Sunday, October 11, 2009

2 Dead 19 taken to hospital in "sweat lodge" tragedy

Lodge Victim Was in Shape, Family Says
By FELICIA FONSECA, AP

PHOENIX (Oct. 10) -- A 38-year-old New York woman who died after sitting in a sauna-like sweat lodge at a scenic Arizona resort was an avid surfer and hiker who was "in top shape," took self-improvement seriously and had a passion for art, a family spokesman said.

Kirby Brown of Westtown, N.Y., was one of two people who died Thursday evening after being overcome in the crudely built hut during a spiritual cleansing ceremony. Authorities on Saturday identified the other victim as 40-year-old James Shore of Milwaukee, who served as director of business development at an Internet marketing company in his hometown.

Nineteen other people were taken to hospitals, suffering from burns, dehydration, respiratory arrest, kidney failure or elevated body temperature. Most were soon released, but one remained in critical condition Saturday.

Brown had no pre-existing health conditions that would have kept her from participating in an otherwise safe activity, said cousin and family spokesman Tom McFeeley. That two people died and 19 others became ill at the Angel Valley Retreat Center indicates that "something went horribly wrong."
go here for more
Lodge Victim Was in Shape, Family Says

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Victims trapped in domestic violence

E.V. victims trapped in domestic violence
Sonu Munshi, Tribune

October 8, 2009

The 27-year-old woman could have continued endlessly the constant war of words with her longtime boyfriend. But his physical punches, blows and beatings - especially in front of her three young sons - wore her down.

"We'd keep arguing," she said. "He thought I was talking to guys, looking at guys, but he was just jealous for no reason."

His insecurity led to nights when he'd punch her in the back of the head, even as she held her baby in her arms.

"Boom, boom, boom, he hit me, for wearing tight clothes," she remembers. She'd get kicked in her legs and on her sides "as hard as kicking a football for a field goal." Then, after months of abuse, one night she got choked so bad, she couldn't speak, felt the room spin around her and staggered about in a daze.

"My chest hurt, my sides hurt, my throat was out of control and I just told myself 'I cannot do it anymore,'" she said, choking up as she recalled her 8-year-old son's insistence on staying away from his dad.

That was the moment she decided she had to get out. She had nothing on her, not even her purse, but a kindly woman saw the mother and her children wandering by themselves and gave them shelter for the night. The next day, she called A New Leaf's Autumn House, a Mesa domestic violence shelter, which took her in a month ago.
read more herehttp://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/145575

Brain injuries plague returning veterans

Brain injuries plague returning veterans

Andre Bowser, Tribune

October 10, 2009 - 3:17PM

When the dust cleared, after an improvised explosive device ripped through a military patrol vehicle on a road in Iraq, one East Valley soldier’s only thought was to save his fallen comrade, even as he slipped in and out of consciousness.

The fallen comrade was a Marine who had lost his arm after the vehicle triggered an explosive-laden booby trap.

U.S. Navy Hospital Corpsman Kevin Ivory, meanwhile, suffered injuries to his brain, which were unseen and apparently not as urgent as the fallen Marine’s wounds during that 2006 incident.

Like many veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan plagued by injuries that can’t be seen by the naked eye, Ivory today receives care locally for his traumatic brain injuries, or TBI.
read more here
http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/145654

If you love them, talk to them

by Chaplain Kathie

What's stopping you from talking about what is inside of you? Do you think someone you care about will think differently of you if they knew? Too late, they already think differently of you but not the way you deserve them to. They are thinking either you don't love them anymore or, you changed into a jerk they don't know anymore.

Are you thinking they will think you are weak? Too late on that one too because while they could be seeing the strength you have inside, they are seeing you reach for another drink, another pill, another joint. They see you running away from them and trying to run away from yourself. You are really not fooling anyone the way you think you are.

They loved you when before you began to hurt inside and you are still the same person. Let them know you are in pain. Let them know where the pain is coming from. Let them know you need their help and understanding. You didn't change but the events you lived through ended up changing how you are feeling toward every aspect of your life.

When you become a veteran, you are not like anyone else. You did not do a job like anyone else. As a matter of fact, you are very rare. Over three hundred million people in this country and there are less than 30 million veterans. When you become a police officer, you are rare, just as you are when you become a firefighter. Emergency responders and National Guards, all rare. Do you expect to react to any part of life the same as anyone else does? Your perception of every aspect of life is no longer the same. Add in when you have PTSD and need help, then you know how important it is to speak up, speak out and be helped up to heal.

If you trusted them before you ended up with PTSD, you need to trust them now. Talk to them and tell them you are hurting.

The other problem is when there is an event with well meaning people, out of a good time. They may care about veterans, may want to know what is really going on, but no one knows what to do, how to start a conversation. For those who are really interested, usually they have someone in their own family needing help because the rest are just there to have a good time.

Most service groups are made up of different types of people. Some of them just go for fellowship, others go to become a part of something bigger than themselves. Each group needs to have some people of courage within them, able to listen when someone needs to talk. It isn't that hard to listen. You just need to care first and the rest comes. You begin to look to understand better, find answers and learn more so you can help them. This way, you will also be able to help other veterans. The key is listening when someone wants to talk, being for them, hearing them, instead of judging them. We can take care of a lot more people if we are only willing to talk, take down the emotional walls and others are ready to listen.

Man strangles pet rat, grabs wife after she smokes last cigarette

I quit a month ago and while it's still very hard, this story really goes over the top.

Rats, no smokes! Man strangles pet rat, grabs wife after she smokes last cigarette

From Staff and Wire Reports

3:35 p.m. EDT, October 10, 2009


Rats, no smokes!

What did a 22-year-old man do when he found out his wife used the last cigarette? Open a pack? Buy a pack?

No, Volusia County authorities say.

Records show Darren Daniels of DeLand became angry, bashed and strangled a pet white rat and grabbed his 20-year-old wife during a confrontation early Thursday.
read more hereMan strangles pet rat, grabs wife after she smokes last cigarette

Friday, October 9, 2009

Jacksonville woman found dead in home under 8 feet of trash

Woman found dead in home under 8 feet of trash

By Associated Press Watch the story JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) - Authorities have found the body of a 71-year-old woman after wading through a Jacksonville, Florida home filled with garbage piled eight feet high.

The Florida Times-Union reports that officers were checking on Carina E. Decampo late Tuesday, after worried family members called to say they hadn't heard from her in weeks.

They were met with what police called "unbelievable squalor" and a stench that made officers ill.

After trying to search for about 20 minutes, they had to call in help.

The fire department arrived, using breathing gear and search dogs to find Decampo.

No cause of death was immediately released.
go here for video
found dead in home under 8 feet of trash

Woman dies after shooting in Winter Springs a day before wedding

Woman dies after shooting in Winter Springs -- a day before wedding

Rene Stutzman and Willoughby Mariano

Sentinel Staff Writers

4:29 p.m. EDT, October 9, 2009
WINTER SPRINGS - A 62-year-old woman died after a shooting at her home before dawn today -- one day before she was to get married.

Killed was Nancy Lynne Dinsmore, a retiree who lived at the house with John J. Tabbutt, her husband-to-be, also 62.

They were to be married Saturday at St. Stephen Catholic Church in Winter Springs, according to friends and family.

It was to be a small ceremony, said Dinsmore's son-in-law, Scott Sposato, 39, of Vero Beach. It was to include mostly family, he said.

"They loved each other. It was quite apparent," he said.

Dinsmore and Tabbutt had lived together for about a year, he said, but had known each other for much longer. The couple has a summer home in Maine and had recently returned from there to Tabbutt's gray-and-white stucco home near Tuscawilla, he said.
read more here
Woman dies after shooting in Winter Springs

American troops in Afghanistan losing heart, say army chaplains

So what is the answer now? Leave? Then what is left behind? Stay? What is the end goal? I don't know the answers but I do know the fact remains more of our troops end up wounded by body and mind increasing the need of those who need care. More will die increasing the need of families trying to cope. More has to be done for them when they are back at home or there won't be enough to send anywhere.

October 8, 2009

American troops in Afghanistan losing heart, say army chaplains
Martin Fletcher at Forward Operating Base in Wardak province

Picture: Peter Nicholls
American soldiers serving in Afghanistan are depressed and deeply disillusioned, according to the chaplains of two US battalions that have spent nine months on the front line in the war against the Taleban.

Many feel that they are risking their lives — and that colleagues have died — for a futile mission and an Afghan population that does nothing to help them, the chaplains told The Times in their makeshift chapel on this fortress-like base in a dusty, brown valley southwest of Kabul.

