Monday the Washington Post published a story about evidence of fraud at the VA. The extent of the fraud is unknown but with taxpayers spending nearly $200 billion a year in compensation payments to disabled vets, it seems like something that deserves a close look.
One thing the article revealed was that the number of claims made per person has gone up dramatically in the past two decades.
Last year, each disabled veteran received, on average, benefits for a combination of about seven injuries and illnesses, up from 2.5 per person in 2001. The Post found that it has become common for veterans to submit claims for 20 or more disabilities each.
And the VA culture under the Biden administration was all about finding a way to say yes to any claim. The more claims individuals make, the more money the VA sends them on a monthly basis. This money can potentially continue for the rest of their life.
Today the Post published a follow up looking at some of the most egregious cases, the ones which have resulted in criminal charges against the fraudsters. There have been dozens of cases in which people pretended to be either blind or paralyzed in order to maximize their disability payments.
The case of Barry Wayne Hoover, a Navy vet from Tampa, shows how easy it is to take advantage of VA — and, in turn, taxpayers.
In 1997, the federal agency began paying Hoover $179 a month for retinitis pigmentosa, a rare inherited eye disease that flared up when he was in the Navy and caused him to be medically discharged after five years of service…
For more than a decade, Hoover had a 20 percent disability rating from VA. Eventually, he wanted more money and concocted a story to get it, records show.
In 2009, he told a VA doctor that his sight had rapidly worsened and he had given up driving because he could no longer see people or other cars, even with corrective lenses. Just being in the sun, he said, made him feel nauseated and his head…
VA raised Hoover’s disability rating to 100 percent and declared him permanently unable to work, which boosted his compensation to more than $3,800 a month. The government also enrolled him in blindness rehabilitation courses, training him how to navigate obstacles with a long white cane.
But Hoover had faster ways to get around. In January 2012 — the same month that VA classified him as completely disabled for blindness — he walked into the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles to renew his driver’s license, records show.
He passed the eye test with 20/40 vision while wearing corrective lenses…
From that point forward, according to the documents, Hoover claimed he was blind when he visited VA for medical appointments. Meanwhile, he cashed his disability checks and bought expensive toys, including an 11-foot boat, a three-wheeled motorcycle and a motorized canoe. Then he bragged on Facebook about how much fun he was having.
In 2020 Hoover was finally charged with stealing government money. He went to trial in 2022 and his attorney unsuccessfully argued that he was really blind. HIs attorney explained, “Can a blind man drive? I submit to you he can. Should he drive? That’s a whole different story.”
It’s not clear how common this blindness fraud is but the story lists several similar examples from around the country. Some of these people were stealing money from the taxpayers for decades.
One of the schemes was perpetuated for decades by Paul Lesslie Thompson, a 71-year-old Army vet who served in Vietnam. He pleaded guilty in federal court in June to defrauding VA by feigning blindness since 1993. Prosecutors say he bilked taxpayers of nearly $1.2 million. His sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 23.
To get the money, Thompson told VA examiners he couldn’t make out the largest letter — the big black “E” — on an eye chart a foot from his face, even with corrective lenses. Yet state records showed he had renewed his Florida driver’s license three times over two decades and always passed the vision test. Authorities charged him after federal agents spied him driving to a restaurant to pick up a pizza.
Other vets claimed not to be able to walk or get around and then were found to be doing manual labor at home.
In 2011, a tipster in Kansas called a VA hotline to accuse Bruce L. Hay, a veteran and farmer from Osawatomie, of faking injuries from a car accident when he was in the Army.
To obtain a 100 percent disability rating, Hay had claimed he needed a walker because he was afflicted with tremors that made him stagger around “like a Frankenstein,” in the description of a VA official who observed him. Hay also said he couldn’t dress or bathe himself…
Federal agents installed a covert camera on a utility pole across from Hay’s house and recorded him driving and hunting, fixing roofs and throwing hay bales on trucks. Over time, the former sergeant hauled more than 1 million pounds of scrap metal.
Eight years passed between the tip and when Hay was finally indicted for fraud. It took another three years to convict him.
At his sentencing, Hay, then 53, complained about the unfairness of the proceedings and called himself “an innocent man” with “a strong moral compass.”
These are just some of the handful of cases where people have been caught and charged. The real question is how many more fraudsters are out there doing the same or maybe something slightly less egregious but still dishonest. And the truth seems to be that we have no idea how common this is, only the bottom line which is that nearly $200 billion a year is going to pay these claims with very little oversight. If ever there was a strong case for DOGE, the VA is it.
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