Legal Question in Elder Law in New York

Probably. The adult son may or may not have had the authority to close the joint account. If effect, what he did was make a gift to himself of the money which was dad's half of the account. That may or may not have been lawful. New York's banking laws regarding joint accounts are tricky, especially in this situation of a father/son joint account (compared to, for example, a husband/wife joint account). Regardless, the burden is on the creditors to force the issue in the Surrogate's Court if they want to get paid. The decedent's bills do not automatically fall on the family to pay: there are legal procedures for the creditors to follow in order to get paid. If they do, they probably will eventually be able to recover from the son. But most likely they will just go away. If there was a fiduciary appointed for dad's estate, then the answer may be different. The fiduciary may have a responsibility by law to pay creditor's claims, and if there's no money in the estate, the fiduciary may have to ask the court to order that the son return dad's half of the money in the joint account to the estate. Maybe.