GAIL DRAKE: Lt. Uhura: May she live long and prosper

“A person who flatters his neighbor spreads a net for his feet.”

— Proverbs 29:5

She was born Jan. 19, 2233 A.D. in the United States of Africa. Along with her native tongue of Swahili she speaks dozens of dialects. With her extraordinary abilities, she was assigned to serve as a spaceship communications officer specializing in linguistics and cryptography. She even knew all three dialects of Romulan, which came in handy when the spaceship came under attack — again and again. When called upon, she could man the helm and direct navigation and science stations. Off duty she would sometimes serenade her shipmates, occasionally accompanied by the Vulcan lyre.

Dignified and beautiful communications Officer Uhura first graced television screens in her red mini skirt in the original Star Trek series in 1966. Musical theatre actor Nichelle Nichols played one of the first black characters to serve in a non-menial role.

After the first season, Nichols wanted to quit the show, tired of portraying a “glorified telephone operator.” But a conversation with Martin Luther King Jr. changed her mind. “Don’t you understand that for the first time we are being seen as we should be seen? You don’t have a black role. You have an equal role. … You are our image of where we’re going; you’re 300 years from now.”

Entertainer Whoopi Goldberg recalled her first time watching the show: “I just saw a black woman on television … and she ain’t no maid!”

And so Nichols kept translating through three years of science fiction television … and six movies. She even helped save her shipmates – and the whales.

So strong was Nichols’ influence that from 1977 to 2015, she volunteered for NASA’s programs to promote diversity and recruit women and minorities.

Sadly, in 2015 Nichols suffered a mild stroke, announced her retirement, and more recently become embroiled in a guardianship dispute between her son, Kyle Johnson, and her manager, Gilbert Bell. Recent filings in the Los Angeles Superior Court describe allegations of long-time elder abuse.

“What we’re dealing with is a ‘confidence man’”, said her younger sister, Marion Smothers.

The filings allege that Bell first met Nichols in 2010 when he presented a feature film idea. The project never materialized, but instead Bell became her manager and took fees from convention appearances, paid in cash. In January 2013, Nichols was hospitalized for pancreatitis and released to a rehabilitation center. Filings allege that Bell removed Nichols from the facility against medical advice and took her to his office to sign a Power of Attorney and health care directive naming him as agent. The same day he opened new bank accounts granting him access to her assets. She also signed an eight-year lease for him to rent her guest house for $300 per month. In 2017 Bell deeded Nichols’ house to his name, triggering an expensive California tax reassessment. Johnson then petitioned for conservatorship in the Los Angeles Probate Court for this breach of fiduciary duty. In August, Nichols’ family opened a GoFundMe account for the 87-year-old actor’s legal and living expenses.

Sadly, elder law practitioners see these cases all too often. Opportunists will befriend lonely seniors, flatter them, gain their confidence. Then they isolate the senior from their family members by invoking fear and a siege mentality. Then the undue influence to gain power over their property.

The wise will plan for their sunset days with an Advanced Healthcare Directive that details choices for final health care treatment, and a Durable Power of Attorney that appoints a specific person to manage finances in the event of incapacity. Safeguards can be put in place that require a doctor’s recommendation or joint approvals, leaving the drama to the theatre – or starship voyage.

Lt. Nyota Uhura has reigned for 55 years as a role model for women, minorities and Trekkies everywhere. May she live long … and prosper.