Veteran Sent To Jail After Asking For Help

UPDATE
June 4, 2015
Update from News Observer
Army vet who made threatening call will learn his fate Thursday

(Corrected title of original post: I apologize for the error. Usually readers point out mistakes because I do not have an editor checking what I do.)

Army combat veteran’s call for help lands him in jail
News and Observer
BY MANDY LOCKE
May 30, 2015

A search of federal court records across the country found charges against at least six other veterans whose rants on the crisis line or to a trusted VA medical provider brought arrest and imprisonment.

For years, Ryan Broderick has been trapped inside his mind, watching a constant reel of explosions that rocked the Army vehicles he had scrubbed of blood during three combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Since January, Broderick has been stuck inside a real jail, fortified by cinder blocks, surrounded by barbed wire. The government that Broderick upended his life to serve locked him up in Edgecombe County, about 75 miles east of Raleigh.

In the eyes of federal officials, Broderick posed a threat to America and should be treated as a criminal.

Broderick, 31, of Fayetteville, is being prosecuted for comments he let fly during a call to speak with a counselor at the Veterans Affairs suicide crisis hotline. He was frustrated and sleep-deprived.

His words were clear: If he didn’t get the help he needed for his post-traumatic stress disorder, he would bring a gun to the VA hospital and Fort Bragg and start shooting.
read more here

When Will Nation Make Veterans High Profile Story?

I was watching WESH 2 News this morning and they were reporting on the protest in Orlando over the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore. They called it a "high profile" story.

'We're human beings. We all need to care about each other and that's not what I'm seeing," demonstrator Krystal Pherai said.

She is right. We should care about each other. What she isn't seeing is what is happening to veterans all over the country everyday in America. They come home from wherever they are sent and simply don't get the help they need to be pulled from the brink of total despair. No matter how many times we've heard the American people care about them, the result is always the same. They are forgotten about. People move on until the next scandal and they become a story that is supposed to matter.

What doesn't matter is people forget all about everything they just learned. Their suffering doesn't end, nothing substantial happens and then the next time a reporter covers another scandal, folks get to pretend it is something new. The cycle goes on and on as history is repeated.

They have no clue how bad it has been for veterans. This report out of Boise sums up what the average citizen isn't aware of.

Boise Police Department On average, Boise police officers encounter approximately one veteran per week facing a crisis and in need of assistance, and officers are provided the opportunity to aid in referring the veteran to one of the network partners. These interactions demonstrate the value of the program, and that its objective is being met.

At least they are talking about what veterans are going through. Too bad it hasn't become a "high profile" news story. The population of Boise is 214,237 yet every week they have to respond to a veteran in crisis. There are only 16,725 in Boise.

There is the National Veterans Crisis Line veterans can call 1-800-273-8255 24-7. But over and over again we find that veterans are still committing suicide double the civilian population.

There is now an investigation into veterans being put on hold by the Crisis Line topped off with the fact that when veterans call the VA the automated phone message says "If this is an emergency call 911.

The VA has the Veterans Center where veterans are supposed to be able to get help they need before they end up in crisis.
The Vet Center

Ten Minutes Away
As fate would have it, there was a Vet Center just 10 minutes down the road from where Beatty worked at Fort Belvoir.

“When I walked in there, everything changed for me,” she said. “I had individual sessions with a female therapist, and 12 weeks of Cognitive Processing Therapy to specifically address my PTSD. I also completed a 12-week trauma group that was designed for women Veterans. I had always felt alone in my trauma, but being surrounded by supportive women who understood what I was going through was comforting. It helped me a lot.”

On April 4th a freeway was shut down because there was a police standoff with a suicidal veteran.

WacoTrib.com It was then that the man told officers he was trying to get to the Veterans Administration hospital in Temple when he ran out of gasoline.

Police confirmed he was a veteran and took him to the hospital. Investigators were waiting Saturday afternoon to talk to doctors and decide whether to file charges, Dickson said.

But here is another one that was resolved and the veteran is finally getting help.

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Less than one week after being found not guilty by a Travis County jury on charges of assaulting a police officer, Marine veteran Gene Vela says he will check himself into a Veteran Affairs clinic in Temple on Tuesday.

