{"id":35434,"date":"2013-05-03T16:38:44","date_gmt":"2013-05-03T20:38:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=35434"},"modified":"2013-05-03T16:39:43","modified_gmt":"2013-05-03T20:39:43","slug":"pts-doesnt-make-vets-thieves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=35434","title":{"rendered":"PTS doesn’t make vets thieves"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser<\/a> reports that Iraq War veteran Brittany A. Taft has been sentenced for stealing the identities and GI Bill benefits from her friends to the tune of $18,000. Of course, in a round-about way, the journalist blames PTS;<\/p>\n

An Iraq War veteran suffering the effects of post-traumatic stress disorder and a traumatic brain injury will have to spend three months in jail followed by three months of electronically monitored home confinement…<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Taft pleaded guilty to mail fraud in January and admitted that she applied for and received $3,000 Post-9\/11 GI Bill advance payment checks for each of her victims at her home in Wai\u00adpahu in November and December 2009. She then cashed or deposited the checks into her own bank account using false power of attorney forms she prepared in her victims’ names.<\/p>\n

Federal prosecutor Lawrence Tong said Taft obtained a document containing the names, Social Security numbers and birth dates of fellow soldiers from a roommate and personally knew two of her victims. He said some of the victims lost their benefits because of Taft’s actions, one had a tax refund check withheld by the IRS and another was forced to pay back the $3,000 to clear the debt.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Supposedly, Taft hit her head on the steering wheel of the HMMV she was driving when an IED went off near the vehicle in front of here and she was knocked unconscious briefly and then drove herself and other wounded soldiers to the aid station. <\/p>\n

Taft later learned she suffered a traumatic brain injury.<\/p>\n

In addition to the PTSD and brain injury, Taft said she also suffers from attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But I just want to make it clear that PTS and TBI doesn’t turn veterans into devious criminals. It sounds to me like Taft would have committed this crime without banging her head on the steering wheel. I know mentioning PTS explains the whole thing to journalists and most civilians who want to think of veterans as time bombs ticking away just one honking horn away from committing a crime, but, no, sorry, millions of veterans who suffer from PTS didn’t rip off their room mates today.<\/p>\n

The story is also linked at Stars & Stripes<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports that Iraq War veteran Brittany A. Taft has been sentenced for stealing … PTS doesn’t make vets thieves<\/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":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-veterans-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35434","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=35434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35434\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}