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VA failed soldiers back from wars, lawsuit says

Retired Marine Col. Jim Cook, Northern California director of Veterans United for Truth and part of the lawsuit, speaks during a news conference Monday in San Francisco. Associated Press (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)
Henry Weinstein Los Angeles Times
Retired Marine Col. Jim Cook, Northern California director of Veterans United for Truth and part of the lawsuit, speaks during a news conference Monday in San Francisco. Associated Press (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)

SAN FRANCISCO – The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs was accused Monday in a lawsuit of “shameful failures” in providing medical and mental health care to injured servicemen returning from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

According to a 73-page lawsuit, which is proposed for class-action status on behalf of hundreds of thousands of veterans, “The VA’s outmoded systems for providing medical care and disability benefits (have been overwhelmed by) the huge influx of injured troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.” In particular, attorneys for the plaintiffs say the VA is “structurally unsuitable” for dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder, which the lawsuit calls “a signature problem of veterans” of the current wars. Symptoms of the disorder, the suit says, include intense anxiety, persistent nightmares, depression, uncontrollable anger and difficulties coping with work, family and social relationships.

About 1.6 million men and women have served in the two countries. A recent report by a special Pentagon Task Force found that 38 percent of soldiers and 50 percent of National Guard members coming home from Iraq or Afghanistan have mental health issues, ranging from PTSD to brain injuries.

Only 27 of the VA’s 1,400 hospitals have inpatient PTSD programs, the plaintiffs’ lawyers said.

“A number of veterans have committed suicide shortly after having been turned away from VA facilities either because they were told they were ineligible or because the wait was too long,” the lawsuit states.

The case was filed as a proposed class action on behalf of hundreds of thousands of veterans. The named plaintiffs are two veterans advocacy groups, Veterans for Common Sense, based in Washington, D.C., and Veterans United for Truth, based in Santa Barbara. The defendants include outgoing VA chief R. James Nicholson, several other ranking VA officials and U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

The lawsuit, prepared by half a dozen lawyers led by Melissa Kasnitz of Disability Rights Advocates in Berkeley and Gordon Erspamer of Morrison & Foerster, a San Francisco law firm, does not seek monetary damages. Rather, it is designed to stop the VA from systematically denying what it asserts are valid claims filed by injured veterans.

Veterans’ entitlement to benefits under U.S. law is being violated wholesale by the VA, according to the lawsuit. In addition, the plaintiffs’ lawyers assert that the procedures the VA uses to handle claims and appeals of denied claims violate the veterans’ constitutional rights to due process of law under the Fifth Amendment and their right to petition for redress, guaranteed by the First Amendment.

Moreover, the suit contends that the VA “has consistently presented misleading statistics,” falsely understating the length of time it takes to decide a claim, the number of veterans who need mental health services and the amount of money the agency needs to meet its obligations to veterans.