In an exclusive interview with KXAN’s Sally Hernandez, Vela, 31, says he’ll be getting treatment for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Treatment was something he was trying to do for months before he was shot three times by Austin police during a stand-off in November 2013, the day before Veteran’s Day.

Why didn't he get help before that? Why did it all this happen?
Brian Babb, Oregon National Guard, had PTSD and TBI. He called for help because he was suicidal. He ended up being shot by police instead.

Veteran’s family pledges to push for changes
Brian Babb’s relatives are proposing a new protocol for police responding to similar incidents in the future
The Register-Guard
By Christian Hill
MAY 3, 2015 (Edited for summary)

The therapist called police to Babb’s home in west Eugene after Babb reported to her that he was contemplating suicide and had fired a handgun in his home.

The therapist, Becky Higgins, remained on the phone with Babb for about 45 minutes. She said her client was beginning to calm down and had unloaded the handgun.

But Higgins said Babb walked away from the call after police directed Babb over a loudspeaker mounted on an armored vehicle to exit his home unarmed, and when a 911 dispatcher directed Higgins over her objections to hang up her line so a crisis negotiator on scene could get in touch with Babb.

Higgins said she had repeated to the 911 dispatcher that Babb had unloaded the handgun, but it’s unclear what information got to the officers on scene.

“We have said that we believe there were multiple points in time that if where a single action had been changed, he would be alive,” said Ronda McGowan, Babb’s other sister. “It would have been a better outcome.”
read more here

May 1, 2015
Officials layout a moment by moment timeline of events leading to the fatal shooting of Brian Babb by a Eugene Police Officer during a standoff in Eugene March 30th, 2015. (Chris Pietsch/The Register-Guard)
My first thought was why didn't the negotiator talk to his therapist? After all, she was on the phone with 9-11.

“Nothing I’ve said here is intended to suggest there was no possible alternative or no possible better outcome or nothing could have fallen differently,” Gardner said. “We have the benefit of lots of information now that we didn’t have then.”

It is also puzzling as to why they didn't use tear gas or a flash grenade?

A stun grenade, also known as a flash grenade or flashbang, is a non-lethal explosive device used to temporarily disorient an enemy's senses. It is designed to produce a blinding flash of light and intensely loud noise "bang" of greater than 170 decibels (dB) without causing permanent injury.

After the roommate walked out of the house, there was no one else in the home other than Babb.

So yes, veterans should be a high profile story. The question is, when will the national media notice a national crisis for our veterans?

Eugene Oregon Police Reach Out After Suicidal Veteran Killed by Officers

Eugene police reach out to vets
The chief is seeking their help with training after an officer fatally shot a veteran in crisis
The Register Guard
By Christian Hill
The Register-Guard
APRIL 30, 2015

“In the long run,” Kerns concluded, “our goal is that our department will have an expertise in the unique skills of working with veterans that will be ideal to the needs of our community.”

The Eugene Police Department is reaching out to veterans and enlisting their help to train officers in the wake of the March 30 fatal shooting of a war veteran in crisis.

Police Chief Pete Kerns outlined those and other steps he said his department is taking in an email he sent out before the publication in Wednesday’s Register-Guard of a lengthy opinion essay by Becky Higgins, the veteran’s therapist . The essay was highly critical of the police response.

Higgins was on the phone with her client for about 45 minutes before he was killed.

An as-yet-unidentified officer shot and killed Brian Babb, a 49-year-old former captain in the Oregon Army National Guard, after Higgins called police to Babb’s west Eugene home because he was suicidal and told Higgins he had fired a gun in his home.

Kerns has said the officer fired after Babb, who had moved to the doorway, pointed a rifle at the officer.

Higgins wrote in her op-ed essay that she felt “used by the police” and that officers approached the situation as if Babb “was an enemy combatant, instead of a wounded military officer.”

Higgins questioned the police department’s show of force and asked why officers were in a hurry when Babb appeared to her to be calming down. Engaging a traumatized combat veteran with startling commands from a bullhorn, she said, “begs common sense.”
read more here

Killing of suicidal veteran likely avoidable
The Register Guard
By Becky Higgins
For The Register-Guard
APRIL 29, 2015

Monday, April 27, marked a month since Brian Babb was killed at his home by Eugene police. The Interagency Deadly Use of Force Investigation Team (IDFIT) has given its report on the incident to Lane County District Attorney Alex Gardner, who will determine whether the shooting was justified. Regardless of that decision, the shooting likely could have been avoided.

