminal contempt hearing will take place this Wednesday and Thursday at 2 pm Central Time in room 1810 of the Daley Center.

Janet Phelan has been on the trail of the biological weapons agenda since the new millennium. Her book on the pandemic, At the Breaking Point of History: How Decades of US Duplicity Enabled the Pandemic, has been published in 2021 by Trine Day and is available on Amazon and elsewhere. Her articles on this issue have appeared in Activist Post, New Eastern Outlook, Infowars and elsewhere. Educated at Grinnell College, UC Berkeley and the University of Missouri Graduate School of Journalism, Janet “jumped ship” and since 2004 has been writing exclusively for independent media. Her articles previously appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Oui Magazine, Orange Coast Magazine, the Long Beach Press Telegram, the Santa Monica Daily Press and other publications. She is the author of the groundbreaking expose, EXILE and two books of poetry. She resides abroad. You may follow Janet on Parler here @JanetPhelan and Twitter @JanetPhelan14. To support her work, please go to JanetPhelan.

Image: Pixabay

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