BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) — The elderly woman made a terrible mistake in judgment — she trusted her daughter.

The woman granted her daughter power of attorney. The daughter promptly deeded her mother's home to herself, mortgaged the home and defaulted on the mortgage.

"We represented the mother," said Jamie Andree, managing attorney for Indiana Legal Services, which provides free legal assistance to low-income people and people 60 and older. "We helped her keep her home."

Not all such cases of elder abuse have happy endings.

The outcome for an elderly couple who yielded control of their finances to trusted family members by granting them power of attorney did not have as happy an ending, Andree said.

"They later discovered that the family members had taken all their money and spent it on themselves," she said. "What they did was against the law, but there's no watchdog agency to make sure the power of attorney you've appointed is not spending all your money on himself."

Local officials say this kind of financial exploitation — along with other forms of elder abuse such as caregiver crimes, home improvement scams and physical abuse and neglect — take place all too frequently.

Most often, the culprit is a blood relative. It's estimated that 90 percent of elderly abuse is committed by family members — with adult children making up 40 percent of that total and spouses comprising 27 percent.

The National Committee for the Prevention of Elder Abuse estimates that more than a million elderly are abused or neglected in the U.S. each year.

But the number of victims may be even higher. Monroe County prosecutor Chris Gaal said elder abuse is highly underreported, pointing to a National Center on Elder Abuse estimate that for every case of elder abuse, neglect or exploitation, five more cases go unreported.

"Part of the reason is embarrassment," he said. "Another reason is that some elder people are suffering from poor health or dementia that makes it difficult to fully understand what is happening to them."

It was for the purpose of preventing elder abuse that Gaal, last spring, spearheaded the formation of the Elder Crimes Task Force — a group of law enforcement officials, social service workers and community members designed to protect the elderly.

"One of our goals is to give people the tools they need to prevent elder abuse before it happens," Gaal said. "Take financial exploitation, for example. Once the money is gone, it's gone. Trying to get it back is often like trying to get blood from a stone."

Jewel Echelbarger, director of the Area 10 Agency on Aging, says elderly citizens can help protect themselves from smooth-talking scammers by registering their home phone numbers on the do-not-call list that forbids most telemarketers from calling.

"Many elderly folks are very trusting, making themselves vulnerable to scams," she said. "And the people running the scams are very good at what they do."

To help reduce the likelihood of being victimized by caregiver crimes, Echelbarger said older people wanting to hire people to provide housekeeping or home care can call 211 to get a list of providers who've passed her agency's limited criminal history background screening.

The Elder Crimes Task Force, in collaboration with the Monroe County prosecutor's office, Indiana Legal Services and Bloomington Hospital, produced a DVD video last fall called "Power of Attorney: What You Need to Know." It educates people on how to protect themselves when signing a power of attorney document, and on other matters, such as how to appoint a health care representative to make decisions regarding their health care should they become incapacitated.

"Power of attorney documents are available all over the Internet, but there is little knowledge about the rules," Gaal said. "If you're a power of attorney you can't spend the person's money on yourself or intermingle it with your own personal funds. You also have to keep financial records and provide accounting on request. If you don't follow these rules, you can be charged with a criminal offense."

Gaal said elderly people should grant only a trusted family member or friend their power of attorney, adding that it's best if the appointed person has an ample source of income.

"We've distributed 600 to 700 videos," Gaal said.

Gaal said a second video — on home improvement fraud — will be ready for distribution in July.

"I don't want to impugn the entire contractor trade, but there are some bad apples who are just pretending to run a legitimate business," he said. "The video covers some red flags to look for and tips on choosing a good contractor — such as asking the right questions and checking his references."

Gaal said a scamming contractor often knocks on your front door and tells you your roof needs to be repaired immediately — creating a sense of urgency.

"He'll say he can fix it cheaply, for only $3,000," Gaal said."But he'll add that he needs the money up front to buy the materials. Once he gets the money, he disappears."

Gaal said the video talks about two cardinal rules — never give a contractor all the money up front and always talk to his former clients.

On the Net: To get your name on Indiana's telephone privacy list, sign up at http://www.in.gov/attorneygeneral or call 1-888-834-9969.

The DVD can be purchased at www.savingourparents.com for $29.95.

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Distributed by The Associated Press