Vets of Bush's Wars Sue the VA: 'More than Half of Wounded Troops Slipping Through the Cracks'

A national class action lawsuit brought by Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans went to trial on April 21. The suit, known as Veterans for Common Sense v. Peake was brought by two veterans organizations who argue the Department of Veterans Affairs is systematically denying hundreds of thousands of wounded veterans needed medical treatment, while forcing them to wait months or even years for the disability benefits they've earned.

"We're dealing with people who are almost totally disabled; people who have lost arms, lost legs in these wars, people who have come home with post-traumatic stress disorder or physical brain injury," explained Gordan Erspamer, an attorney with the law firm Morrison and Forrester who is handling the case pro bono. "We can't have these people waiting for months and years for the treatment they need."

According to a study released last week by the Rand Corp., an estimated 300,000 veterans among the nearly 1.7 million who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan are battling depression or post-traumatic stress disorder. Another 320,000 veterans suffer from traumatic brain injury, physical brain damage that is often caused by roadside bombs.

However, the VA reports only about 300,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans have received health care from the VA system -- about 120,000 for mental injuries. That means more than half the American service personnel wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan have slipped through the cracks.

"The VA needs aggressive, pro-veteran leaders, for more, additional funding for staff, office space and for screening and treatment equipment," said Paul Sullivan of Veterans for Common Sense. "The VA needs more streamlined policies so that veterans don't need to fill out a 20-page form in order to get care."

Sullivan said his organization decided to file suit when it became clear the agency wouldn't take action on its own. Before helping to found Veterans for Common Sense, Sullivan monitored disability claims for the VA. In 2006, he resigned in protest.

"In 2005, while working at VA, I briefed senior VA political leaders that VA was in a crisis of a surge of disability claims of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans," he said. "I recommended in writing that the VA hire more claims processors to make sure the veterans get their benefits faster instead of facing six month delays or even longer."

"The VA didn't do anything to help the veterans. What the VA actually did was several things to lock the doors and block veterans from getting mental health assistance from VA," Sullivan added.

The groups filed their claim in the Federal District Court in San Francisco in July 2007. In their lawsuit, the veterans groups asked the federal courts to force the VA to clear the backlog of disability claims and make sure returning veterans receive immediate medical and psychological help. They also want the judge to force the VA to screen all vets returning from combat to identify those at greatest risk for PTSD and suicide.

Since then, the Bush administration has tried multiple times to get the case dismissed. In court papers last year, the Justice Department argued that Veterans for Common Sense and Veterans United for Truth did not have standing to sue because they were not individual veterans but associations. The Bush administration also argued that the entire notion of a veterans' class action lawsuit was illegal, declaring that all veterans are required to petition individually.

The judge, an 86-year-old Nixon appointee and World War II veteran named Samuel Conti, rejected each of those claims.

"It is within the court's power to insist that veterans be granted a level of due process that is commensurate with the adjudication procedures with which they are confronted," Conti ruled in January.