Benefits restored

After four months, newspaper story gets quick action from the SSA on Alison's withheld benefit payments  

By David Baker

   One day after a story was published in the Albany Times Union - and four months after the Social Security Administration was told that it had incorrectly reduced Alison's SSI to $30 a month - the agency said the error had been fixed, and a deposit of some of the withheld money was in her bank account.

   The reduction in the benefit amount apparently was made because the SSA somehow believed that Alison was still in a nursing home, where she had been following a hospitalization, for physical rehab. And despite a letter sent by Alison to the agency's Hudson office in early August saying that she had moved into an apartment, the benefit payment remained at $30 on Sept. 1; the letter did not get a response.

   A copy of the letter was set on Oct. 1.  That too was ignored, as was a third letter sent via certified mail on Oct 18. 

   Then last week, the Times Union published a story about the SSA's non-response.  And with 24 hours the agency had emailed a letter detailing the new monthly amount.  By that afternoon, part of the withheld money was in Alison's bank account. 

    Missing from the SSA letter was any apology or even an explanation for the agency's failure to respond to the three letters from Alison.  The letters said Alison was in an apartment, not in the nursing home; a simple phone call to the nursing home would have confirmed that she was no longer there.

  But that call was evidently never made; Alison's letters - three of them - were ignored.

  The question now is was it just Alison's statement about her residency that repeatedly was ignored? And if so, why? 

  Or are there dozen's of other people out there, who don't have a famous sibling and someone to assist them in presenting the situation to a newspaper, whose protests about incorrect cuts in benefits are dismissed?

   One day after her benefit was restored, Alison received a call from the office of the SSA's inspector general. The caller wanted to know if Alison's matter had been resolved. She said it had.

    The hope now is that the AG will also investigate what happened in Alison's case, and take steps to see that other claimants' communications are not also routinely and callously ignored. 

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Read the second Times Union story here: https://bit.ly/3DCdk58

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In the news again

 The Albany Times Union with its exclusive story about Alison's fight to get her SSI payments restored.

https://bit.ly/3CmGYKg

An update: Soon after this story was posted Tuesday afternoon a spokesman with the Social Security Administration contacted the reporter to say that the issue with Alison's benefit payments has been rectified. Presumably this means she will now receive the withheld money. 

After four months and three letters.

The power of the press.

Calls by the reporter to the SSA and the office of U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer were not returned.

Meanwhile, the mention in the story of the GoFundMe page resulted in almost $400 being donated for new dentures.

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Press release: Taking on the SSA

 

Mariah Carey’s estranged sister fights with the Social Security Administration over “mistaken” cut in disability benefits 

Alison Carey wants to know why the the Social Security Administration ignored  her repeated letters telling them that she lives in an apartment - not in a nursing home

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:  Nov. 12, 2021

   HUDSON,  N.Y. — A Greene County women disabled by a devastating brain injury has been left with just $30 a month in benefit payments after the Social Security Administration incorrectly listed her as living in a nursing home and ignored her repeated letters telling the agency about the error.

   Sixty-year-old Alison Carey - who is the older estranged sister of pop diva Mariah Carey - was homeless for 14 moths before moving into an apartment in a town near Albany, N.Y. in April. Before the move, Carey had been in a Columbia County nursing home for physical rehab following a hospitalization. Just before she left the home Medicaid approved her to become a permanent resident.

   But Alison was not ready to give up some measure of independence and when an apartment suitable for her limitations was found she decided that with help she could live on her own for a few more years.

   And that’s when the problem began; In a letter dated July 20 the SSA said that because Alison was in a medical facility for which Medicaid was paying at least half the fees, her monthly benefit would be reduced to $30 a month. The letter stated - wrongly - that  Alison was a resident of a medical facility for all of April, May, June and July, but because she had received her full benefit amount for those months, the overpayment would have to be repaid by reducing her benefit from $841 a month to $30.

  And that benefit amount, it said, would continue “from August  on.”

  But Alison was not in the nursing home. In a letter to the SSA’s Hudson office dated August 3, Carey wrote that she left the home and moved into her apartment on May 1. 

   Alison says she received no response to her letter, and that the filing of a form appealing the cut - which under the agency’s rules should have stopped the reduced benefit until the appeal was decided - also produced no response; the payment for August was $30.

