The Difficult Path

Mom sends $hundreds to this company for magazines
she barely reads. Sweepstakes? she hasn't won a dime.

The following query could have been written by me, except that mine would apply to Mom, not Dad:

My elderly father gets over 100 pieces of junk mail every week, and I just discovered that he’s given away nearly $5,000 over the past few months to many of the solicitors that mail him this junk. Can you offer any tips on how can I stop this?

Most of their letter concerns winning the grand prize,
Two sentences are about fighting children's cancer.

Excerpts from columnist Jim T. Miller's answer (my mother's "favorites" in bold):

Mail fraud can be tricky to detect because there are many different types of schemes out there that may seem legitimate. Some of the most common mail scams targeting seniors today are phony sweepstakes, foreign lotteries, free prize or vacation scams, fake checks, donation requests from charities or government agencies that don’t exist, get-rich chain letters, work-at-home schemes, inheritance and investment scams, and many more....

Only 10% of this group's donations make it to charity.

Unfortunately, once a person gets on these mail fraud lists, also known as “suckers lists,” it’s very difficult to get off. That’s because these criminals regularly trade and sell mailing lists of people who they believe to be susceptible to fraud, and they won’t remove a name when you request it.

Mr. Miller doesn't give entirely satisfactory answers. Intercepting without permission the mail of a person who retains her faculties could be immoral and even illegal. And registering with "Do not call" and "opt-out" lists works with legitimate organizations, not heartless souls who scam seniors.

For the time being we will continue along the difficult path of respecting Mom's independence while being watchful over her communications.