I was Brian’s therapist. I was on the phone with him until minutes before he was shot dead in the doorway of his home. In this column, I can share the information from the 911 call, which is a public record, and I can share my opinions. Everything else about Babb as my client is privileged, even after his death.

I called 911 on March 30 from my cellphone, reporting that I was a therapist in private practice, I had a client on my office phone who was suicidal, he was a combat veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder and a traumatic brain injury (TBI), he had a handgun, and he was not willing to take the clip out of the gun or the round out of the chamber. The 911 operator told me to place my cellphone next to me while I talked with my client on my office landline. The recording, which picked up only my end of the conversation, lasted about 45 minutes. The 911 operator could hear me; I could hear her.
read more here

Wanda McBride Hollaway 3 weeks ago
Oh my son. I never knew pain until now. When you were four, you told me that when you grew up, you were going to marry me and take care of me. I hugged you and told you that would be great, but mommy would take care of you too. I have failed horribly. The only thing I can do now, is to make every effort to change prodigal on the VA RESPONSE to suicidal veterans. A trained team from the VA should be dispatched - not police! I will miss you every day of my life and look forward to our reunion in heaven. You are my heart, son.

Hundreds attend memorial for slain veteran

Eugene man killed by police was an Army veteran

Calling Veterans Crisis Line Shouldn't Leave Life On Hold

Veterans describe runaround when calling crisis line; Texas man records 36 minutes on hold 
KJRH News
Amanda Kost, Scripps News
Isaac Wolf, Scripps News
Feb 23, 2015

WASHINGTON D.C. - On an evening last March, 42-year-old Dedra Hughes’ thoughts turned to suicide.

The Army veteran, who had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder five years earlier, had split with her boyfriend days before. She was unemployed and had stopped taking classes. And she was convinced her two daughters would be better off without her. Sitting on the floor of her suburban Chicago living room, Hughes attempted to slash her wrist but didn’t draw blood, and says she passed out from anxiety. Her 12-year-old discovered her there on the floor with the knife beside her.

Hughes decided that night to turn to the national Veterans Crisis Line, a 24-hour, seven-day-a week service that promises an immediate, open line to professional help. But when Hughes phoned, she said, her call went straight to hold. After several minutes, she became frustrated and hung up. “I would never call the hotline again,” said Hughes. She said she needed to quickly get to someone that night who could give her help and reassurance.
read more here

Oscar Goes To HBO Veterans Crisis Line Documentary

Oscars 2015: Who Dana Perry Is and Why She Want Us to Pay Attention to Suicide 
ABC News
By JOI-MARIE MCKENZIE and EMILY SHAPIRO
Feb 23, 2015

Producer Dana Perry and director Ellen Goosenberg Kent accept the Best Documentary Short Award for "Crisis Hotline; Veterans Press 1" onstage during the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, California. Kevin Winter/Getty Images

While accepting the Oscar for best documentary short subject, director Dana Perry said suicide should be talked about "out loud," dedicating the award to her son.

During her acceptance speech on behalf of "Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1," the music abruptly cut off when Perry mentioned her son, Evan Scott Perry, who committed suicide at age 15 in 2005. "I lost my son," Perry told reporters after the speech.

"We need to talk about suicide out loud to try to work against the stigma and silence around suicide because the best prevention for suicide is awareness and discussion and not trying sweep it under the rug."

Perry also mentioned veteran suicide in her Oscar speech, which she called "a crisis." Tonight's Oscar-winning HBO documentary, directed by Perry and Ellen Goosenberg Kent, is about the Department of Veterans Affairs' 24-hour call center for veterans.
read more here

Veterans Crisis Line Turned Into Veteran In Line Hanging Up

Vets describe crisis line runaround 
Texas man records 36 minutes on hold
Standard Times Amanda Kost and Isaac Wolf
Feb 21, 2015

Matt Anzur/Scripps News When veterans in crisis pick up the phone for help, their calls are directed to the Veterans Crisis Line call center on the VA campus in Canandaigua, N.Y.

