We first wrote about David Stump a year ago last August when he was first buried in a Chicago area cemetery. His obituary said that he made about 50 parachute jumps behind enemy lines in Vietnam. Anyone with a passing knowledge of that war knows that there were no enemy lines to jump behind.
Well, it seems that the Department of Veterans’ Affairs arrived at the same conclusions that we did over a year ago and since the family couldn’t justify the Bronze Star Medal and three Purple Hearts listed on his head stone, there’ll be a new stone placed according to the Chicago Tribune;
Cemetery officials gave the family about four months to provide documents supporting the Bronze Star and Purple Hearts. The family showed a Tribune reporter yellowing documents, but they never provided clear evidence to satisfy officials at the federal cemetery.
“I find all this awful hard to believe,” said Stump’s widow, Geri. “Where would he get these records from?”
But stolen valor is a victimless crime, well except for the family whose last memory of their departed father and husband is the fact that he was a liar most of his life.
Looks like a grave I need to piss on.
You are fast, Jonn, it was just published in the paper this morning. After the Headstone gets replaced I intend to take another picture so it can be posted along side of the false one. I’ll keep you posted.
I sent you the original picture and Obituary to post.
Great work to all involved. especially Chuck and Mary at POWNETWORK.
Well Done.
Don
That really is a very nasty thing to do to your family.
Stolen Valor, the gift that keeps on taking … even after death
Not the first to be buried under a lying tombstone and certainly not the last.
http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM6FRK_Thomas_J_Stowers_Sole_Survivor_of_Custers_Last_Stand
I owe an appology to a friend of mine that helped a great deal on the David L. Stump case.
Without his help and guidance this would never have come to this conclusion.
He did a lot of the contact work with the NPRC and the
U.S. Army from whom he finally got them to release the real
DD-214’s for Stump.
Where others told me to just forget about it, that there was nothing we could do, as Stump was dead, he continued on with me, I owe him a big thank you for helping.
Ben Drake was the driving force that continued on with me to right the wrong that we both saw with this project.
Thank you.
Don
I didn’t know that you could etch Bronze Star medals on veterans’ headstones. I suppose we should have requested that for my Dad. Oh bother…
It looks like my brother &/or the military cemeteryy was on the ball & had everything covered. As you were, carry on….