Showing posts with label homeless in America. Show all posts
Showing posts with label homeless in America. Show all posts

Monday, January 3, 2011

Police Chief forced out after Sanford police officer's son hit homeless man

Sanford police chief forced out the same day cop's son goes to jail, accused of attacking homeless man

By Rene Stutzman, Orlando Sentinel
5:13 p.m. EST, January 3, 2011


There's a new casualty in the case of a Sanford police officer's son who threw a sucker punch that floored a homeless man: retiring Police Chief Brian Tooley.

Sanford's City Commission voted Monday to dismiss Tooley.

He was scheduled to retire Jan. 31, but at a special meeting, commissioners voted to oust him immediately.

As of Tuesday, the department will be headed temporarily by former chief Steve Harriett, who currently works as chief deputy at the Seminole County Sheriff's Office.

Also Monday morning, Acting Chief Capt. Jerry Hargrett admitted at a public meeting that the officer's son, Justin Collison, 21, should have been arrested a month ago, the night he punched the homeless man. Sanford police questioned Collison, put him in the back of a patrol car but did not handcuff or arrest him.

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Sanford police chief forced out

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Dishonorably discharged man posed as homeless veteran

Reading this my knee-jerk reaction was anger. A veteran living on the streets begging for money is more heartbreaking for most people than to see someone else asking for money. We give to charities, like the Salvation Army, never knowing where our money or clothing goes because we just want to help someone with less than we have. We don't know how they ended up homeless, if it was their "fault" or not any more than we care if they are on drugs or drinking because as humans they have basic needs like clothing, shelter, food and to know that someone thinks they are worth helping. When it comes to veterans, most of us look at them differently because they were willing to die for the rest of us. To see them living on the streets after that is heartbreaking. To have someone claim to be a veteran just to get more money makes us wonder if every other person we see begging claiming to be a veteran is really a veteran or not.

Then I finished reading this coming to the part where it says this faker was dishonorably discharged. I wasn't so angry after that. I wondered if he was one of the 26,000 or more discharged under personality disorder instead of taken care of because they had PTSD. This kind of discharge left them without everything. No income, no help from the VA or service organizations, no jobs and no hope. It would be very interesting to find out why he was discharged but I doubt we'll see any reports getting further into this.


POLICE: Beggar posed as veteran


Posted: Dec 29, 2010 10:59 AM

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB Fox 41) -- Police say a homeless man went too far when he impersonated a veteran.

Paul Kaemerer was apprehended by officers Tuesday afternoon when he was seen walking near the I-264 westbound off-ramp to eastbound U.S. 31. A police citation indicates that he was holding a sign that said, "homeless hungry veteran."

When officers asked Kaemerer to prove that he was a veteran, he couldn't do so, according to the report.

Officers quickly became suspicious.

"It is common knowledge that persons will lie about their veteran status to attempt [to] gain additional monies from begging," the citation states.

Police say Kaemerer was disturbing traffic and had previously been warned not to beg for money at that location.

Kaemerer eventually told them that he had been dishonorably discharged from the military and that he was begging for money, police say.

He was charged with misrepresenting his military status, disorderly conduct, standing on a limited-access highway and criminal trespassing.
Beggar posed as veteran

Friday, December 25, 2009

Shepherds still among us as Vietnam vet takes care of the forgotten

Shepherds still among us
By Krista Ramsey • kramsey@enquirer.com • December 25, 2009


Lining the banks of the Ohio River is one of Cincinnati's sadder secrets. People - tucked into cardboard boxes, tents and cobbled-together wooden structures hardly bigger than a doghouse.

There are addicts and felons. There are also mothers and children. Altogether they are a band of lost souls, many of whom - having struggled with the outside world so long - are not looking to be found.

Into this pocket of misery goes Jim Murphy, several times each week. The Vietnam veteran slings a backpack full of milk, baby formula, flashlights, bread onto the back of his wheelchair. He makes his way to the people in need, often getting stuck in the mud along the way.

The riverbank dwellers trust Jim Murphy. They let him into their carefully camouflaged encampment and, more surprisingly, into their lives. He knows who struggles with addiction, and who with mental illness. He has seen a young woman in the last stages of AIDS reunited with her family from California. He has met the 3-week-old baby just born into the "community."
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Shepherds still among us

Thursday, November 13, 2008

New solutions sought as homeless ranks grow

New solutions sought as homeless ranks grow
Gregg Krupa / The Detroit News
DETROIT -- Latrina Medlock knows how a few bad decisions can lead to homelessness.

As she walks the streets of the city pregnant and uncertain of the future, she says she knows that handling money and opportunities a bit differently in her life would have saved her from dire straits.

"Bad decision-making caused me to get in the situation I am now," said Medlock, who is one of a growing number of pregnant women and families left homeless in Metro Detroit as the economy shrivels. Being "homeless is not pleasant," she says. "I just make it day by day."

As state officials, along with more than 5,000 social workers, charities and the poor gather at Cobo Center for a major conference on poverty Thursday, a national and worldwide recession threatens to burst the seams of the social safety net in Michigan, where the economy soured earlier in the decade. The recipients and providers of social services, who normally grapple with solutions for poverty in good times, will gather to hammer out a new, concerted approach to fighting rising levels of poverty as more workers and their families are exposed to dire circumstances.
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http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081113/METRO/811130414
Linked from RawStory