On an evening last March, 42-year-old Dedra Hughes’ thoughts turned to suicide. The Army veteran, who had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder five years earlier, had split with her boyfriend days before. She was unemployed and had stopped taking classes. And she was convinced her two daughters would be better off without her.

Sitting on the floor of her suburban Chicago living room, Hughes attempted to slash her wrist but didn’t draw blood, and says she passed out from anxiety. Her 12-year-old discovered her there on the floor with the knife beside her.

Hughes decided that night to turn to the national Veterans Crisis Line, a 24/7 service that promises an immediate, open line to professional help. But when Hughes phoned, she said, her call went straight to hold. After several minutes, she became frustrated and hung up.

“I would never call the hotline again,” said Hughes. She said she needed to quickly get to someone that night who could give her help and reassurance.

“That’s what I wanted,” she said. “Someone to make me feel that I mattered.” After reaching out to a local veterans group, someone arrived at her home that night.
read more here

HBO Veterans Crisis Line Documentary Up For Oscar

HBO Veterans Crisis Line Documentary Up For Oscar

There are many things the VA got wrong over the years. So much time had to spent talking about them so that someone would see fit to fix the issues. This isn't about what they got wrong. This is about something they have gotten right.

Is it perfect? No, as we've seen in the increased number of suicides after this effort began in 2007.

Suicides in the veterans population increased including Clay Hunt, the Marine with a prevention bill in his memory. None of what is in it is new. Wish I could say it was and join in the crowd pretending we've finally done something to make enough of a difference but I can't.

Suicides among veterans in state after state have reached double the rate of civilians committing suicide. Among younger veterans, they are triple the rate of their peers. Those numbers, sadly, could have been a lot higher if this Crisis Line was not in place.

Veterans Crisis Line connects Veterans in crisis with qualified, caring responders.
By Hans Petersen, VA Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2015

Caring, Confidential Responders Always There

VA’s Veterans Crisis Line has answered over 1,625,000 calls.

That’s more than a million-and-a-half times a Veteran has felt suicidal or depressed or lost and decided to call for help…and the Crisis Line was there.

It’s a crisis too many of our wounded warriors face.

The Crisis Line has sent over 45,000 rescues to assist callers with emergency services.

That means that when our trained responders know the caller is in a serious crisis and they can’t calm them down or convince them to go to a VA hospital and see a Suicide Prevention Coordinator, they call the closest local emergency personnel to go to that Veteran’s home and help them.

And that has happened 45,000 times.

That saves lives and helps Veterans on the road to recovery. And since 2007, the Crisis Line has been there non-stop: 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year. Mental Health problems do not take a holiday and neither do we.

VA’s Veterans Crisis Line connects Veterans in crisis and their families and friends with qualified, caring responders through a confidential toll-free hotline, online chat, and text services.

The Crisis Line has provided over 261,000 referrals to local facility Suicide Prevention Coordinators. It is an essential component of VA’s overall effort to prevent suicide.

Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 (HBO Documentary Films)


A moving entry for an Oscar: Saving vets from suicide
USA TODAY
Gregg Zoroya
February 18, 2015

Among the candidates vying for an Oscar on Sunday night is a powerful film that highlights the persistent and troubling trend of lives devastated by war – to the point of suicide.

No, not American Sniper, the box-office smash based on a true story about a Navy SEAL who piled up record kills while developing emotional trauma.

This movie is a 40-minute documentary filmed in an austere, cubicle-setting on the campus of a Department of Veterans Affairs center in Canandaigua, N.Y.

It is the VA suicide hotline center (800-273-8255), where staffers take 1,000 calls a day from veterans or servicemembers on the brink of self-destruction or family members terrified a suicide might occur .

The HBO-produced film, Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1, is an Oscar nominee for best short documentary. It has been picked as a potential winner by critics that include The New Yorker magazine.

"Whether we win or not, I just think it's so great that it's getting all this attention and that it's going to help people call in," says Julianne Mullane, acting director of the hotline operations. She says she's putting on extra staff for the Oscars in case more calls are generated Sunday night.
read more here

Veterans Crisis Line
Published on Aug 28, 2014

One small act can make a big difference in the life of a Veteran or Service member in crisis. “The Power of 1,” a public service announcement from the Veterans Crisis Line, shows how taking the time to reach out can be the first step to getting those who served the support they need. A single action — one call, one chat, one text, one conversation — can have a significant impact. The Veterans Crisis Line connects Veterans or Service members in crisis, as well as their families and friends, with qualified, caring U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs responders through a confidential, toll-free hotline, online chat, and text-messaging service. Veterans and their loved ones can call 1-800-273-8255 and Press 1, chat online at VeteransCrisisLine.net/Chat, or text to 838255 to receive confidential support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Reach out. One call can open the door to support.

