GI Denied Care After Speaking Out

[kskiska]

WASHINGTON - An Operation Iraqi Freedom veteran says Army officials at Fort Knox, Ky., refused him medical treatment after he talked publicly about poor care at the base, which helped spark hearings in Congress.

Fort Knox officials charged that soldier, Lt. Jullian Goodrum, with being absent without leave and cut off his pay after he then went to a private doctor who hospitalized him for serious mental stress from Iraq, Goodrum said.

"They are coming after me pretty bad," said Goodrum, 33, a veteran who has served the military for more than 14 years, including the first Gulf War and Operation Iraqi Freedom.

He showed United Press International a form from Fort Knox that states that Fort Knox officials "do not want him in medical hold." Some soldiers are kept on medical hold during treatment while the Army determines their status.

Goodrum has now been hospitalized in a locked mental ward at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. after turning himself in there Feb. 9. Doctors there say he has post-traumatic stress disorder from Iraq and major depression, and they worry he could hurt himself. He is not allowed to go down the hall from the inpatient psychiatric clinic for a Coke without an escort.

more…
http://www.military.com/Content/Printer_Friendly_Version/1,11491,,00.html?str_filename=FL%5Fdenied%5F030304&passfile=FL%5Fdenied%5F030304&page_url=%2FNewsContent%2F0%2C13319%2CFL%5Fdenied%5F030304%2C00%2Ehtml

[saigon68]

1. Your benefits at work

Re-up for the bennies

[Cooley Hurd]

2. Where in the Pentagon does this shit come from?

It's no secret the DoD has always been highly political when it comes to internal criticism, but given the track record of the Bush admin on how it treats dissent in general, it wouldn't surprise me if this came from Rummy or Wolfowitz directly...

<on spellcheck, Wolfowitz comes up as "halfwits" :D Cool, huh?>

[littlejoe]

3. Isn't this just like the government? Use them all up, then dump them.

[proud patriot]

4. This steams me

:grr:

Vote bush out and support Veterans

[zbdent]

5. Wasn't an Anti-Clinton military person paraded about as a "true patriot"

by the Repubs in the 90s? After being reprimanded for speaking out against his C-in-C?

[Mari333]

6. when my stepson gets out of that quagmire

and if he comes home severely insane, I will have
a lawyer
a mental health professional
a vet group
waiting for him
and you better believe Ill make waves if he comes back screwed up from this bloodbath.

[damnraddem]

7. He made a big mistake:

he was only 'AWOL' for hospitalization. He should have been absent for a year, instead, and worked on a GOP senatorial campaign. Why can't a soldier manage to follow the example of his commander in theif?

[dArKeR]

8. This would be a good recruitment ad.

[bemildred]

9. An interesting contrast with Abizaid begging them to stay. nt

[w4rma]

10. Vindictive, anti-veteran, anti-first amendment SOBs (n/t)

[mbperrin]

11. Wow! Look at that *Bush administration

support the troops!