From the Washington Post:
Kinsley Kilpatrick put on a convincing show.
During visits to Atlanta VA Medical Center, the Iraq War veteran arrived in a wheelchair, claiming multiple sclerosis had paralyzed his arms and legs. By the time he turned 35, the onetime athlete said he could barely move from the neck down, leaving him dependent on others to eat, dress and bathe, according to court records.
Obligated to help a former soldier in need, the Department of Veterans Affairs began paying Kilpatrick $7,900 a month in tax-free disability benefits in 2015, the records show. The federal government also gave him $20,000 for a specially equipped Jeep Cherokee to make it easier for his wife to take him to medical appointments.
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The hoax lasted for three years and might have continued indefinitely, if not for a whistleblower who sent VA proof that Kilpatrick was lying: videos of the Army veteran backflipping on a trampoline, prancing around a sports field like a ballerina and swan diving into a playground ball pit. ...
Why would I be posting this story about VA on the Social Security News blog? This sort of story gets planted when you want to cut a program. You could easily get the Post to do a similar article about Social Security disability and use it to justify making it harder to get on disability benefits and to stay on them. In fact, I imagine that's coming.
I can't say how common fraud is at VA but I'm sure that a few vets caught faking it doesn't mean that the program has lax standards. There must be well over a million vets drawing VA benefits. It's inevitable that there will be at least a few crooks among them. Coming up with a few cases like this one prove nothing about the overall program but can sway many members of the public and members of Congress.
11 comments:
Considering that people voted the a$$clowns to lead the country, I wouldn’t put anything past them. There are people that are extreme, stupid and extremely stupid out there, sad times.
I acknowledge your premise, Charles, but there does appear to be an increase of potential clients receiving 100% permanent and total VA disability that I turn down for SSD representation. I wouldn't call it fraud, but the qualifications seem to have been relaxed. I speak with more vets now in their 30's and 40's with a combo of health issues getting 100% P&T that would likely not lead to a finding of less than sedentary work and a finding of disability in an SSD case.
I do not have a problem with the VA having lax standards of disability.
I do, however, have a problem with 100% P&T claimants getting critical case status with SSA and moving to the front of the line when the medical evidence quite often shows few to no abnormalities.
I read the entire lengthy article and found it instructive in the issue of, yes, lax administrative standards.
“The basis for the whole program really is based upon the forthrightness of the veteran and his or her telling us the truth about something, because we assume that they’re telling us the truth,” said Dean Holtzman, the deputy chief of the Veterans Service Center in Louisville.
“It’s a very pro-claimant system. Nobody likes taking money away,” Holtzman said. “We’re not Big Brother. We don’t look over people’s shoulders.”
"The Veterans Benefits Administration, the arm of VA that oversees disability payments, has a dedicated fraud team. But according to agency documents, the fraud unit is relatively small and spends most of its time investigating external scams targeting veterans, not ones committed by them."
The many cases cited were egregious and yes should not damn the entire program but reflect poor oversight no matter how you parse it. Provides opponents of assistance all the ammunition they need to attack current systems.
$7,900 a month in tax free disability payments? How is that possible he’s making gs14 pay
The article says that Kilpatrick was receiving $7,900 is benefits in 2015. According to the VA, someone with a 100% SC Disability with a spouse, two parents who qualify a dependents and a child would in 2025 would be $4,544.23 plus an extra $106.14 for each other dependent child. Unless I'm missing something, perhaps a separate military pension or even SS benefits, the number don't add up.
Am I missing something or is this just sloppy reporting?
EVERY SINGLE VA case I see has the claimant getting paid for PTSD. Every one of them. Cuz, you know, they say they have PTSD, even though the substantiating background to prove the PTSD never seems to make it into the file. Then we pay them for PTSD on top of the VA paying them for PTSD.
The gnashing of teeth (and dare I say gatekeeping) over PTSD is so overblown. If the medical evidence does not show a disabling mental impairment, the claimant isn't going to be approved for Social Security benefits for a disabling mental impairment. There is not a single shred of agency guidance that suggests that we give any deference at all to PTSD diagnoses. PTSD cases don't get their own sequential evaluation or special rules. Just follow the dang evidence.
I'm surprised DOGE didn't hire people to follow disabled people around to catch them in lies about their conditions. Considering the administration, however, I'm glad they didn't. A simple walk to the store for a person with a mental disability would certainly result in being cut off. 🙄 I wouldn't put it past DOGE to do anything to prove fraud/abuse.
DOGE didn't have to hire people to do this because there are already Cooperative Disability Investigation Units that do this.
“… doesn't mean that the program has lax standards.”
Tell me you’re not familiar with VA standards without telling me you’re not familiar with VA standards. It’s certainly not fraud most of the time, but the way the VA cleared their backlog 10-15 years ago wasn’t applying strict standards. Their program is incredibly deferential to subjective allegations of vets even in the absence of supporting evidence. It’s written in the statute.
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