Man Charged After Hit and Run Left Veteran in Road

Police make arrest in hit-and-run that left local veteran injured

KWTX News

August 15, 2017

WACO, Texas (KWTX) Bellmead police made an arrest Tuesday in a hit-and-run crash in June on an I-35 access road that left a local veteran seriously injured.

Cody William Jones, 25, was charged with failure to stop and render aid.

Boone Barott, 45, of Riesel, the vice president of the American Legion 121 Elm Mott riders group, was riding his Harley Davidson motorcycle shortly after 10 p.m. on June 25 on the Interstate 35 access road next to the Texas Department of Transportation offices when an SUV whose driver was headed the wrong way hit the bike.
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Sad update

Man charged in hit-and-run that left local veteran injured found dead

Barott sustained a broken pelvis and a number of lacerations and scrapes and bruises over all his body.He was later released from a local hospital, but faces several months of rehabilitation before he’s able to get back on a motorcycle.Police located the vehicle involved in the crash in early July.“We sure didn’t want this to happen,” Barott said after learning of Jones’ death.

Community Comes Together to Save Home of Korean War Veteran

Lincoln Countians scramble to save Korean War POW’s home

Lincoln County Journal

By Megan Myers
Staff Writer
August 14, 2017

Luckily, Johnson’s plight has been attracting the attention of many in Lincoln County and abroad. Troy resident Kathi Boley is among those trying to help Johnson, whom she began referring to as “our veteran.” 

Flanked by Troy residents Kathi and Doug Boley, Korea veteran Richard Johnson shakes the hand of Albert St. Clair after the group dined together at Harry J’s Steakhouse Aug. 8. The Boleys and St. Clair have been raising money to keep Johnson’s home from being foreclosed on. Megan Myers photo.

Richard Johnson has never been the type to seek attention.

After all, that’s why the 88-year-old Korean War veteran moved to his longtime home in Winfield in the first place. After experiencing a rocky road back to civilian life, the avid nature-lover longed for the peace and quiet of the country.
And for the last 32 years, that’s just what he’s found.

But now Johnson is finding that peace interrupted. About one year ago, his lending company mysteriously increased the mortgage payments on his home from $506 a month to $860. Johnson, who lives on a fixed income, could not afford to make the larger payments. Then in June, he received a letter stating that if he did not come current on the payments, he would lose his home on Aug. 31.

But in the meantime, Boley said that coupled with attorney fees, late fees and interest, the total amount that Johnson will have to pay to stay in his house is around $8,000. So Boley started a GoFundMe account for the cause. In about one week, the account raised more than $2,500, with donations coming from individuals all across the area.Boley also began organizing a team of volunteers to help make necessary repairs and to furnish Johnson’s home with appliances.Many on the team were veterans themselves, including Sheriff John Cottle and Albert St. Clair Sr., an army veteran who runs a charity called St. Clair Hearts Foundation for homeless veterans in the Greater St. Louis area. Guy Kimler, a fellow Patriot Guard rider with Boley’s husband, Doug, donated $250.

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This Police Officer Can Do Job With One Arm

ONE ARM, NO PROBLEM: Army veteran amputee fulfills dream of becoming police officer

Idaho State Journal

By Shelbie Harris 
August 15, 2017


“No matter where you go or what you do there is going to be pros and cons to it. But it all depends on how you picture it. If you look for the bad stuff that’s all you’re going to get. If you look for the positive and the good out of it, no matter what situation you are in you’ll see it.” Carlos Lugo

Pocatello Police Department patrolman Carlos Lugo is an Army veteran who lost half of his left arm in a roadside bomb blast in Afghanistan. But he didn’t let that stop him from becoming a police officer.

POCATELLO — As a 9-year-old living in Stockton, California, Carlos Lugo grew up in a very low-income family.

His mother, a single parent surviving on government checks to feed the mouths of himself and three younger siblings, bounced around from house to house whenever the rent was too high or the bills began to stack up. That was difficult for Lugo, but watching his mom endure constant episodes of domestic violence inflicted by the men in her life was nearly unbearable.

At the brutal height of one such attack, Lugo got a signal from his mom to run to a neighbor’s house and phone the police for help — something he said she rarely asked him to do.

That’s where Pocatello police Capt. Roger Schei first encountered Lugo.

Schei said Lugo never struggled to keep up.

