The never-ending battle for benefits
Published: November 10, 2011
WASHINGTON -- Rising with a crowd of hundreds to give a standing ovation to two wounded veterans really is something else. So it's hard to reconcile that sentiment with the fact that those two vets had to get lawyers to force their country to give them the benefits they deserve.
The two Army captains were injured in Iraq with severe head trauma. Both were rated as 100 percent disabled. And both were denied full benefits.
The government wanted to give Capt. Patrick Horan and Capt. Raymond Flieg half of what was owed to each of them. They were two of the lucky ones who had the pro-bono National Veterans Legal Services Program (www.nvlsp.org) step in on their behalf. Eventually both were given the maximum allowable benefits, giving them, as one of the wives said, a chance to breath again.
You can see some of Flieg's story on NVLSP's YouTube channel.