  On October 1 - after the September and October payments were also $30 - Alison sent a copy of her August 3 letter to the SSA via Certified Mail. Again, she received no response.

   In mid October, Alison contacted the office of U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer. A member of the senator’s staff contacted the SSA and the agency finally called Alison, describing the detailed proof it would need to begin investigating Alison’s statement that she was living in an apartment. But she could not explain why Alison’s letters had been ignored for three months. In the meantime, the Schumer staffer had, at Alison’s request and citing the long delay in responding to her August letter, asked the SSA to make at least one month’s payment while the question about her residency was investigated.

    No payment had been received by Nov. 11 and the staffer has not responded to an email asking about the agency’s response to the request. The delay has so far left Alison out $2,378 in withheld benefits. 

    Alison has been estranged from her multimillionaire sister for about two decades.  In September 2020 the singer made headlines around the world when she revealed that her about-to-be-published memoir would say that when she was 12 years old the then 20-year-old Alison drugged her with Valium and offered her cocaine - claims Alison denies.

   In February, Alison filed a legal notice of her intention to file a lawsuit against Mariah Carey.  A month later the sisters’ brother, Morgan Carey, filed his own lawsuit over statements about him in the book. 

   In addition to multiple health issues - in the spring Alison had emergency overnight surgery for a life-threatening perforated stomach ulcer - she also has been struggling for several months without teeth after her dentures were broken in a fall. Medicaid won’t pay for a replacement until 2026.  In October, a GoFundMe page was set up, seeking donations for the $2,500 needed for new dentures.

  It’s at: https://gofund.me/f561ad7a

Hush....

Mariah Carey's paperback

is out; just don't tell anyone

   By David Baker

   The paperback edition of Mariah Carey’s controversial memoir was quietly published Nov. 2, with no effort made to promote it. A Walmart store in upstate New York had no copies on its shelves Tuesday morning.  At a Barnes & Noble store in Albany, an employee had to go into the storage area in back Tuesday evening to get a requested copy.

   As for the statements in the book that have prompted one lawsuit and notice of another; they are also in the new edition because the defendants really had no choice; they could hardly remove them while claiming in response to Morgan Carey’s lawsuit that they are protected speech because they are in the public interest. 

   Paperbacks are published to reach a new audience, people who would not have purchased the more expensive hardcover edition. That makes this paperback a republication - which restarts the 1-year window in which lawsuits can be filed.

   And that raises a question: Why publish a paperback which then has to be all but disowned?  If it hadn’t been announced - as it was on Twitter back in the summer -  it could have been simply forgotten.

   

   Instead, the flat-out statements that Alison Carey committed several crimes 40 years ago are repeated, presenting further evidence of actual malice.

   

   Not promoting the new book doesn’t change anything; it’s still the work of a cruel and vindictive multimillionaire. 

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No promotion this time

Mariah Carey’s memoir is out in paperback

Tuesday - accompanied by the sound of silence

By David Baker

   A little over a year ago Mariah Carey was busy promoting her about-to-be-published memoir by pushing out to the media a section in the book in which she claims - without offering any evidence - that when she was 12 years old her 20-year-old sister Alison drugged her with Valium, offered her cocaine and tried to pimp her out.

   Fast forward a year  - during which both Alison and brother Morgan filed legal papers claiming that they have been damaged by the multimillionaire’s statements - and there is hardly a word about the release of a paperback edition of the book, scheduled for Nov. 2.

   Back in the summer, Mariah sent out a tweet announcing the date, along with an image of what appears to be the front cover - which has a photo of her that is on the back of the hardback edition. The tweet has a link to a page where the book can be pre-ordered.

   But since then: No more tweets. No media interviews. No apparent effort to publicized the new edition.

   Publishing the paperback has meant a decision had to be made: Whether to include in it the statements about Alison and Morgan that prompted the legal filings.

   Remove them, and it would look like an admission that they were libelous.

   Leave them in and it could be considered further evidence of Mariah Carey’s malice toward her brother and sister; that she intended to damage them - which has legal implications - as does accusing Alison of committing crimes, which Mariah did in the hardcopy.

   The new edition is listed at $16.99, a high price for a paperback, particularly as copies of the hardback can be found on the Internet for as little as $5.95 - with free shipping.

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