Son was alarmed over salaries for father's nurses

Chris Marder testified Tuesday that he had asked his father's accountant to keep an eye out for unusual checks written by his wealthy father.

The accountant told him in 2005 that the salary his father was paying his head personal nurse, Mary Williams, was "going through the roof," he said.

The testimony came during the second day of Williams' trial in Lake County circuit court on charges of financial exploitation of an elderly person.

Williams, 70, of Reno, Nev., is charged with using her position as an employee of S. Edward Marder since 1992 to enrich herself at the expense of an ailing man she manipulated.

Answering questions from Assistant State's Attorney Christen Bishop, Marder said his father had as many as six nurses employed, first to care for his wife who died in 2002.

Williams was the head nurse and had ingratiated herself into his father's personal finances to the point where she was writing most of the checks to pay household expenses.

In 2004, prosecutors say Williams was paid a salary of $459,000 and Marder decided to exercise some oversight into his father's spending.

After monitoring skyrocketing household expenses for more than a year, Marder said he obtained an order of protection against Williams and two other nurses that barred them from entering his father's Highland Park house.

Not long afterward, he said, jewelry and art belonging to his father and late mother were found at Williams' house in Reno.

But defense attorney Thomas Breen of Chicago had Marder go through a list of trips his father had taken in 2004 and 2005, which included a several-weeks stay in Naples, Fla., and nearly a month in Palm Beach.

S. Edward Marder, who died in 2007, stayed at the finest hotels when he traveled, Breen pointed out to Marder, and because the nurses traveled with him they did as well.

Breen suggested to Associate Judge George Bridges, who is hearing the case without a jury, that Williams' salary was increasing dramatically because Marder was paying her for the time she spent on the road with him.

Williams faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted, but would also be eligible for probation.

Testimony is expected to continue today.