“She was a good woman,” Rosa said, “and that was a cruel thing, and both of those are true, and I have had seven years to decide which one is more true and I have not been able to.

So I keep them both. I light a candle for her every year and I still think it was cruel.”

Chapter 12 — The File

The Ozuna file landed on my desk at Foothills Elder Justice in the second week of May, which was either coincidence or the kind of thing that only looks like design in retrospect.

Walter Ozuna, eighty-four, retired HVAC contractor, widower, lives in a bungalow in Globeville. Two adult children in California. A caregiver named Ynez Bracamontes who has worked for him nine years, five days a week, and who now lives in the back bedroom.

Nine months ago, Mr. Ozuna executed a revocable trust naming Ms. Bracamontes as recipient of the house and roughly sixty percent of a modest estate.

His children filed a petition alleging undue influence and requesting a conservatorship.