VA’s Suicide Hot Line Begins Operations
July 30, 2007

Nicholson: “Help a Phone Call Away”

WASHINGTON – To ensure veterans with emotional crises have round-the-clock access to trained professionals, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has begun operation of a national suicide prevention hot line for veterans.

“Veterans need to know these VA professionals are literally a phone call away,” said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson. “All service members who experience the stresses of combat can have wounds on their minds as well as their bodies. Veterans should see mental health services as another benefit they have earned, which the men and women of VA are honored to provide.”

The toll-free hot line number is 1-800-273-TALK (8255).

VA’s hot line will be staffed by mental health professionals in Canandaigua, N.Y. They will take toll-free calls from across the country and work closely with local VA mental health providers to help callers.

To operate the national hot line, VA is partnering with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

“The hot line will put veterans in touch – any time of the day or night, any day of the week, from anywhere in the country – with trained, caring professionals who can help,” added Nicholson. “This is another example of the VA’s commitment to provide world-class health care for our nation’s veterans, especially combat veterans newly returned from Iraq and Afghanistan.”

The suicide hot line is among several enhancements to mental health care that Nicholson has announced this year. In mid July, the Department’s top mental health professionals convened in the Washington, D.C., area to review the services provided to veterans of the Global War on Terror.

VA is the largest provider of mental health care in the nation. This year, the Department will spent about $3 billion for mental health. More than 9,000 mental health professionals, backed up by primary care physicians and other health professionals in every VA medical center and outpatient clinic, provide mental health care to about 1 million veterans each year.

Military Suicides: What Good Did It Do To Be Right?

I am drained. I can't possibly be the only person in this country wondering why the hell this latest bill out of congress deserves supporting. Then again, considering my email box is usually full of reasons why it should be supported, it is very lonely from where I sit.

Senate panel OKs bill to lower veteran suicide rate
The Associated Press
By Matthew Daly
January 21, 2015

WASHINGTON — A bill aimed at reducing a suicide epidemic among military veterans cleared a Senate committee on Wednesday, as lawmakers vowed quick action on a measure that was blocked in the last session of Congress.

The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee unanimously approved a bill named for Clay Hunt, a 26-year-old veteran who killed himself in 2011. The bill is aimed at reducing a suicide epidemic that claims the lives of 22 military veterans every day.

Aimed at reducing? Ok then what about all the other bills? Anyone figure out how to aim the right weapon to accomplish that? Nope! So far the only aiming is being done by a veteran with the gun in his hand and they usually don't miss.

Click the link to read the rest of the article if you can stand it. I can't. I had to leave this comment.

When will this ever end? How many more years of bills being passed while veterans pay for the failures of congress with their lives? How many more have to die before they figure out they had it wrong since the first bill in 2007 and then only reprinted more of the same?

HBO did a documentary back in 2013.

Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1
Since 2001, more veterans have died by their own hand than in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, one veteran dies by suicide in America every 80 minutes. While only 1% of Americans has served in the military, former service members account for 20% of all suicides in the U.S.

Based in Canandaigua, NY and open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the Veterans Crisis Line receives more than 22,000 calls each month from veterans of all conflicts who are struggling or contemplating suicide due to the psychological wounds of war and the challenges of returning to civilian life.

The timely documentary CRISIS HOTLINE: VETERANS PRESS 1 spotlights the traumas endured by America’s veterans, as seen through the work of the hotline’s trained responders, who provide immediate intervention and support in hopes of saving the lives of service members.