“Everything that we taught he was able to do,” Schei said. “No matter what he was able to find a way. He never asked for special treatment or considerations, and he just figured out a way to get it done.”
Pocatello Police Chief Scott Marchand has similar praise for Lugo, who has now been on the police force a little less than six months.

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Inspirational Vietnam Veteran Plans On Surviving Again After Being Set on Fire At Denny's

Vietnam Veteran Is Determined To Survive After Being Set On Fire

WLTZ News

Christe Lattimore-Staple 
August 14, 2017

Nearly four months after he was doused with gasoline and lit on fire at a Happy Valley, Oregon Denny’s, walking remains a goal for Scott Ranstrom.

“I’m trying to take steps,” he said.

The 69-year-old Vietnam veteran didn’t know his attacker.

He doesn’t like to think about him.

“Every morning I get up with expectations of tomorrow, not what happened,” said Ranstrom, his hands covered by protective gloves.

Sitting in a private room in Vibra Specialty Hospital, a recovery center for those who need long-term, in-patient care, Ranstrom is unwavering.

He remembers everything.
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Camp Pendleton National Navajo Code Talkers Day

On National Navajo Code Talkers Day, a look back at what started at Camp Pendleton
San Diego Union Tribune
Jeanette Steele
August 14, 2017

Navajo Code Talkers took part in every U.S. Marine Corps assault in the Pacific from 1942 to 1945. They transmitted messages by telephone and radio in their native language — a code the Japanese never broke. 

The idea came from Los Angeles resident Philip Johnston, a World War I veteran raised on a Navajo reservation as a missionary’s son. He took his concept to the Marines at Camp Elliot in San Diego, now Miramar Marine Corps Air Station. 

In May 1942, the first 29 Navajo recruits attended boot camp. Afterward, at Camp Pendleton, this group created the Navajo code for military terms. 
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Hole in Spokane VA Hospital Roof--Leaked for 5 Years!

Investigation discovers staff ignored hole in roof for years at VA hospital in Spokane

Spokesman

Thomas Clouse

August 11, 2017

"The hole is scheduled to be fixed sometime by the end of the year."

U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers’ frustrated attempts to secure changes for veterans’ care in Spokane just fell through the roof.

Based on complaints funneled through a group of veterans who have protested for a year about the lack of cooperation from the staff at Mann-Grandstaff VA Medical Center, McMorris Rodgers asked for staff from the House Veterans Affairs Committee to come to Spokane in June and investigate conditions at the hospital. Among the problems they discovered: a hole in the roof.

The hole apparently has been leaking water for about five years. McMorris Rodgers said VA staff has known about the problem, evidenced by the fact that someone had built a rectangular funnel to catch water dripping through the roof. The funnel channels water through a hose into a metal bucket.

But the make-shift-leak-management system is located only feet from hospital’s large electrical panel that fuels power to the entire facility, she said.

“Just how unbelievable it was to learn we had a leaking roof,” McMorris Rodgers said. “And it’s been going on for years and hasn’t been addressed.”

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Just no other way to put it!

After News Reporters Showed Up, Restaurant Owner Checked Law on Service Dogs?

Restaurant owner refuses entry for PTSD vet’s service dog
Panama City News Herald
Wendy Victora
August 12, 2017

“I don’t know how to verify that they are in fact a service dog, or how that plays out in a restaurant that serves food. What are my rights?” Papa Joe’s Hideaway owner pat Dougherty 

FORT WALTON BEACH — A disabled veteran who took her service dog to an Okaloosa County restaurant last week left after the owner confronted her about bringing the dog inside.

Brittney Healy and her service dog Grunt, visit the grave of a friend who was killed in Iraq. Healy worked in a morgue in Iraq for a year when she was in her late teens. She has been medically retired with PTSD

Brittney Healy received her dog, Grunt, in 2012, shortly before she was medically discharged from the Army with post-traumatic stress disorder. Over the past five years, she has become very familiar with federal laws governing her service dog.

“For a service dog, they can only ask you two questions legally: Is your dog a service dog? What is he trained to do?” she said. “That’s how it should be. You don’t know what that person is going through.”

But Pat Dougherty, the owner of Papa Joe’s Hideaway, isn’t as familiar with that portion of the Americans with Disabilities Act. What the longtime business owner does know is that in the past two weeks, one service dog bit a customer in the face and another threw up in the restaurant.

