Consumer complaint received 2022-02-10
Company: Northern Trust Company, The
State: CO
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Domestic (US) money transfer
Issue: Fraud or scam

Complaint:
Northern Trust XXXX is trustee of an irrevocable trust I inherited from my mother after she died in XXXX, that she inherited from her parents. In XXXX XXXX Northern raised its trust management and advisory fees nearly +50 %. It deducts half its fees from my trust income, so its fee increase resulted in my trust income transferred to me each month declining approx. {$17000.00} per YEAR since XXXX XXXX. I am trustee remover so I should be able to transfer my trusts to another corporate trustee, and Northern suggested I transfer to its XXXX office when I moved from XXXX to XXXX in XXXX. But after delaying 6 months it told me I could not transfer there and lied and said I was rude on the phone to its XXXX branch. After its nearly 50 % fee increase I asked its XXXX branch if it could send me its brochure stating its fee increase for trusts. It refused. I have tried to transfer to many other banks since XXXX, but I have gotten the run around from both banks and lawyers for XXXX years. I also have a small trust, that IL Statute says should be distributed in full to the beneficiary when it falls under {$100000.00}, which occurred in mid XXXX. At that time, XXXX imposed on me an Agreement Letter stating it could distribute it to someone else intended it would not identify. I crossed off that clause & others & sent a signed copy to XXXX, who would not agree to my amendments to its legal maneuver, its Agreement Letter. I could find no atty who would help me. One XXXX atty who knew about Northerns first lawsuit against us told me Your brother is doing this to you. In late XXXX Northern sued me a second time, in XXXX XXXX Court, IL, claiming I abused them so they wanted me to approve their accountings and transfer, after not letting me transfer to its XXXX office after suggesting it to me. I replied to its lawsuit in XX/XX/XXXX, including pointing out that it didnt attach its Agreement Letter about my small trust to its lawsuit. Its attorney did not send me most court filings or hearing notices in XXXX, or in XXXX until XXXX, and in the last several months again stopped sending me court filings.etc. It has delayed for XXXX years. The IL judge ignored my lawsuit replies and my comments during zoom hearings. In XXXX my brother filed an emergency petition for conservatorship of me, misrepresenting me as not managing my finances ( my credit score is proof I handle my finances responsibly, his credit report shows he wastes money buying 9 cars in 11 years & financing all of them & paying them all off in a year or two ). In XXXX I learned that my father, who died in XXXX, had worked for the govt in an intelligence capacity. If I am being used by the govt, it needs to stop, and my money not used for it, while XXXX withheld my small trust in XXXX and {$50000.00} of my larger trust income. I submitted a complaint to the XXXX Atty Office but the site did not let me upload attachments. The office replied by email concluding it closed my complaint ( did nothing ). But I informed it I had not been sent Northerns court filings/etc. For my brothers conservatorship lawsuit, the CO judge assigned a XXXX XXXX XXXX for me, who has misrepresented me in court reports and covered up that Northern Trust decreased the amount of my trust income ( and discretionary distributions that are allowed ) transferred to me in the last three years ( {$50000.00} ) by increasing its fees hugely. The XXXX is a trust attorney. I learned from Northern Trusts first lawsuit in XXXX against me & my brother the beneficiaries after my mom died, that trust attorneys do not do anything adverse to banks. My large trust has grown by $ XXXX since I inherited it, and by {$600000.00} recently, yet Northern has decreased the amount of money I have received from my trusts in the last three years- {$50000.00} less because it has gone to pay its fees, and it also stopped making discretionary distributions. It has dribbled out my small trust ( created mainly from the sale of the home I grew up in ) and only increased the monthly amount given to me a few times despite knowing my health insurance increased XXXX $ XXXX several years earlier. My brother ( or his kids ) inherits my trusts when I die because I have no children. His children will receive the irrevocable trust rather than it remain in trust under a corporate trustee. My brother submitted a false, damaging report about me to authorities in XXXX, & requested a wellness check by police without even trying to contact me first, and I was held against my will at a mental institution for 8 days and nights and not given my clothes or eyeglasses for 3 days, nor