After serving their country overseas, many military veterans struggle with post-traumatic stress, depression and addiction. Since 2007, the Veterans Crisis Line has answered about 900,000 calls. CRISIS HOTLINE highlights how its dedicated responders react to a variety of complex calls and handle the emotional aftermath of what can be life-and-death conversations. The film captures these extremely private moments, where the professionals, many of whom are themselves veterans or veterans’ spouses, can often interrupt the thoughts and plans of suicidal callers to steer them out of crisis. Hotline workers sometimes intervene successfully by seizing on the caller's ambivalence and illuminating his or her reasons for living.
read more here

Since its launch in 2007, the Veterans Crisis Line has answered more than 1.35 million calls and made more than 42,000 lifesaving rescues. In 2009, the Veterans Crisis Line added an anonymous online chat service and has engaged in more than 192,000 chats. In November 2011, the Veterans Crisis Line introduced a text-messaging service to provide another way for Veterans to connect with confidential, round-the-clock support, and since then has responded to more than 28,000 texts.

This means as bad as the numbers are with young veterans committing suicide triple their civilian peers and veterans in general double the civilian rate, it would be worse without this crisis line. But hey, why talk about this? It is a lot easier to just follow along and push to have another bill passed. 

Why come up with the change veterans have been waiting for? Why do something different since they have been paying for these failures with their lives?

The granddaddy of all these bills was the Joshua Omvig Suicide Prevention act passed by the Congress in 2007 and signed by President Bush in 2008.

This was part of it.

`(h) Hotline- In carrying out the comprehensive program, the Secretary may provide for a toll-free hotline for veterans to be staffed by appropriately trained mental health personnel and available at all times.

You can read everything else in the bill but you can find more of the same in every other bill they have pushed, passed, signed and funded.

Hint, these bills were in place before Clay Hunt and thousands of others committed suicide.

While we're on the subject, why would we want to talk about veterans facing off with police officers or committing suicide by cop? Or why talk about them still asking for help like Clay did only to discover the help he needed was not what he got? Why talk about the fact that no one has been held accountable for all the failures this far? Why talk about Congress listening to family members after someone they love made it back from combat but ended their pain the only way they could think of?

Why talk about the fucking fact that none of this is new?

If you want to keep spreading the message that this will do anything tomorrow, show up at your local cemetery because they'll be needing more graves for veterans.

Think I'm wrong? Well they thought I was wrong back in 2009 too when I said if the Army pushed Comprehensive Soldier Fitness they would see suicides increase and they did. Maybe you can tell me what good did it do to be right if they died faster?

UPDATE Add this to the above

CBS News: VA Patient Data Reveals Growing Number Of Suicide Attempts By Veterans 2008
"When you go through war, you're going to change permanently and totally for the rest of your life," said veteran Harold Pendergrass.

Pendergrass knows firsthand the hidden wounds of war. He served two tours in Vietnam.

"I carried a suicide note in my pocket for years," he said.

At 57, the former Army soldier has tried to take his own life three times, constantly wrestling with thoughts of killing himself.

"I sat around numerous times with a .44 in my mouth," he said. "But for some reason, I just couldn't pull the trigger. I don't know why."

Now, CBS News has obtained never-before seen patient data from the Department of Veterans Affairs, detailing the growing number of suicide attempts among vets recently treated by the VA.

The data reveals a marked overall increase - from 462 attempts in 2000 to 790 in 2007.

"This is highly statistically significant," said Dr. Bruce Levin, head of the biostatistics department at Columbia University. Levin is one of three experts who analyzed the data for CBS News.

"I'd characterize it as something that deserves further attention," Levin said. "Overall the data suggests about a 44 percent increase and that is not due to chance."

According to the experts, two age groups stood out between 2000 and 2007. First, ages 20-24 - those likely to have served during the Iraq-Afghan wars. Suicide attempts rose from 11 to 47.

And for vets ages 55 to 59, suicide attempts jumped from 19 to 117.

In both age groups, the attempted suicides grew at a rate much faster than the VA patient population as a whole.

In addition, this VA study, also obtained exclusively by CBS News, reveals the increasing number of veterans who recently received VA services ... and still succeeded in committing suicide: rising from 1,403 suicides in 2001 to 1,784 in 2005 - figures the VA has never made public.

And add this to that from today

A new study suggests that the suicide risk for Eldridge and other veterans who served in the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is significantly higher – 41 to 61 percent higher -- than for the general population. The study, led by Department of Veterans Affairs and Army researchers, is the most comprehensive look to date at the suicide risk for veterans who were on active duty during the recent wars.