{"id":34666,"date":"2013-03-21T10:01:59","date_gmt":"2013-03-21T14:01:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=34666"},"modified":"2013-03-21T10:01:59","modified_gmt":"2013-03-21T14:01:59","slug":"stolen-valor-creep-in-md-dva","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=34666","title":{"rendered":"Stolen Valor creep in MD DVA"},"content":{"rendered":"

MCPO Ret. In TN sends us a link to an article in the Baltimore Sun<\/a> which tells the tale of David Clark, formerly the deputy chief of claims at the Maryland Department of Veterans’ Affairs who used his position to get higher payouts for his friends and then took kickbacks from them. In addition, he helped them get credit for service and awards they never had, as well as padding his own resume`.<\/p>\n

He saved some of his best work for himself, prosecutors say, claiming that he had been awarded medals including the Air Medal, Army Commendation Medal, Republic of Vietnam Gallant Cross and the National Service Defense Medal. He allegedly received benefits and waivers worth $153,633 between 1995 and 2012.<\/p>\n

Clark is charged with wire fraud alongside eight other veterans, for whom he is accused of securing the benefits. Neither Clark nor his attorney could be reached for comment, and no court dates have been set in the case.<\/p>\n

Phil Munley, the director of the Veterans Service and Benefits Program at the Maryland veterans department, said the agency conducted an investigation after learning of the allegations about Clark last spring.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yeah, but folks are stacked up waiting on legitimate claims to be approved.<\/p>\n

Joe Moore, a partner at Bergmann & Moore, a law firm that represents veterans making claims, said the department’s outdated systems make it more difficult to catch schemes like the one in which Clark is accused.<\/p>\n

“It’s the kind of thing that if the VA were not 10 years behind the rest of the government, forget about the private economy … just would never have happened,” he said.<\/p>\n

The charges stem from a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs inspector general’s investigation, which reported that it pursued 21 cases of fraudulent benefits claims in the most recent fiscal year, and Moore said he’s seen other cases like Clark’s.<\/p>\n

“It goes on a lot where local guys like him take money on the side,” he added.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While the rest of us sit and wait patiently.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MCPO Ret. In TN sends us a link to an article in the Baltimore Sun which … Stolen Valor creep in MD DVA<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-phony-soldiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34666\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}