“The many soldiers who come to see us have a sense of futility and anger about being here. They are really in a state of depression and despair and just want to get back to their families,” said Captain Jeff Masengale, of the 10th Mountain Division’s 2-87 Infantry Battalion.

“They feel they are risking their lives for progress that’s hard to discern,” said Captain Sam Rico, of the Division’s 4-25 Field Artillery Battalion. “They are tired, strained, confused and just want to get through.” The chaplains said that they were speaking out because the men could not.
read more here
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/Afghanistan/article6865359.ece

Another suicide from Cold Spring bridge makes 5 for year

Another suicide from Cold Spring bridge

Staff report Posted: Thursday, October 8, 2009 4:55 pm
A Santa Paula woman died early this morning after she jumped from the Cold Spring Canyon Bridge on Highway 154 in the Santa Ynez Valley, said Drew Sugars, spokesman for the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department.

The woman has been identified as Nancy Bright, 59.
Today's death at the bridge marks there second apparent suicide at the Cold Spring Canyon Bridge in just over a week, and the fifth suicide at the bridge for the year, according to Sugars.

On Sept. 30, 28-year-old Robert Silva of Santa Barbara apparently jumped off the bridge to his death.

Earlier in the day on Sept. 30, deputies were able to convince a person not to jump off the bridge, Sugars said.
Another suicide from Cold Spring bridge

Civilian therapists urged to get training in PTSD and TBI

Start in the right direction but they are still not hiring people already trained when they are needed the most.

Civilian therapists urged to get training in veterans' needs
Knowledge is vital for civilians practicing in small towns, official says
By Will Higgins
Posted: October 9, 2009
A top Indiana National Guard mental health professional reached out Thursday to civilian mental health workers and urged them to learn more about returning soldiers' common afflictions so they could counsel them.

"We need more therapists trained in PTSD and TBI," Sydney H. Davidson, director of psychological health for the Indiana National Guard, told a gathering of nearly 100 managers of the Indiana Council of Community Mental Health Centers in Indianapolis.

Post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury often make for rocky transitions for veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. Nearly one in five returning veterans suffers from one or the other, or both.

So far, a handful of community mental health organizations have trained staffers to treat returning vets.

Last spring, Four County Counseling Center in Logansport received an $85,000 grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration to better serve veterans in four Northern Indiana counties. Four of the group's 25 therapists have received training in PTSD and TBI, with six more scheduled for training later this year.
read more hereCivilian therapists urged to get training

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Gun-toting soccer mom, husband shot dead

UPDATE
Cops: Soccer mom shot during webcam chat
A Pennsylvania soccer mom was chatting with a friend via webcam when she was shot to death by her husband, who then went upstairs and shot himself, police said Friday. Meleanie Hain, 31, made national headlines last year as the mother who carried a loaded, holstered handgun to her 5-year-old daughter's soccer game. full story

Gun-toting soccer mom, husband shot dead
Story Highlights
Melanie and Scott Hain shot to death in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, home

Melanie Hain brought loaded gun to daughter's soccer game in 2008

Police are avoiding calling Wednesday night shooting a murder-suicide

Their three children are unharmed and in neighbor's care
By Edmund DeMarche
CNN

(CNN) -- Soccer mom Melanie Hain, who made national headlines last year by having a loaded, holstered handgun at her 5-year-old daughter's soccer game, has been found shot dead in her home along with her husband, police said Thursday.

Information from 911 calls shows that it took a SWAT team nearly an hour and a half to gain entry to the Lebanon, Pennsylvania, home Wednesday evening. Inside, they found the bodies of Hain, 31, and her husband, Scott, 33, police Capt. Daniel Wright said.

Police have avoided labeling the incident a murder-suicide. However, they do not believe that another person was involved, Wright said. A full investigation is under way, he added.

"Who [Melanie Hain] is does not change the course of this investigation," he said. The autopsies are scheduled for Friday.
read more here
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/10/08/gun.soccer.mom.dead/index.html

Army investigating 14 possible Sept. suicides

Army investigating 14 possible Sept. suicides

By Michelle Tan - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Oct 8, 2009 20:16:56 EDT

As many as 14 soldiers are believed to have killed themselves in September, three fewer than the month before, the Defense Department announced Thursday.

Of the 14 deaths, seven were active-duty soldiers. So far, one has been confirmed to be a suicide, and the other six remain under investigation.

The other seven deaths were among reserve component soldiers who were not on active duty at the time of their deaths. All the cases are still pending a determination.

Army officials have said that 90 percent of pending cases typically are ruled to be suicides.

In August, as many as 17 soldiers –— 11 of them active duty — were reported to have committed suicide. Since those numbers were first announced, four of the 11 active-duty deaths have been confirmed to be suicides.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/army_suicides_100809w/

U.S. military challenges Marine's story of PTSD

There is a problem with this because you do not have to kill someone to end up with PTSD and you do not have to even see someone die to end up with PTSD. This is a fact and you need only visit a neighborhood after a natural disaster to find that out. There has also been a history of veterans after they worked in the motor pool after bombs have blown up ending up with PTSD, just as there has been other people never in combat with PTSD.

U.S. military challenges Marine's story of PTSD
by Elizabeth Dunbar, Minnesota Public Radio
October 8, 2009


St. Paul, Minn. — Military officials released a statement Thursday saying a Minnesota Marine diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder never engaged in combat while deployed to Iraq.

Pvt. Travis Hafterson's mother, Jamie Hafterson, has spoken publicly about her son's diagnosis and raised questions about whether he will receive adequate treatment at Camp Lejeune, N.C. Her son, who went AWOL, turned himself in to Fort Snelling last week before going to the Marine base.

Based on medical assessments in Minnesota, a judge had ordered Hafterson to be committed to Regions Hospital in St. Paul for treatment of his mental illness. Instead, the military held Hafterson at Fort Snelling before taking him to Camp Lejeune.

Jamie Hafterson has said her son's PTSD is linked to serving two tours in Iraq, where she said he killed people and saw a suicide bomb seriously injure other Marines.

But on Thursday, Marine Maj. Kelly Frushour said a Marine Corps investigation on the matter showed Hafterson did not witness the bombing that injured a lieutenant in his command and did not engage in any combat while deployed. Frushour also said Hafterson did not kill anyone or even fire his weapon.
read more here
U.S. military challenges Marines story of PTSD

Family wants answers after Ohio soldier's suicide

Family wants answers after Ohio soldier's suicide
By JOHN SEEWER (AP) – 6 hours ago

WILLARD, Ohio — Just about everyone in Keiffer Wilhelm's life — his father, his brother, his best friends — had worn a military uniform or grew up around someone who did.

So when he decided that was his best option too, he heard plenty of advice about surviving boot camp and beyond. He ended up liking the Army so much, he wanted to make it a career. He even volunteered to join another unit so he could speed up his departure to Iraq.

Just days after arriving, everything changed.

Now his family and his friends want to know what happened in Iraq that pushed the gentle, playful 19-year-old to kill himself two months ago. His final desperate act, they say, doesn't fit with the young man who grew up in a proud military family and always wanted to please everyone.

They hope to get some answers on Friday when two soldiers who served with Wilhelm in Iraq are expected to appear at a military hearing similar to a civilian grand jury. They have been charged with cruelty and maltreatment related to Wilhelm and at least two others. Two more soldiers also have been charged and are scheduled to appear at hearings next week.

Military investigators say Wilhelm had been a target of the four soldiers, who were mistreating some of the men in their platoon. But they also concluded the alleged misconduct didn't cause Wilhelm's death.


read more here
Family wants answers after Ohio soldiers suicide

Pvt. Terrance Hilton flees federal escort in Colo

UPDATE
Suspected AWOL private from Carson arrested

The Associated Press
Posted : Sunday Oct 11, 2009 12:13:31 EDT

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. — Mesa County deputies arrested a 20-year-old private suspected of being AWOL.

Authorities say Pvt. Terrance Hilton had escaped a federal escort at Denver International Airport Wednesday while he was being transferred in handcuffs from Salt Lake City to Colorado Springs. Officials searched for him at the airport for about an hour.
go here for more
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_awol_101109/



AWOL suspect flees federal escort in Colo.

The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Oct 7, 2009 20:52:26 EDT

DENVER — Authorities say a soldier suspected of being AWOL is again at large after escaping from a federal escort at the Denver airport.

Denver police say the handcuffed man was being transferred from Salt Lake City to Colorado Springs via Denver on Wednesday when he ran from his escort on Concourse B at Denver International Airport.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_army_awol_suspect_100709/

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

House panel votes to overturn Feres doctrine

House panel votes to overturn Feres doctrine

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Oct 7, 2009 17:42:11 EDT

A bill that would overturn a 59-year-old Supreme Court decision that bars service members from suing the government for peacetime medical malpractice narrowly passed a House Judiciary Committee vote Wednesday and now will be considered by the entire House.

The Carmelo Rodriguez Military Medical Accountability Act, sponsored by Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y., and Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., is named for a Marine Corps sergeant who died in 2007 at age 29 from melanoma. The condition was correctly diagnosed 10 years earlier, but the doctor failed to tell Rodriguez or refer him for treatment. Years later, another military doctor said the growth was a birthmark.

The Rodriguez family could find no relief in the courts. A 1950 Supreme Court decision that became known as the Feres doctrine prohobits active-duty members from holding the government accountable for medical negligence.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_feres_overturn_100709w/

Tony Fein Iraq vet cut by NFL’s Ravens found dead

Iraq vet cut by NFL’s Ravens found dead

By Tim Klass - The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Oct 7, 2009 20:28:17 EDT

SEATTLE — Tony Fein, an Iraq war veteran and NFL rookie linebacker who played with the Baltimore Ravens during the preseason, has died of unexplained causes after collapsing at a friend’s house in what his agent said appears to be “an accidental situation.”

Fein, 27, an undrafted rookie free agent from Mississippi, was lying face down and unconscious, vomiting and barely breathing when medics arrived at a house outside Port Orchard on the Kitsap Peninsula on Tuesday morning, said Mike Wernet, a battalion chief and medical officer with South Kitsap Fire & Rescue.

A man and woman who were present described Fein as a friend who was staying with them. They told the aid crew they awoke to find him unresponsive and vomiting.

“They didn’t really give us a lot of information about what had happened the night before,” apparently because they were upset, Wernet said. “They didn’t indicate anything out of the ordinary.”
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_army_vet_ravens_dies_100709/

Canyon County Paramedic ex-employee killed by door

Woman killed by garage door made fake 911 call

By KBCI Staff & Associated Press CALDWELL, Idaho -- An Idaho woman who died after being pinned under a garage door at the paramedic building where she used to work first lured emergency workers away with a fake 911 call.

Caldwell Police say Melissa Farris, 35, died when authorities found her pinned under the garage door at the Canyon County Paramedic building last week.

Farris identified herself as Stacy in the 911 call and reported a crash on Interstate 84.

"My name is Stacy and I'm driving toward Ontario and a car went off the median at mile marker 22," Farris says. "I'm trying to stop...go back and see if they need help." (Listen to the 911 call)

Authorities say they could not find any accident on the highway.
read more here
http://www.komonews.com/news/local/63672377.html

DOD issues list of fallen in Afghanistan

News
10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (8 of 8)
Pfc. Kevin C. Thomson, 22, of Reno, Nev...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (7 of 8)
Spc. Stephan L. Mace, 21, of Lovettsville, Va...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (6 of 8)
Spc. Christopher T. Griffin, 24, of Kincheloe, Mich...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (5 of 8)
Sgt. Michael P. Scusa, 22, of Villas, N.J...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.

10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (4 of 8)
Sgt. Joshua J. Kirk, 30, of South Portland, Maine...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (3 of 8)
Sgt. Joshua M. Hardt, 24, of Applegate, Calif...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (2 of 8)
Sgt. Justin T. Gallegos, 27, of Tucson, Ariz...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualties Identified (1 of 8)
Staff Sgt. Vernon W. Martin, 25 of Savannah, Ga...died Oct. 3 in Kamdesh, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked their contingency outpost with small arms, rocket-propelled grenade and indirect fires.


10/07/09 DoD: Army Casualty Identified
Spc. Kevin O. Hill, 23, of Brooklyn, N.Y., died Oct. 4 at Contingency Outpost Dehanna, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit using small arms and indirect fires. He was assigned to the 576th Mobility Augmentation Company, Fort Carson,

http://www.icasualties.org/OEF/index.aspx

The price of ignoring the oracle

In ancient times oracles were sought out and listened to. Anything important enough to wonder about, was important enough to know about.


oracle
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French, from Latin oraculum, from orare to speak - More at - oration
Date: 15th century
Results

1 a. 1 aa person (as a priestess of ancient Greece) through whom a deity is believed to speakb. ba shrine in which a deity reveals hidden knowledge or the divine purpose through such a personc. can answer or decision given by an oracle

2 a. 2 aa person giving wise or authoritative decisions or opinionsb. ban authoritative or wise expression or answer


People often regretted ignoring the wise council of the oracle. Just as now this nation is filled with people scratching their heads wondering what to do about PTSD, pretending they have been inventing the answers only to find out none of them really work.

The problem is, the oracles in this case have not only lived in the past, they see clearly where it is all leading to today because nothing has changed. Mistakes will be repeated with deadly consequences. People will still search and a few of them will snag some media attention as if they are the only people on the planet paying attention to PTSD, but that's because the reporters just don't have a clue about what they have refused to listen to all along. Give me an oracle if you really want answers because finding out that the answers have been there all along, will leave a lot of people really, really pissed off no one told them.

The BBC did a report a few years about with our troops in Afghansitan talking about how little time they had to understand PTSD. The subject back then was Battlemind. No one is really doing anything if there are any colonels still out there saying they didn't have any training at all. Give this, looks as if my worst fears have been brought to life. The people with the power to listen wouldn't. The people who sought advice, did but had no power to make the changes.


PTSD: An Army colonel’s quest for answers

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Oct 7, 2009 14:51:58 EDT

Army Col. Rich O’Connor does not mince words when he talks about the amount of mental health training he had before he took a squadron in the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment to war in Iraq’s Diyalah province in 2006.

“What kind of training did I receive on post-traumatic stress?” he said. “Zero. How much did our soldiers receive? None.”

O’Connor told a room of high-ranking officers and enlisted soldiers at the annual Association of the U.S. Army convention that he was too busy training for war to even think about post-traumatic stress disorder. And he said that after talking to other battalion commanders and command sergeants major, he realized nobody else had, either.

Then a military psychiatrist told him she didn’t believe commanders cared about PTSD.

“I can tell you that’s probably true,” O’Connor said. “We’ve got an issue here.”

As he returned from the battlefield, more and more of his men were diagnosed with PTSD, and he began to wonder if he was doing enough for them. The issue struck even closer to home when his son, Pfc. Ryan O’Connor, was diagnosed with PTSD and a traumatic brain injury after serving in Iraq during the same time period as his father.

He realized people needed to be educated about the issue, and he began with himself. He decided to write a paper about the history of PTSD, its definition, how soldiers see the issue, what therapists believe needs to be done, what research has shown and what needs to happen next.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_ausa_ptsd_100709w/



The problem is they also didn't listen to the people I listened to in the beginning.
Aphrodite Matsakis Ph.D.
Licensed Counseling Psychologist

Dr. Matsakis is an internationally recognized trauma specialist in areas such as post-traumatic stress disorder and other anxiety disorders, clinical depression, addiction and related issues and their impact on relationships and the family. She has authored twelve books self-help books for clients and therapists and two professional text books; three book chapters; and a book on the Greek-American experience.

Dr, Matsakis has over twenty five years experience counseling individuals, couples, and families and six years experience teaching at the university level. She has conducted trauma-processing, pain-management anger-management, self-esteem, and guilt processing groups and has presented seminars on these and other topics nationally and internationally to both professional and lay audiences. Following the bombing in Oklahoma City , she was called upon to assist survivors and professionals She's also presented at the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial on Memorial Day and at national conferences on sexual assault and anxiety management.

Most of her forensic work has involved vehicular accidents, personal injury, medical malpractice, murder, family violence and sexual assault. She has also testified on traumatic and stress reactions, addiction, mood disorders and issues pertaining to racial discrimination

Dr. Matsakis received a BA in history from Washington University in St. Louis , MO ; a MA in Secondary Education from Stanford University ( Palo Alto , CA ) and a MA and Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from the University of Maryland in College Park ( College Park , MD ). See also resume.


Areas of Expertise:
Women's Issues Depression
Sexual Trauma Combat Civilian Trauma
Relationships Stress Management
Family Violence Eating Disorders Addictions
Divorce Parenting Contracts
Chronic Pain Medical Disability
Bereavement Midlife-Evaluation
Minority Issues Cultural Assimilation Issues
Services:
Individual Couples Family Counseling
Psychological Evaluation Expert Witness
Professional Lay Seminars Professional Supervision
Telephone Consultation Forensic Consultation: Records Review


With over 17,000 posts on my two blogs, there are only a few posts with her name even mentioned.


They didn't listen to Dr. Jonathan Shay either. While there are more posts on him, there is very little about his opinion being sought out. It didn't matter that he was already an expert when I started to learn about PTSD and why my husband was dying a very slow death in front of my eyes. I actually had a lot of communication with him because his book was so good and so true to life. Try reading Achilles in Vietnam sometime and you'll know what I mean.



Need I remind you, dear gentle reader that my husband and I just had our 25th wedding anniversary on Sept. 30th? The marriage that was supposed to fall apart before 5 years managed to thrive because of people like Shay and Matsakis. A lot of other people managed to stay alive, keep families together and find hope because of the work I was able to do, because other people did what they did first. Now do you get it? See, we're here, have been here, all along no matter how much others want to keep making their own wheel instead of using the ones already built. I may have tweaked the way I say things but Shay and Matsakis, among others, started to say it all first. I came up with putting this suffering into videos, but I had to learn what I was talking about first. While what I learned from them helped me to cope with my own marriage, living in my own marriage helped me help other people.

Maybe it's time old oracles were heard once again so that more lives can be saved instead of letting our hearts get broken watching the wreckage we couldn't have prevented. I'm not talking about just me, or Matsakis or Shay, but all the others out there all along. After all, skipping over what we've already learned has been a lesson in disaster.

Veterans' memorial dedication set

Veterans' memorial dedication set
Buzz up!By Jeff Pikulsky, VALLEY INDEPENDENT
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Last updated: 11:09 am

NEW EAGLE - Borough officials and residents Saturday will unveil a rebuilt veterans' memorial that's been five years in the making.

A dedication ceremony will take place 11 a.m. at the monument on Main Street outside of the Ringgold School District administration building.

Borough residents formed the New Eagle Veterans' Memorial Committee in 2004 to raise $50,000 so the monument could be expanded and updated.

The original memorial, built in 1948, showed names of New Eagle residents that served in World War I and II.

Plaques on the old memorial recognized that soldiers from the area served in the Persian Gulf, Korean and Vietnam wars - but their names were not listed.

Those names - and many more - are on the new memorial wall.

Memorial committee member Arch Caseber, a Vietnam veteran, said there are more than 2,000 names on the new monument, with room for 500 to 600 more.

The names of those involved in such smaller military engagements such as the conflicts in Grenada and Panama are included.

Coast Guard member names are also displayed - a tribute Caseber said some memorials miss.

"They really didn't get much recognition from World War II," he said.
read more here
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/valleyindependent/s_646852.html

40 men from Camp Lejeune now report breast cancer

40 men from Camp Lejeune now report breast cancer
By William R. Levesque, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Wednesday, October 7, 2009
A Florida man with male breast cancer says he has now identified 39 other men with the rare disease who all share one thing: They lived at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.

The numbers surprise scientists studying water contamination at the Marine Corps installation where up to a million Marines and family members may have been exposed to tainted water during 30 years ending in the late 1980s.

Among them are more than 12,000 Floridians who have signed up for a health survey.

"This is statistically unheard of," said Tallahassee resident Mike Partain, 41, a breast cancer survivor who was born at the base and is looking for others like himself. "We've got a cancer cluster that defies explanation."

The cluster is expected to be discussed Thursday when the U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs holds a hearing on contamination at U.S. military installations. A Marine Corps major general is expected to testify, as will Partain.
read more here
40 men from Camp Lejeune now report breast cancer

Neighbor saves politician from burning home

Fire destroys Mount Dora candidate's home

By Martin E. Comas

Sentinel Staff Writer

12:07 p.m. EDT, October 7, 2009


MOUNT DORA - The home of former City Council member Fay Brooks-Williams, who is running for the at-large seat on the council this fall, was destroyed in a fire this morning, fire officials said.

Brooks-Williams was taken to Florida Hospital Waterman in Tavares after suffering from smoke inhalation, officials said. A neighbor had carried her out of the burning home, according to authorities.

"We heard that she is going to be all right," fire Chief Ronnie Snowberger said.

However, two of Brooks-Williams' three dogs, died in the blaze.
read more here
Fire destroys Mount Dora candidates home

For Max Cleland, Politics Was A Refuge From War


Courtesy of The Max Cleland Collection, duPont-Ball Library, Stetson UniversityMax Cleland reads Arthur Schlesinger's biography of John F. Kennedy, A Thousand Days, while recuperating at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in 1968.




For Max Cleland, Politics Was A Refuge From War

October 6, 2009
As a boy growing up in a small town in Georgia, Max Cleland, a former Democratic senator from Georgia, was inspired by the adventures of the Lone Ranger on his TV screen.

Just as the Lone Ranger was motivated by a sense of duty, so was Cleland. As he tells NPR's Renee Montagne, Cleland's parents raised him "to be an eagle, not a sparrow." When he was in college, he joined the ROTC and volunteered to go to war in Vietnam. There, he was brutally maimed by a grenade that a fellow soldier dropped accidentally. The explosion took away both of his legs and his right arm.

In his new memoir, Heart of a Patriot, Cleland recalls that moment, and how he overcame the trauma it caused. The book is subtitled "How I Found The Courage To Survive Vietnam, Walter Reed and Karl Rove."

After his military service, Cleland turned to public service as a way to find meaning in life outside of his own struggles. "It meant survival. It meant a purpose and destiny," he says.

His political career spanned four decades, and ended with a loss to Republican Saxby Chambliss in 2002. Cleland says that his opponent — backed by Karl Rove's political machine — questioned his patriotism by airing attack ads that listed his votes on homeland security bills that opposed President George W. Bush's policies.
read more here


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113497762

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Little known underground Horrorcore music genre celebrates macabre killings

'Horrorcore' singer suspected in Virginia killings
Story Highlights
20-year-old rapper of "Horrorcore" accused of Virginia slayings

Little known underground music genre celebrates macabre killings

Tow-truck driver gave suspect a lift; said he was "stinkiest rascal I've ever smelled"

Defense lawyer said he's unsure Richard McCroskey "gets the severity of everything"


By Wayne Drash
CNN


(CNN) -- Elizabeth McCutchen and a friend were walking to book club two weeks ago in quaint Farmville, Virginia, when they strolled by a home on First Avenue. "Something smells dead," her friend said.


They were thinking animal. A dog, a cat, something like that. They never imagined they were smelling the remains of massacred humans. It was Thursday, September 17. But another 24 hours would pass before police made the gruesome discovery.

Richard Samuel McCroskey III -- a 20-year-old rapper in the underground genre of "Horrorcore" who sang of chopping people into pieces -- has been arrested in connection with the slayings. The crime scene was so horrifying police would not even describe it, saying only that the victims died of blunt force trauma.

The victims were Mark Niederbrock, 50, the beloved pastor at Walker's Presbyterian Church; his 16-year-old daughter, Emma Niederbrock; Melanie Wells, Emma's 18-year-old friend from West Virginia; and Niederbrock's estranged wife, Debra Kelley, 53, a professor at Longwood University.
read more here
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/10/06/virginia.horrorcore.killings/index.html

Leaders must focus on military families, McHugh says

It is the families on the front lines when it comes to them coming home, and one day, being able to be sent back again. It is the families on the front lines for the rest of their lives as well when they do not go back. This we've heard before, but this may be just more talk instead of plans we waited for.

Leaders must focus on families, McHugh says

By Karen Jowers - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Oct 6, 2009 17:22:24 EDT

If Army leadership doesn’t take care of the Army family, then the leadership has failed.

That, said new Secretary of the Army John McHugh, is one of the lessons he took away from his 17 years in Congress, delving into military quality-of-life and personnel issues.

At a family forum of about 800 people at the Association of the U.S. Army’s annual meeting, McHugh said he has a lot of things to focus on as the new top civilian Army leader. But when it comes to challenges, “preeminent in my mind is ensuring we take care of soldiers, and that means taking care of their families,” he told the attendees — more than half of whom were family readiness group leaders.

In his discussions with Army uniformed leaders during his first two weeks in the job, McHugh said, he has been “uplifted by the fact they understand.”

Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey, Vice Chief of Staff Peter Chiarelli and Lt. Gen. Robert Wilson, chief of the Army’s Installation Management Command, are “leading in this initiative to do a better job for families,” McHugh said.

He said it is critical to encourage bases — from the unit level on up — to “think innovatively to implement programs that tend to the needs of Army families.”
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_mchugh_families_100609w/

Army vet donates $1.5m to VA hospital

Army vet donates $1.5m to VA hospital

By David Mercer - The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday Oct 6, 2009 20:33:50 EDT

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — After serving in the Korean War, John Wright apparently lived a quiet life in Danville, where he volunteered at the local Veterans Administration hospital but otherwise kept to himself.

As it turns out, Wright was also building a fortune in real estate and other investments worth $1.56 million, all of which he left to the eastern Illinois town’s VA hospital when he died.

The staff and other volunteers he got to know in his 40 years volunteering at the hospital’s recreation therapy section were the closest thing Wright had to family, said Douglas Shouse, a hospital spokesman.

“They were his family,” Shouse said. “On holidays he would go to [meet] the recreation staff for meals.”

His colleagues at the hospital did not know much more about Wright’s life outside the hospital or his military record.

“John was pretty subdued and didn’t really talk about his military service,” Shouse said.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_army_va_hospital_will_100609/

PTSD and AWOL, is this justice?

Soldier turns himself in after deserting

Alexandra Poolos and Ismael Estrada
AC360°

Jerri Hyde first sent Anderson an email in July. In it, she wrote that her sons Donald and Daniel had both served in Iraq. Dan, 23, worked as an explosives expert in the Marines, and Don, 25, had been in the Army. Both, Jerri wrote, now suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and weren’t getting the help they needed.

“I am writing because I feel Mr. Cooper just might be the one to listen,” Jerri wrote. “My sons are suffering PTSD after serving our country. And getting no help. I don’t understand this.”

Jerri’s email arrived after visiting her younger son Dan in Texas.

When we first called her, Jerri told us that Dan’s problems seemed minor when compared to his older brother Don’s, who had deserted the military almost six months ago after reenlisting for another tour of duty. Don didn’t know what to do now that he deserted the army. Jerri didn’t know where he was hiding, just that he was somewhere in their home state of Illinois. For three months, the family kept in touch, and then finally in late September, Don reached out and said he wanted to talk.


Don was on the run and was getting tired of looking over his shoulder. He was ready to turn himself in and face the reality of his decision to abandon his duties.

According to the army, the penalties for desertion can be quite steep. He could receive up to 5 years of confinement, forfeiture of all pay, and a dishonorable discharge.

Still, Don showed up at the Illinois State Police station with his mother, father-in-law and girlfriend. He was emotional, but ready to turn himself in. He says leaving was a good decision because he was worried that he would hurt himself or a fellow soldier while he was in the army. His only regret was re-enlisting.

PTSD across military and civilian communities

Ret. Chaplain: PTSD across military & civilian communities
By Arthur Mondale Reporter
Published: October 1, 2009

A chaplain in the heart of military country is tackling one of the biggest problems facing service men and women: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. The problem stretches equally across the military and civilian populations.

When it comes to PTSD, Lt. Col (Ret.) Chaplain Charles Smith of Saint Paul’s Lutheran Church in Havelock wants to dispel a myth. He says you don’t have to go to war to have a problem.

Chaplain Smith brings 25 years of experience down range and across the country asking one question: Do you know the signs to identify PTSD? Because you could be suffering from it.

“Commanders or supervisors tend to key in on the symptoms of something and not the cause of the symptoms,” Chaplain Smith said. “And PTSD—you not only have to know the symptom you have to know what causes it and try to go to the root of it.“

Smith says 60% of men and 51% of all women have suffered a traumatic experience that could lead to PTSD. Stress could intensify the problem.

Smith says the answer is coping and overcoming individual circumstances—not avoiding it. He adds, “You have to reach out to something that’s real and what’s real is medication or some kind of spiritual outlet…there are people to help.“

Saint Paul Lutheran Church in Havelock will host two more rounds of seminars on PTSD later this month. Classes planned for October 8th and October 15th.
go here for video
PTSD across military and civilian communities

Stolen Valor - At War Blog - NYTimes.com

There is so much that is missed when we hear stories about phony veterans, especially posers pretending to have medals of valor, as if they would even know what that word meant. This one, did much more damage than that but I doubt he cared at all.

He claimed he had a Purple Heart, when he never even served. Then he claimed he had PTSD, when again, he never served. People will read this story and just think about the fact this is one more coward-lower-life-form wanting to take what he did not earn. The problem is, he took a lot more than that when he claimed to have PTSD.

There have been Vietnam veterans suffering for over 30 years with PTSD, real veterans with real battle scars, with real suffering. They will not admit they have PTSD because they cannot overcome the stigma of it as if it is some kind of stain on their courage, but this fake, saw it as a badge of courage he would take as well. He had no clue. We've lost too many because they viewed PTSD as something to be ashamed, instead of something that came home with them because they cared. This man, this man didn't care about anyone but himself.


October 5, 2009, 6:19 pm
Stolen Valor
By James Dao
Fraudulently claiming to be a decorated war hero so infuriates veterans that they have given the deception a name: stolen valor. And since 2005, it has been against federal law, punishable by a fine and up to a year in prison.

Now, in perhaps the highest-profile case of its type this year, the government has charged a Colorado man, Richard G. Strandlof, with fraudulently claiming to have won a Purple Heart in Iraq.


Until he was unmasked this year, Mr. Strandlof was better known in Colorado as Rick Duncan, a charismatic former Marine Corps captain who had served three tours in Iraq, been wounded by a roadside bomb in Falluja and struggled with post-traumatic stress disorder.

His tale was convincing enough that Mr. Strandlof became a spokesman for Iraq veterans in Colorado, meeting with mayors, appearing with political candidates and forming a well-regarded group, Colorado Veterans Alliance.
read more here
http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/05/stolen-valor/

Vietnam vet is awarded Silver Star after 43 years

Vietnam vet is awarded Silver Star after 43 years
The Boyle Heights man hadn't received the medal for heroism because of lost paperwork. When the officer who recommended him found out, he doggedly worked to correct the oversight.

By Esmeralda Bermudez

October 4, 2009


It took 43 years, but Marine Pfc. Daniel Hernandez finally got his medal.

And when he did Saturday morning in Boyle Heights, the Vietnam veteran stood up straight and proudly puffed out his chest, his eyes glistening with emotion.

"His immediate and fearless actions, while himself painfully wounded, undoubtedly saved many lives," said Marine Lt. Jim Lupori, reading from the Silver Star medal citation that, because of lost paperwork, was never awarded to Hernandez by the secretary of the Navy after he left Vietnam in the late 1960s.

The four-decade wait only made the honor more meaningful to Hernandez, 63, as several hundred relatives, friends and fellow veterans gathered for a ceremony in his honor at the Hollenbeck Youth Center. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-East Los Angeles) and a host of other state and city leaders attended.

They came in support of a man they had known for decades as a community youth leader and president of the Hollenbeck Youth Center, which provides after-school programs to keep children away from gangs and drugs.

Few knew Hernandez also was a war hero.

"There's a difference between action heroes in movies and action heroes in real life," said Schwarzenegger, who has long collaborated with Hernandez on youth issues. "Danny is a real action hero."
read more here
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-medal4-2009oct04,0,3123760.story

Bodies of soldiers killed in Afghanistan due back in U.S.

Bodies of soldiers killed in Afghanistan due back in U.S.
Story Highlights
NEW: Afghan security forces hunting down attackers kill insurgents in raids

Coffins of at least four U.S. soldiers due to return home

At least eight U.S. soldiers, two Afghan soldiers killed in attack in Nuristan province

Largest number of U.S. soldiers killed in single attack in more than a year



(CNN) -- The flag-draped coffins of at least four U.S. soldiers killed during a weekend onslaught against a U.S. military outpost in Afghanistan were scheduled to arrive Tuesday at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, the military said.

The bodies will include

Sgt. Joshua J. Kirk of South Portland, Maine;

Spc. Michael P. Scusa of Villas, New Jersey;

Spc. Christopher T. Griffin of Kincheloe, Michigan; and

Pfc. Kevin C. Thomson of Reno, Nevada

according to the Air Force mortuary affairs office. The dignified transfer ceremony also might include other fallen service members.
for more go here
http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/10/06/us.afghanistan.troops/index.html

Monday, October 5, 2009

Army continues criminal probes into Iraq electrocutions

Army continues criminal probes into Iraq electrocutions
By Lisa M. Novak, Stars and Stripes
European edition, Sunday, October 4, 2009
It was near 100 degrees on May 8, 2004, when Spc. Chase Whitham and a few other soldiers decided to cool off in the swimming pool at Forward Operating Base Patriot in Mosul, Iraq.

A junior officer had recently renovated the pool, but a battalion commander had placed the pool off-limits until final precautions could be made.

No signs were posted, so Whitham and the others jumped in. The 21-year-old from Oregon was electrocuted when he touched a metal pipe that was circulating the pool water. It was later determined that the water pump had shorted and was not properly grounded.

Whitham was one of the first Americans to be killed by electrical problems at U.S. bases in Iraq.
read more here
http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=65180

2 in custody after reports of armed men on South Florida campus

2 in custody after reports of armed men on South Florida campus
Story Highlights
NEW: Campus police question 2 men after incidents on school campus Monday

Report of armed intruder on the University of South Florida campus in Tampa, Florida

Police received a report of person armed with bomb, gun near the library

USF police say say no one was hurt, no shots were fired

(CNN) -- Campus police at the University of South Florida were questioning two men in connection with back-to-back incidents on the school campus Monday.

Investigators were questioning one man following a report of an armed intruder, USF police Lt. Meg Ross said. And a second man was also being questioned following a report of a man carrying a large hunting knife and a puppy, she said.

USF police asked the Tampa police's bomb team to respond to the campus regarding a backpack belonging to man in the first incident, said Ross. No one was hurt, she said, and no shots were fired.

"We have someone we think may have been involved," Ross told CNN, "but we have to investigate fully."
read more here
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/10/05/south.florida.intruder/index.html

Congratulations to Military Times

Military Times Web site wins journalism award

Staff report
Posted : Monday Oct 5, 2009 16:40:10 EDT

MilitaryTimes.com has been honored for its service to the far-flung military community.

The Web site won “Best Large Specialty Site,” one of the 2009 Online Journalism Awards given Sunday by the Online News Association during its conference in San Francisco.

M. Scott Mahaskey, Military Times’ managing editor for interactive and visual coverage, accepted the award.

The organization of online journalists and academics, founded in 1999, praised MilitaryTimes.com for both its content and design.

“This site is cleanly designed and easy to navigate. It has a unique challenge in that it does serve a community, but not one with a geographic centre — the type of challenge for which the Internet is perfect,” the organization wrote. “This is a virtual meeting place for people in the military, where they can catch up on news of professional and personal interest, exchange stories and advice, and honor their colleagues and their service.”

The awards are administered by the Online News Association, in partnership with the University of Miami’s School of Communication, and are funded in part by the Gannett Foundation. Gannett Corp. is the parent company of Military Times.

MilitaryTimes.com is part of the Military Times family of Web sites, which includes AirForceTimes.com, ArmyTimes.com, MarineCorpsTimes.com and NavyTimes.com.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_times_online_award_100509w/

Military men and the secrets they carry

Military Men Silent on Sexual Assaults
October 05, 2009
Virginian-Pilot

For years after the parachute accident that ended his Army service, Cody Openshaw spiraled downward.

He entered college but couldn't keep up with his studies. He had trouble holding a job. He drank too much. He had trouble sleeping, and when he did sleep, he had nightmares. He got married and divorced in less than a year. He had flashbacks. He isolated himself from his friends and drank more.

"His anxiety level was out of this world," his father said. "This was a young man who got straight A's in high school, and now he couldn't function."

Openshaw had the classic symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, even though he had never been in combat. His parents attributed the trauma to the accident and the heavy medications he was taking for the continuing pain.

But there was more.

Finally, he broke down and told his father.

A few months after his accident, as he was awaiting his medical discharge from the Army, he had been sexually assaulted.

The attack left him physically injured and emotionally shattered. Inhibited by shame, embarrassment, sexual confusion and fear, it took him five years to come forward with the full story.

What truly sets this story apart, however, is not the details of the case, horrific as they are, but the gender of the victim.

There is a widespread presumption that most victims of sexual assault in the military services are women. That presumption, however, is false.

In a 2006 survey of active-duty troops, 6.8 percent of women and 1.8 percent of men said they had experienced unwanted sexual contact in the previous 12 months. Since there are far more men than women in the services, that translates into roughly 22,000 men and 14,000 women.
read more here
Military Men Silent on Sexual Assaults

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Mold turned Orlando man's 'castle' into 'house of horrors'

Mold turned Orlando man's 'castle' into 'house of horrors'
Jean Patteson

Sentinel Staff Writer

October 4, 2009
When he moved into his lakefront dream house, Ronald Brooke was hale and hearty. One year later, he was a sick man.

"My castle ended up being a house of horrors," said Brooke, 65, founder of Brooke Enterprises, a money-management company in Orlando.

He bought the two-story house near the University of Central Florida for $245,000 in June 1997. His nightmare experience began that December, when storm water cascaded through the roof into the family room. Soon afterward, leaks were found in the upstairs shower, around several windows and behind the front and rear gutters. Brooke had the roof repaired and the rotted windowsills replaced. But a fertile breeding ground for mold had already been created in the damp, dark spaces behind the walls.
read more here
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/mold-sufferer-100409,0,4621954.story

Satellite Beach FL soldier killed in Afghanistan

Satellite Beach soldier killed in Afghanistan

Sentinel Staff Writer

1:13 a.m. EDT, October 4, 2009


A soldier from Central Florida was killed in Afghanistan, the Department of Defense announced late Saturday.

Sgt. Roberto D. Sanchez, 24, of Satellite Beach, died Oct. 1 in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit with an improvised explosive device.

Sanchez was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, Hunter Army Airfield, Savannah, Ga.
Satellite Beach soldier killed in Afghanistan

Step away from the whole and everyone gets hurt

Get away from the people you almost died with, end up isolated and alone. The wholeness of the unit is broken. There is something missing.

Get away from the person you always thought you were, end up isolated and alone, but top that off with not being comfortable in your own skin. There is a stranger there instead of the person you thought you were.

When you live on an island all by yourself, you can just pretend to be someone else, but when you live in the real world, with family and friends, the changes in you hurt them. It's not just about "you" hurting.


A Marine comes home after his world view has been changed forever. A lifetime of pretending to be a hero with video games replaced by life changing reality where there is no reset button restoring people back to life. There is just the exasperating reset button in your brain doing it for you so the event can be resurrected just long enough to torture you. You try to take yourself out of the "picture" playing head games with yourself only to find out, the more you try to pull away, the more emotionally dragged in you become.

In the process of transformation from Sheriff Andy Taylor of Mayberry to John McClane Die Hard, somewhere in the middle was the "you" everyone knew. You were the kid they watched grow up, heard what made you laugh, saw what made you cry, knew what you liked to eat and what would eat away at you. Your family thought they knew everything about you. Your friends thought you'd never change. When you got back from training, you were like Andy, still, pretty much the same as when you left. When you got back from a year in combat, there was not much of "you" left inside. At least not the person everyone thought they knew including yourself.



Pvt. Travis Hafterson, 21, of Circle Pines, was released from Ramsey County jail into military custody Thursday, hours before a court ordered him to be civilly committed in abstentia for a twice-diagnosed case of post traumatic stress syndrome. (Courtesy Hafterson family)

Family fears Circle Pines Marine won't get treatment after being whisked to N.C.
By Tad Vezner
tvezner@pioneerpress.com
Updated: 10/02/2009 07:48:31 AM CDT
Military mother Jamie Hafterson has one thought about her U.S. Marine son getting treatment at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina for post-traumatic stress disorder.

"I don't think they're going to treat him," said Hafterson, a member of the Minnesota Patriot Guard. "Civilian is civilian, and military is military — especially with the few and the proud."

Pvt. Travis Hafterson, of Circle Pines, who had been AWOL for roughly a month and a half — which, after 30 days, officially made him a deserter — turned himself in at Fort Snelling on Monday. The hope of his family and attorney was that he would receive psychiatric treatment in Minnesota and then be sent to Camp Lejeune for punishment, which he accepted.

Instead, Hafterson, 21, was released to the military from Ramsey County Jail on Thursday morning and taken to Camp Lejeune. Even though Hafterson wasn't in Minnesota, on Thursday afternoon a Ramsey County District Court judge ruled to commit Hafterson — in absentia — to six months of treatment at Regions Hospital.

Part of what the judge considered was that Hafterson has been diagnosed twice with post-traumatic stress disorder in the past week — including once by a jail psychiatrist.

"It got all complicated — he was going to turn himself in. We just wanted to be sure he was treated," his mother said.

A spokesperson at Camp Lejeune could not be reached for comment late Thursday.
read more here
http://www.twincities.com/ci_13467500?source=most_viewed


He is not so much unlike any of us except he was exposed to what we have not been exposed to. No, you cannot compare even the same event with them because you are not them.

We may look the same on the outside, just as these wires pretty much do, but when the outer covering comes off, what is exposed is all that went into making us who we are. Every life experience is in there, wrapped inside the shell we trust will protect us. The shell others judge us by when they walk by us on the street. Just as there are many different sizes of cables put together for different purposes, there are also many different types and sizes of cutters to take them apart. The cutters are our life events.




You may have gone through one experience just as they did, but you did not go through all of them and that is the biggest difference of all. You are not them. Your past is your past, just as their's is. Today you may walk away from a traumatic event believing you are better, stronger, smarter, more prepared than someone else, but what you don't think about is, what else they have gone through you have yet to be tested by.

You won't see how deep their pain is any more than you can see how deep their compassion is. You don't know how spiritual they are, how many times their faith has been supported or how many times their faith has been exposed to the elements.

You don't know how many excuses they are looking for to dismiss what they have going on inside of themselves. Anything they can blame other than their own core because they cannot escape that. If they cannot escape that, then there is no hope in their own minds. They need to know there is hope still inside of the covering they hide behind. That hope comes with being able to see past the casing and see into the soul. Once you can do that, once you stop judging them, once you can stop feeling superior to them, then and only then will we truly find what will heal them. Until then, we are just spinning in circles pretending we are trying to fix what we don't understand.


This is one of the biggest reasons all the programs they have come out with don't work. They never understood what makes us all different under the skin.

Soldiers face challenges after returning home

Soldiers face challenges after returning home
Nahum Lopez
Section: News

With troops returning home daily from Iraq and Afghanistan the Texas Work force Commission, Veterans Affairs and the state of Texas have joined together to help soldiers reintegrate back into society.

"Not every one can carry the burdens we live with on a daily basis, " said Navy Corpsmen SGT. Euclides Misael Lopez, 26, of Port Arthur, TX who served in combat in Afghanistan in 2008-2009.

TWC is linking soldiers with the local Veterans Administration to help nurse the soldier back to mental health through several different programs.

"We didn't have these benefits the guys coming back now have. We had the same PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and some of us got over it, and some of us didn't and still have problems," said Air Force Technical Sgt. Nat Arriola who served in Vietnam in 1968-1969.

Arriola is also the Veterans Employment Representative for the East Texas Workforce Center.

Young recruits go in knowing that they will accomplish more than they ever expected. They bring with them perceived limits and learn to overcome them. However, many return home shell-shocked or suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
read more here
Soldiers face challenges after returning home

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Police believe Army Reservist committed suicide

Post office stab suspect believed dead; cops say he likely committed suicide
BY Simone Weichselbaum, Kenny Porpora, Michael J. Feeney, Leo Standora and Jonathan Lemire
DAILY NEWS WRITERS

Updated Wednesday, September 30th 2009, 9:14 AM


An Army Reserves soldier identified as the man who fatally stabbed a young dad outside the main post office appears to have committed suicide, cops and his family said early Wednesday morning.

NYPD detectives rushed to Philadelphia, where the body of a man thought to be Sir'mone McCaulla, 28, was found in his ex-girlfriend's apartment, slumped in a tub with a plastic bag over his head.

Sources said a television cable box was found on his chest, suggesting he electrocuted himself. A relative of McCaulla said the family was told he was dead - but NYPD cops said they were still investigating. A Philly source, however, said authorities believe the body is McCaulla's.
read more here
Post office stab suspect believed dead

Osceola firefighters burned when something went wrong with grill

Osceola firefighters burned while cooking dinner at Poinciana station
Deputy chief: Something went wrong with grill

Susan Jacobson

Sentinel Staff Writer

10:27 p.m. EDT, October 2, 2009


Two Osceola County firefighters are recovering tonight after being burned while cooking dinner on a grill at their station, officials said.

The men, whose names were not released, were grilling outside Station 65 on Cypress Parkway in Poinciana about 6 p.m., Deputy Chief Danny McAvoy said. They had to leave to respond to a call. First, though, something "popped," causing a burst of fire, he said.

The men were burned on the face, chest and arms. Paramedics treated them while they were waiting to be flown by medical helicopter to Orlando Regional Medical Center. Both were treated and released but won't be back at work right away.

"They're burned pretty good," McAvoy said.

The state Fire Marshal's Office is investigating the cause. But McAvoy said the flare-up was not caused by a propane tank exploding.
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Osceola firefighters burned

Wounded warriors get heros' welcome at Andrews

Wounded warriors get heros' welcome at Andrews

Posted 10/2/2009

by Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

10/2/2009 - ANDREWS AIR FORCE BASE, Md. (AFNS) -- Minutes after the hulking C-17 Globemaster III rolled to a stop on the tarmac here Sept. 28, two oversized ambulances backed up to its rear loading ramp to receive its precious cargo: 23 wounded warriors and sick or injured servicemembers in need of advanced medical care.

Most of the patients arrived from Iraq and Afghanistan after being stabilized at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany.

Several had serious combat injuries. A soldier who had been in a helicopter crash in Iraq was headed to the National Naval Medical Center in nearby Bethesda for specialized care for his head and other injuries. Another, suffering serious musculoskeletal injuries from a mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicle accident outside his forward operating base in Afghanistan, was en route to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington for treatment.

Another patient, severely wounded in a rocket-propelled grenade attack in Afghanistan, remained on the aircraft to be flown directly to the burn unit at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio.
read more here
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123170970

Homeless Veteran Receives Military Funeral

Homeless Veteran Receives Military Funeral
By STACY MORROW
Updated 12:04 AM CDT, Thu, Sep 24, 2009
Getty Images A U.S. Army veteran who was found dead behind a dumpster gained some dignity in a memorial service attended by strangers Wednesday morning at the Dallas Fort Worth National Cemetery.

Cpl. William Thomas Spence, 64, lived in a cardboard box behind a Haltom City shopping center. He was laid to rest with military honors in a graveside service that included the folding and presentation of the American flag, a rifle volley and the playing of taps.

The Dignity Memorial Homeless Veterans Burial Program organized Spence's final arrangements after no legal next-of-kin could be found for him. No possessions were found with Spence, and his fingerprints established his identity, the organization said.

VA records confirmed Spence served in the U.S. Army from 1973 to 1985.


"When his country needed him, he went. When he needed people from his country to help him, they walked on by," said Jeff Thorp, a Staff Sergeant in the Texas State Guard who attended the funeral. "If all we can do is give him this one last salute, this one last honor, then that's what we do."

Spence was one of more than 150,000 homeless veterans in the U.S., the organization said.
read more here
Homeless Veteran Receives Military Funeral

Afghan policeman kills 2 US soldiers he was on patrol with

Afghan policeman fires on troops, kills 2

By Lori Hinnant - The Associated Press
Posted : Saturday Oct 3, 2009 14:31:23 EDT

KABUL — An Afghan policeman on patrol with U.S. soldiers opened fire on the Americans, killing two of them before fleeing, officials said Saturday, raising questions about discipline in the ranks of the Afghan forces and possible infiltration by insurgents.

Training and operating jointly with Afghan police and soldiers is key to the U.S. strategy of dealing with the spreading Taliban-led insurgency and, ultimately, allowing international forces to leave Afghanistan. But Afghan forces have periodically turned their guns on international soldiers.

The U.S. military said two American troops were killed by "an individual wearing an ANP (Afghan National Police) uniform" in Wardak province on Friday. Shahidullah Shahid, a spokesman for the Wardak provincial governor, said the policeman fired on the Americans while they were patrolling together Friday night, killing two and injuring two.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_afghan_policeman_kills_troops_100309/

Alleged Veteran Impersonator Charged

Alleged Veteran Impersonator Charged With Faking Military Medals
11 News just learned that the man accused of pretending to be a wounded veteran is now facing federal charges.
Posted: 4:10 PM Oct 2, 2009

11 News just learned that the man accused of pretending to be a wounded veteran is now facing federal charges.

Rick Strandlof, who went by the name Rick Duncan, claimed to be a former Marine injured in combat. An arrest warrant has just been issued by the feds for charges of making false claims about receiving military decorations or medals. Strandlof allegedly claimed to have been awarded the Silver Star and the Purple Heart.


An arrest affidavit obtained by 11 News details the exact circumstances of the case against Strandlof. The document says on May 4, 2009, the Denver FBI was notified that a Captain Rick Duncan, born in 1977, was falsely representing himself as a Naval Academy Graduate, wounded Marine veteran and Purple Heart recipient from injuries sustained in the Battle of Fallujah in Iraq.

Individuals reported to the Denver FBI that Duncan started a veteran's organization called Colorado Veteran's Alliance (CVA). However, they reported that the the trade name for CVA was registered under a Rick Strandlof. That's when their suspicions led them to call the Naval Academy, who then confirmed that no one by the name Rick Duncan ever graduated from the academy during the time framed claimed by Strandlof.

