Walter Reed Kickbacks & Enlisted Disability Payments

Man admits to Walter Reed kickback scheme
Maryland contractor could get 5 years for paying off military official

GREENBELT, Md. - A man has pleaded guilty in federal court to participating in a kickback scheme involving contracts at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
Leon Krachyna Jr., 39, pleaded guilty Friday to conspiracy to bribe a public official and defraud the Army, U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein said.
According to the plea agreement, from June 1999 to March 2002, Krachyna and an unnamed accomplice conspired to give kickbacks to a civilian contract specialist employed by the Army Medical Command. The unnamed official was responsible for procurement for the medical center.
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Officers get more, higher disability ratings

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday Mar 10, 2007 12:06:53 EST

The Army and Marine Corps, which are bearing the brunt of the burden in Iraq and Afghanistan, tend to give their wounded troops lower disability ratings than the Navy and Air Force, according to Defense Department data.
The result: soldiers and Marines receive an average of several hundred dollars per month less in disability retired pay than sailors and airmen.
Break those numbers down a different way, and the system shows another inequity: All services tend to grant officers disability ratings of 50 percent or higher at a significantly greater rate than enlisted members.
Critics say those figures support their contention that the Army, in particular, purposely tries to hold down costs by giving low ratings to enlisted soldiers who far outnumber officers going through the lengthy, convoluted system. See related story.
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Veterans Face Vast Inequities Over Disability

James Webb waited 11 months for benefits and began living on the streets. Now he lives at his parents’ house with his son, Christian.

By IAN URBINA and RON NIXON
WASHINGTON, March 8 — Staff Sgt. Gregory L. Wilson, from the Texas National Guard, waited nearly two years for his veterans’ disability check after he was injured in Iraq. If he had been an active-duty soldier, he would have gotten more help in cutting through the red tape.
Allen Curry of Chicago has fallen behind on his mortgage while waiting nearly two years for his disability check. If he had filed his claim in a state deploying fewer troops than Illinois, Mr. Curry, who was injured by a bomb blast when he was a staff sergeant in the Army Reserve in Iraq, would most likely have been paid sooner and gotten more in benefits.
Veterans face serious inequities in compensation for disabilities depending on where they live and whether they were on active duty or were members of the National Guard or the Reserve, an analysis by The New York Times has found.
Those factors determine whether some soldiers wait nearly twice as long to get benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs as others, and collect less money, according to agency figures.
“The V.A. is supposed to provide uniform and fair treatment to all,” said Steve Robinson, the director of veteran affairs for Veterans for America. “Instead, the places and services giving the most are getting the least.”
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