Mentally Ill Veterans Sent Back To War

[babylonsister]

Mentally Ill Veterans Sent Back To War
Team 5 Investigates Uncovers Violation of DOD Rules

POSTED: 12:02 pm EST November 11, 2007
UPDATED: 11:26 am EST November 12, 2007


BOSTON -- Thousands of soldiers coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan are disabled by post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.

But Team 5 Investigates has uncovered that case after case, the military is violating its own policy and shipping them back to the front lines before they are well.

At just 25 years old, Damian Fernandez has already witnessed horrific human suffering.
"Everyday, for 365 days, they were under attack there," said his mother Mary Jane Fernandez. "Bombings and landmines were in the street and he saw his fellow soldiers killed."

The young father from Waterbury, Conn., came back a different man. Doctors classified him as 70 percent disabled from post-traumatic stress disorder. Still the order came to redeploy.

"All day long he was just getting more and more agitated until he said he was going to kill himself rather than go back," his mother said.

Russell Anderson, 50 percent disabled by PTSD, chose to go back to the front lines. And the Army allowed it.

"I don't believe in another circumstance with the war, that Russell would be redeployed with his PTSD," his girlfriend Catherine Colone said. "But in this war, there just aren't enough soldiers."

more...

http://www.thebostonchannel.com/news/14565705/detail.html