my back pillow or neck roll I use up sleep upright in order to prevent my irregular heartbeat and severe migraines. I was required to take XXXX for XXXX although it is known to induce XXXX and the young unprofessional psychiatrist didnt even ask my medical history ( its contraindicated w/ cerebrovascular events ). I was also taken from my home by police, without any warrant, and I was on a bath towel so when the officer tricked me to open my door to get a package on my step, he handcuffed me do I could no longer hold onto my towel and was therefore XXXX, in front of children on their bikes. I was taken handcuffed to an Urgent Care Facility where I was forced an unidentified injection and then my blood was taken for a drug test and I was held handcuffed until midnight. I learned more than a year later ( despite asking an atty who charged {$5000.00}, to get the report but didnt ), that I was injected w/ a controlled substance that I was then tested for. I was set up. He is suing to be my conservator, using misinformation to do it. I informed the XXXX judge since XX/XX/XXXX that I contacted XXXX  XXXX XXXX to transfer, because my mom had been their trust client. Lawyers have refused to help me. It requires a lawyer to write the legal letters to initiate the transfer, and then the transfer occurs six months later. Ten months have elapsed since I first contacted XXXX  XXXX XXXX. Two attorneys it referred me to delayed several months and would not help me. Another bank I contacted in XX/XX/XXXX gave. E the runaround. If the XXXX  judge had done her job correctly, I could have been a trust client at XXXX  XXXX XXXX in XX/XX/XXXX, or another bank by XXXX. Guess who pays for the lawsuits? My trust. And the XXXX  XXXX XXXX XXXX who is a trust attorney? My trust. Northerns atty charged {$90000.00} lawsuit fees as of a few months ago, {$55000.00} of which were for compiling my trust accountings ( including typos from hand-typing them, which they didnt even need to do, they just needed to verify them ). All of this is fraud, and abuse. The XXXX XXXX XXXX keeps delaying the bank lawsuit to first resolve XXXX conservatorship lawsuit. I was allowed to hire an attorney to contest that in XX/XX/XXXX. She helped cover up that Northern Trusts atty hadnt sent me court filings or hearing notices, and she refused to help me transfer to XXXX  XXXX XXXX, and wanted a financial manager named XXXX. Today my brother informed the IL court that XXXX  XXXX XXXX will not accept my trusts unless I have a conservator, the first time I heard of that, since I first contacted XXXX  XXXX XXXX last XXXX and sent them all the information they requested, including last XXXX. In XXXX I was told XXXX XXXX XXXX trust fees were a flat {$50000.00} per year. In XXXX I was told they are higher than Northerns fees. Can banks arbitrarily raise their trust management and advisory fees like this? I want to know if national banks such as Northern Trust can arbitrarily increase their fees 50 % in XX/XX/XXXX, totaling >+ {$20000.00} per year? The trust document states it can sue to protect the trust, but suing me more than two years and delaying it intentionally while withholding XXXX {$50000.00} of my money from me, is fraudulent. As is not sending me court filings and hearing notices throughout the majority of its lawsuit. Northern has also treated me hostily by not selling XXXX XXXX when I requested it in XXXX, and by giving money from my trust to my brother in XXXX simply because he requested it and manipulated the system in order to detain me and give the false appearance I am mentally ill. The bank denied my smaller distribution request to maintain my home four months later. It also delayed three years in a row to reimburse me from my trust for eyeglasses, from four to nine months, while my brother browbeat me that eyeglasses are not a medical expense. I also tried reporting bank fraud to the fbi for a manipulated a bill pay to XXXX XXXX in XXXX, that overpaid my bill by {$3000.00} and didnt send me the standard email confirmation for the bill pay. My report using the fbi link in its main page for cyber crime was blocked and my subsequent phone calls ignored. It required me to go to the bank where more than an hour of my time was wasted by bankers doing nothing, and then calling police who told me transfer to your brothers bank and barred me from returning to that branch again. My irrevocable trust is XXXX. I will follow up separately with my other trust number and lawsuit information. There is a lot more fraud and abusive treatment I have not reported here, including manipulation of the XXXX XXXX XXXX website for my case, the judge hearing zoom cases not reported on that website, and the judge muted me when I tried to speak.

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation