It’s time for the VA to take care of widows requesting VA spousal payments. Denise is a widowed mother of three children. Twenty years ago, her military veteran husband died of a long bout of lymphoma. It was a protracted battle that took his life after 9 long years of fighting. After her husband’s death, Denise went to her local VA and requested spousal support payments. She was horrified to learn that a woman had already claimed her spousal support payments and that the VA was already paying this woman on a monthly basis. Denise began fighting the VA to receive the benefits that she deserved and that her husband obtained through his military service in his country. The VA has still not responded to your requests to fix this problem for the last 20 years and has had to wait.
Denise reported this information to the VA and for the past 20 years they have not acted. What kind of reprehensible human beings can listen to your story and decide that they will not act and fix the problem like it should be fixed right away? I wonder how many other widows are in the same situation as Denise. I wonder how many other scammers have been able to commit a crime of this nature against the VA or other government agencies. Does the VA leadership even know about this situation?
As President Lincoln promised, “to take care of him who has endured the battle, his widow and children.” In this case, it doesn’t sound like the VA did a very good job of taking care of “his widow” from him. Denise has been treated with contempt and not the kind of response she would expect from a government agency. That being said, even after 20 years, the VA can still do right by this person and solve this very serious problem of epic proportions. It may be critical to find out if this scammer has done this before and the VA may find out that she is receiving multiple checks a month on the deaths of various military veterans. I hope there is something in place to ensure this doesn’t happen.
The VA is not above the law and must abide by the rules. In addition, the VA must prosecute the woman who perpetrated this heinous crime against this family to the fullest extent of the law. Now is the time for action. The VA cannot dismiss her responsibility to the veteran community and dismiss this woman’s claims. It’s time for Denise to be heard.