Hang on to your hats and read excerpts from this,,,,sorry it's so long.

http://www.sptimes.com/News/080100/TampaBay/VA_office_targeted_fo.shtml

ST. PETERSBURG
Auditors have uncovered 136 cases of potential fraud or mishandling in the distribution of veterans benefit checks from offices in St. Petersburg and St. Louis, including the approval of $475,000 for a veteran who may have died 21 years ago.

(2)embezzled nearly $1.3-million by "exploiting internal weaknesses" in the benefit program.

A team of five VA auditors worked in the St. Petersburg office during the yearlong review of more than 1,000 questionable files. Their review also took them to a VA records center in St. Louis. Among their findings:

Overpayments totaling $475,000 went to a veteran who auditors believe died in 1979. It was not clear from the record whether a veteran was dead or alive, they wrote.

An additional $92,000 went to four more veterans thought dead at the time of payment.

143 employees received benefits themselves, and sometimes had improper access to their own records, increasing the potential for fraud.

A review of 308 claim folders of regional office employees, former employees and relatives found that 41 percent contained claims that were decided by co-workers. Two decisions were "unsupported and unwarranted," six were "very liberal" and two were processed within five days, though it normally takes months.

Controls to prevent employees from gaining access to the records of relatives and friends were inadequate.

In three of every four cases where "third-person review" was required for approval of one-time payments, it was not obtained.

In January 1999 St. Petersburg VA claims investigator Joy Cheri Brown was arrested for stealing $615,451 by creating a fraudulent award in the name of her fiance. That man, a Persian Gulf War veteran and St. Petersburg police officer, was not charged with wrongdoing. Brown forfeited a Mazda Miata, a Mitsubishi 3000 GT and two engagement rings, a prosecutor said at the time of her conviction. and conspired with another employee, Hack Carr, a 29-year employee, to increase her own disability compensation. Carr, a senior claims examiner, was charged with conspiracy, theft, obstruction of agency proceedings and destruction of public records.

St. Petersburg office had more than 20,000 claims pending, the most in the nation, and it took an average of 213 days to complete claims.


~~~~~~~~~~~~`Separate article

Two weeks ago, The American Legion’s Quality Review Team visited the St. Petersburg VA Regional Office. While there, we were confronted with graphic evidence of premature and erroneous denials of claims, a general lack of compliance with the Veterans’ Claims Assistance Act (VCAA) rules, and other types of inappropriate action. It almost appears as part of an orchestrated policy of manipulation of the station’s production figures as a means of meeting its mandated production quotas. Management, rating board members, decision review officers, and front-line claims processors are under tremendous pressure from VA Central Office to produce the expected monthly quotas. There were cases in which veterans received letters stating that their claims were being denied, because their military records may have been destroyed in the 1972 fire at the National Personnel Records Center. The problem was that these veterans got out of the service years after the fire took place.

As disturbing as these tactics are, what was even more shocking was the intentional neglect of the backlog of pending appeals and remanded cases from the Board of Veterans Appeals. Remands are not being worked, because the station receives no work credit toward their mandated monthly production quota. This is not a local issue. It is a national issue.

At St. Petersburg, there were over 1,300 remands in which The American Legion holds power of attorney. Some of these cases had been remanded by the Board more than five years ago and were still waiting final regional office action.

I know this is off topic and I am not a veteran, but wanted to thank each and every one of you for all you have done, and continue to do for me, my family, and the whole country. You are what makes America the great land that it is! Thanks!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMhGhBgvMCM