Be the Story_Re-Treating the Veteran
- By Timothy Pena
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- 27 Sep, 2022
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Taxpayers are Burdened with the Cost of Losing VA Treatment
It has been just about 60 days since moving to New York and I am already establishing a routine that I can carry through the rest of the Homeless to Homeness journey. I have a library where I can free copies for my VA claims: one for deferral of an overpayment while I was incarcerated and denied access to the VA while I was being embezzled, and the other for an increase based on MST and partially on the mental health damage done to me by the Phoenix Veterans Justice Outreach (VJO) and the prison outreach program which accused me of criminal fraud and extortion.
But this is the crap that happens to veterans when they are arrested into the criminal justice system. And depending on the jurisdiction, that veteran can either get treatment or prison, or both. While some county jails may reach out to the VA for records and more expensive medications, in most cases, the veteran isn’t transferred from the VA healthcare and medical system, the county or state just stops providing access to the VA, which continues throughout the veteran’s prison term.
I had a neighbor on one prison yard in Arizona who tested positive for methamphetamine while he was on probation after he was diagnosed with lymphoid cancer. Rather than treat any drug abuses or addictions at the same time as the cancer treatment at the VA, he was arrested, probation revoked, and sent to prison for 3 years. The veteran spent 16 months; first in county jail and then in prison without any cancer treatment whatsoever and it progressed into his brain. Not only should he have never been pulled from a federally-funded treatment program with the VA, but then the state taxpayer should never have become responsible for prosecuting the veteran, jailing the veteran, providing what little healthcare the veteran received, and then whatever happened to him after I left the prison yard.
Every time a veteran who is receiving care of any kind is booked into county jail, that veteran’s mental health and medical care becomes the responsibility of the custodial agency. It makes sense, except that most states operate under the federal first, state second, and then the city jurisdiction. In other words, the feds should be paying as much as possible whenever possible. By pulling the veteran out of a VA treatment program for minor drug offenses burdens the taxpayer with first the VA care, then starting from scratch with the county/state including the cost of prosecuting, and then the cost to transition the veteran out of the state prison system for them to start all over again in the VA system.
Many veterans like myself, come back in much worse shape than when we went in. Not only was my mental health in shambles, but I’m still trying to get back my medical health as well. Some men and women don’t make it back at all.
Following years of struggling with PTSD, mental illness, and suicide ideation, a total mental health breakdown after an arrest for DUI and marijuana possession in October 2014 was the turning point but it wasn’t until 2015 that I got into treatment at the Phoenix VA Hospital. In 2016 I filed a claim for VA Disability, and in 2017 was awarded a 70% VA Disability rating for PTSD. After years of DUI’s resulting in years of jailtime and prison, the diagnosis provided me with some answers to what I was suffering and that the struggles I encountered over the past 35 years were real. The diagnosis also provided a path to mental health success and as a result, provided me an avenue of healing and treatment still to this day at the Manhattan VA Hospital.
Who is The Forgotten Veteran?
The Forgotten Veteran is incarcerated or homeless.
The Forgotten Veteran most likely experienced trauma while serving.
The Forgotten Veteran has unresolved issues with family & friends.
The Forgotten Veteran struggles with lingering drug/alcohol abuse issues and suffers mental illness.
The Forgotten Veteran struggles with suicide ideation.
The Forgotten Veteran is in the shadows but wants to be seen.
The collective scope and variety of existing diversion programs across the country reflect a policy and political context that is increasingly receptive to the benefits of safely diverting individuals – who in many cases are drug-involved or have mental health problems or both – out of costly jail or prison incarceration, and away from conviction and its lifelong collateral consequences, into programs that more effectively and efficiently address the behavioral health conditions underlying their criminal behaviors.