Denver FBI agents then confirmed a man under the name Rick Strandlof had been involved in a fraud scheme in Reno, NV and had two outstanding arrest warrant in California and a state-wide warrant out of Colorado Springs for a traffic offense.
read more here
http://www.kktv.com/military/headlines/63325692.html

POW veteran fraudster 'living a lie'

POW veteran fraudster 'living a lie'

October 03, 2009
Article from: Australian Associated Press
THE Federal Government has referred a case of alleged fraud involving a man who claimed to be one of Australia's youngest prisoners of war to the Australian Federal Police for investigation.

South Australian Arthur Rex Crane, 83, has been on the highest level of service pension since 1988 and is the Federal President of the Prisoners of War Association of Australia, Fairfax Media reported.

He has alleged he was captured by the Japanese in 1942, became a prisoner of war at 15 and was imprisoned in Singapore's Outram Road jail.

But the Sydney Morning Herald reported that throughout the war the 83-year-old lived in Adelaide and had never served in the military.
read more here
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26159772-5006784,00.html

Shattered: even tough guys get the blues

Shattered: even tough guys get the blues
GARY TIPPET
October 4, 2009

ON HIS worst days, Terry Keating wakes to the smell of burning flesh. On his best days it's just a triggered memory away, lingering at the back of his consciousness with the pretty girl from 26 years ago.

She's silhouetted in the doorway where he first saw her. Still standing, though God knows how. He takes her to a bench in the courtyard and gently sits her down, but he can't touch her because she is so terribly burnt that her skin comes off in his hands.

Her name is Angela and she says just two words to him, over and over. ''Help me.'' But he can't.

He keeps other memories in there too. A bus full of dead tourists, mutilated by the semi-trailer that sliced down its side; a furious drug dealer swinging around to aim a pistol at his face; suicides; cot-death babies; a riot of refinery workers booting him into oblivion in the beer stink of a pub carpet.

He has constant nightmares and cold sweats and wakes up kicking, screaming, fighting. He lashes out in bed so often his partner, Shirl, turns her face away so she doesn't wake up with a black eye. He dreams of someone shooting at him or of his car crashing. He'll be struggling in his sleep, or running, but he's never been able to get away.

Police, like other emergency workers, don't forget all the really bad things they've seen or experienced: each traumatic episode is like a snapshot stored away deep in some corner of their brain. But Terry Keating's internal photo album overflowed.

Keating was a policeman for 14 years. He was a detective senior constable and worked undercover, CIB and sexual investigations in the western suburbs. He put away pushers, bank robbers and child abusers and was good at it: commended four times and highly commended once. ''I loved The Job, just loved being a copper,'' he says.

But it cost him two marriages and four children; a couple of other relationships; his self-respect; and for a long time - he thought - his mind. And, at his lowest ebb, it almost cost him his life.
read more here
Shattered even tough guys get the blues

Despite symptoms of PTSD, soldier sees his calling in Army

Coming home: Despite symptoms of PTSD, soldier sees his calling in Army
By Nancy Montgomery, Stars and StripesMideast edition,
Tuesday, September 29, 2009

PREVIOUS STORY: A family broken by war

Spc. William Medlin found a sort of relief in Iraq. It was so much simpler, he said, than dealing with the complications in his other life, the one in which his marriage of three years was falling apart.

He loved the buzz of being on point, he said, driving the lead Humvee in the company commander’s security detail. And he liked garrison life. So Medlin re-enlisted, before his first tour was up and before his divorce was final, with a big $10,000 bonus and a guaranteed spot in air assault school, part of his plan to make sergeant and join Special Forces.

There was just one hitch. Medlin couldn’t sleep. He had flashbacks. He felt angry a lot of the time.

"I had severe rage issues," he said.

A sergeant told Medlin he’d better see a counselor, and off he went, somewhat grudgingly.
read more here
http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=65082

Friday, October 2, 2009

Good enough for God

We went away for a few days for our 25th anniversary. We've been broke, so we decided to roll our change and head to St. Augustine, since we've wanted to go there ever since we moved to Florida. It's been rough the last few weeks, between menopause, financial stress, compassion fatigue, I had to top all that off with quitting smoking. Not a great move on my part, leaving me wanting to cry most of the time, having a terrible time sleeping plus the withdrawal, a whole other issue of my personality being drained out of me, leaving me finding it almost impossible to find anything positive to think about.

I haven't liked myself very much because I'm a stranger in my own skin. The same way I describe PTSD, is what happens when your body goes into shock. I quit cold turkey. (One Chantix doesn't count as being medicated) While this kind of depression will get milder as time goes on, PTSD does not unless there is intervention. It is difficult to find anything good but it doesn't mean there isn't anything good to see.

Part of the trip to St. Augustine, was going for a ride to see where the tours didn't take us. We caught a glimpse of a cemetery just beyond the Florida National Guard building during one of the tours and wanted to get a closer look. Coming from Massachusetts, old cemetery sites were just part of history, visited often, especially in Salem. I was not prepared for what I found in this cemetery among the old stones of this military cemetery.

Pyramids










Monuments and Memorials
The Dade Monument is composed of three distinct pyramids constructed of native coquina stone. The pyramids were erected in 1842 and were originally covered with white stucco. The memorials were dedicated at a ceremony on Aug. 14, 1842, that marked the end of the Florida Indian Wars.

The pyramids cover vaults that contain the remains of 1,468 soldiers who died during the Florida Indian Wars, from 1835 to 1842. According to the inscription, the wars began on Dec. 25, 1835. Three days later, Maj. Francis L. Dade and his regiment were enroute from Fort Brooke (Tampa) to Fort King (Ocala) when they were ambushed and killed. Of the 106 men and officers under his command, only two survived. Maj. Dade and his men are among those entombed at the pyramids.



The Dade Monument, a coquina stone and marble obelisk, was erected in 1881 and commemorates Maj. Francis L. Dade and the men who died with him at the 1835 massacre. Soldiers stationed at the St. Augustine post contributed one day’s pay to fund the memorial.

http://www.cem.va.gov/cems/nchp/staugustine.asp


I found something really good in a cemetery of all places. Think about this story. How the monuments were built and who they were built for. A story of compassion in the midst of such darkness.

It is the same way within all of us. No matter how dark we may feel inside, no matter how hard things get or how heavy the weight on our shoulders drags us down, in the end, it really doesn't matter because all we need to get past it is already there.

Sounds strange? Sure. Think I may be nuts? So do I right now, but stay with me and let's see if I can make some sense out of what I'm trying to say.

I am not me right now because of all that is going on and the smoking thing. I can look at how I'm not sleeping at night only and not at the fact my husband has been extra understanding of the fact I'm exhausted and need some more sleep in the day. I can look at the times when the tears just start to flow, but Jack reaches out to hug me. I can look at the fact that today after we got home, I didn't even want to read the emails or the fact Jack said I should just start by answering one. Look at what I lost in all of these years of marriage getting from there to here, or look at how far we've come and how much we've gained with each other. Life is all about how you look at it and what you want to see.

I used to think that I wasn't good enough for God and that's why I don't seem to be very successful. Then it dawned on me that I don't have to be good enough for God. I am already. Whatever I lack, He's got the ability to fix it, change it, adapt me to it or the people around me. He already knew how miserable I'd be at some things and how good I'd be with others. He put the "corrections" already inside of me and I bet He expected me to find them. Just as the monuments at the cemetery are about the horrific deaths of so many, they were also about compassion from the people who built them. My life is dark right now but God built me with love, just as He built you with love. We don't have to be good enough for anyone other than Him and frankly, when you think about it, we already are.

He built compassion within us and expects us to use it to answer the needs of others, to show them they are loved, to feed them with what they need to face their own lives a little easier than they do now. To let them know they do matter, their lives matter, their dreams matter and yes, their pain matters too.

When it comes to our own lives and our own suffering, we need to remember the same thing. We can look at what caused our pain or think of how it can be used. We can look at something like PTSD, wonder where God was when the events happened, or finally understand that He was there because someone was looking for Him. He was there within those who bothered to ask where He was because they knew Him as a loving God in the midst of such darkness. He was there just as He is with us right now.

My darkest days may not be behind me yet and I may not be able to get past this time, this time. I will keep trying if I do fail because I know I don't have to be perfect but I do have to be as good as I can be in this moment. The rest as they say, is already there.


This statue of David was at the Ripley's Believe it or Not. If you want to know how God can forgive anything think of David. There he was filled with love for God, picked to rule, yet what did he do? He messed up his life big time. His family suffered and so did his people. Yet do we look at his life, his story as one of being a failure? Think about it.