The family of a North Vancouver woman who was abused physically, emotionally and financially by a predatory partner has won back the rights to their mother’s home.
The lays out more than seven years of shocking torment that Judith King suffered at the hands of Zoltan Vimhel, also known as Steven Vimhel.
When King and Vimhel met in 2014, she was a healthy and active 77-year-old church-going woman with close and rewarding relationships with family and friends. But, Vimhel, who was 15 years younger and living out of his car as a peniless artist, “immediately” began to exert undue influence over her, Justice Sheri Ann Donegan acknowledged in her ruling. Soon, Vimhel took over all aspects of her life, eventually keeping her locked in a Surrey motel room.
To isolate King from her family and friends, he forced her to stop speaking with them, including blocking their phone numbers, impersonating her to send cruel emails, disallowing her to visit or speak with anyone, and hiring a lawyer to send her family members letters telling them not to contact her anymore, the ruling notes. He also made baseless accusations about her family to the RCMP and harassed her neighbours and strata council.
Vimhel went so far as installing double-sided locks on the doors to lock her into her North Vancouver home when he went out, the ruling states.
In 2017, he forced her to move to a Surrey motel where they were paying $3,000 per month in rent to live without basic kitchen facilities. There, Vimhel would not allow her to talk to anyone or leave the motel without him, the ruling states. At one point, she visited a doctor who tried to intervene on her behalf, but Vimhel retaliated, according to court documents, by impersonating King in order to lodge a complaint about the doctor with College of Physicians and Surgeons.
King’s daughter hired a private investigator who tracked them down in 2018.
“Although [King] was frightened of him and wanted to end the relationship, she felt trapped and isolated. Her children went to police to obtain help for their mother on more than one occasion over the following years, but to no avail,” the ruling states. “As time went on, Ms. King’s family and friends continued to try to help her, but Mr. Vimhel had successfully isolated her and assumed control over her legal and financial affairs.”
Vimhel’s daughter organized a rescue for her mother in September 2020, bringing her son and the police to confront Vimhel at the Surrey motel, which was soon to be demolished, putting the family at risk of losing track of King for a second time.
“Mr. Vimhel became very angry and began aggressively trying to pull Ms. King back into the room. Police intervened and Ms. King was permitted to leave with her grandson,” the ruling states.
Her rescue ended the physical abuse and torment but it wasn’t until King’s daughter had power of attorney again that they learned the extent of the financial damage.
In 2017, King sold a vacation property the family owned in Parksville for $515,000 and placed the funds into an account she held jointly with Vimhel, according to court documents. In 2019, King took out a $200,000 mortgage on her North Vancouver home because Vimhel told her he needed the money for “a project.”
And in early 2020, Vihmel coerced her into adding his name onto the title of her $1.2-million Bewicke Avenue townhome.
“Ms. King participated in this transfer because of her continuing fear that Mr. Vimhel would hurt or kill her if she did not do as he wanted. She felt that she had no one to turn to for help,” Donegan wrote.
By the time they’d done their investigation, King was rendered completely dependent on her children to support her.
“The records they obtained show, to their horror, that all of Ms. King’s accounts had been drained,” the court documents state.
In 2021, King’s health deteriorated. Before she lost her capacity to dementia, she swore an affidavit detailing much of the abuse she’d suffered.
“She soon moved to a care home on government assistance and her family continues to visit her regularly. Unfortunately, her illness has advanced to the point she no longer recognizes them,” Donegan wrote.
King’s son had to apply to the courts to have the transfer of the North Vancouver property legally undone. Vimhel filed his own counterclaim against the family, according to the ruling, though it never went anywhere.
“The defendant initially participated in this litigation, but he has disappeared. It has been more than two years since plaintiff’s counsel has received any response from him. Although properly served, Mr. Vimhel did not respond to this application,” the judge noted.
Based on the evidence before the courts, there was “simply no question” that King had been coerced, Donegan found.
“She was dependent on him for her food and shelter. He physically, emotionally and psychologically abused her, using her fear of physical harm and even death at his hand, to dominate her will,” she wrote, ordering that the home be registered back in her name.
Because of the egregious nature of the abuse, Donegan handed down another $50,000 punitive penalty against Vimhel.
“This predator completely transformed a happy, vibrant and financially secure woman, who had many fulfilling years ahead of her, into a frightened, lonely, and powerless shell of her former self. He not only robbed her of her property and her considerable savings, he robbed her of her dignity, the support of her family and friends, and the enjoyment of what has turned out to be the last healthy years of her life,” Donegan wrote. “Mr. Vimhel’s misconduct was so malicious, high-handed and offensive, the court must denounce it in the strongest terms.”
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