After talking to the Daily News, Dougherty planned to call an 800 number to learn more about the laws governing service dogs. She said she isn’t “anti-military” and that her son-in-law is active duty. But she remained frustrated with the encounter and with the laws.read more here

UK Hero With PTSD Dumped by Ministry of Defense

NO HELP FOR HERO 

Brave Army officer who defused nearly 100 bombs in Afghanistan says he was dumped by MoD after suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder

The SUN UK 
By Sam Webb 
13th August 2017 

Major Wayne Owers was honoured three times by the Queen during his 27-year career.

AN ARMY bomb disposal expert who saved countless lives in war-torn Afghanistan says he has been betrayed by the military after he was discharged while suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Captain Wayne Owers was decorated with The Queen’s Gallantry Medal

But when the 46-year-old, originally from Whitnash, near Leamington in Warwickshire, asked for help tackling his nightmares and extreme anxiety from Army doctors, he was given a medical discharge.

He underwent two years of treatment and was showing signs of improvement – but he was given a medical discharge and just £6,000 compensation rather than a non-operational posting.

He told the Mirror: “The Army was my life but in my darkest hour when I most needed help I was told, ‘You are no longer fit to serve’.

“I was mortified. It was a devastating blow. I could have continued serving.”

In 2013 the Sun reported how Owers crawled forward in the middle of the battle to defuse a bomb in a school in Afghanistan.

When asked if they may be booby trapped and go off in his face when he touched them, the brave soldier grinned as he said: “Probably not.” 

He says the Ministry of Defence’s claim that it is serious about tackling PTSD is nonsense and says he knows soldiers who have lied about their recovery because they don’t want to lose their jobs.

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Massachusetts First Responders Responding to Traumas on the Job

‘You can’t come to work with emotions’

South Coast Today 
Wesley Sykes 
August 12, 2017

“You can’t come to work with any emotions. You just can’t. It’s different. You may break down after the call, but in the moment it’s like you’re pumping with adrenaline.” Megan Robitaille

Mike Thomas, right, checks with first responders Megan Robitaille and Shain Ramos at St. Lukes Hospital Emergency Room dock after responding to a drug overdose call at Buttonwood Park in New Bedford. David W. OIliveira Standard Times Special SCMG

Life as an EMT, whether it be in city of 100,000 people or a small town of 10,000, can bring many hats to wear. From life-saver to therapist, often there are moments that any amount of training won’t prepare an EMT for.

Some EMTs will tell you that there’s a very vulnerable period that happens in the back of an ambulance. There are moments of clarity that offer a new lease on life. Instances of denial are masked in cockiness or arrogance that can turn into belligerence. Those feelings may give way to tears of remorse or sorrow.

In a four-foot by eight-foot box traveling at speeds in excess of 80 miles per hour, the ambulance is, for some, a confessional on wheels. The paramedics, in a race against time, double as priests hearing what might be a patient’s final words as they come to grips with the grave reality that the EMT may be the last person they ever see on Earth.

“When you get someone to truly open up, or they open up on their own, you hear that they’re a brother, a son, a mother or daughter,” Acushnet Fire and EMS Chief Kevin Gallagher said.

The unsung heroes, Donohoe said, are the wives and husbands at home who make it all work. Families stop by during down hours to check in, bring food and get quality family time when they can.“They put up with our god-awful hours,” Donohoe said. More than the hours, families deal with any residual effects from a traumatic call.

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Combat PTSD Veterans Learn They Can Survive To Thrive

I can't count how many times someone has sent me a link to what they are doing on PTSD, or how many times I simply close the email without responding at all. Something about an email from Jess Abernethy of Survive To Thrive Nation got my attention. I am glad I opened this one.

After ten years on this site and 35 doing this work, I got to the point where the problems with efforts by a new group smacked me across the face. I used to take the time to slam them. Then, well, it just wasn't even worth responding to them. 

I'm emailing this group because I am impressed. They cover most of it. The effects of PTSD on those who love them and live with them comes out strongly with the interview of Iraq Veteran Dane Christison's wife. She talks about how it was when things were bad and then offers hope.

They get into the importance of treating every part of the veteran, mind-body and spirit.

The other thing is that this is not yet one more group raising awareness in the US. This is a group trying to make veterans aware of the fact there is nothing to be ashamed of and they can heal to go on and live happier lives. They are out of Australia!

Isn't that what all of us should be doing?



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