✍️ A Testimony of Betrayed Promises, Ethical Failures, and the Will to Keep Fighting

🎯 Introduction

This is not just the story of a single veteran. It’s the story of a nation’s broken promise—and a family who shouldered the fallout. A story where bureaucratic delays lasted longer than a war, where silence hurt more than shrapnel, and where, in the end, justice came too late. But the fight didn’t end there.

⚖️ The Legal and Procedural Context

• 38 CFR § 3.344 protects ratings in place for more than five years. Reductions must be based on sustained improvement, not just one exam.
• 38 CFR § 3.327 allows reexaminations—but does not require or endorse the use of the same examiner.
• The M21-1 Manual guides VA decisions, but it is not binding law. And while it may follow the letter of the law, it frequently fails the spirit—which is to protect veterans through fairness, impartiality, and a duty to assist.

“Procedure without principle is not justice. Following a manual isn’t the same as honoring a mission.”

🧪 The Examiner Dilemma: Procedure over Principle

• The same examiner conducted both the original evaluation and the reexamination that reduced the veteran’s benefits from 80% to 10%.
• This raises major ethical concerns:
  • Confirmation bias
  • Lack of independent review
  • Inconsistent testing methods, including invasive procedures like inserting tubes
• Clinicians—especially those contracted through third-party vendors—can remove benefits with their documentation, yet often refuse to support claims.

“If they can cross the line to remove a benefit, they should be able to cross it to defend one.”

🧠 The Human Cost: A Family’s Fight

At the time of the reduction, the veteran was under evaluation for Alzheimer’s.

• The veteran’s son gave testimony describing the harm: financial devastation, mental stress, and VA silence.
• The local CVSO offered no meaningful support, even telling the family their only option was the Supreme Court.
• Over 13 years, the family fought to restore what should never have been taken.

“You won’t just find exams in that file. You’ll find 13 years of procedural stalling and a family abandoned.”

🏠 A Family That Stood Tall

• One son gave up opportunities to stay home and care for their parents.
• The other worked full time to support the household financially.
• The veteran was placed in a VA-approved facility, but the conditions were reprehensible—a facility in name, not in care.

And then—when the benefits were finally restored—the veteran passed away. Just days later. The system’s delay became a final injustice.

🪦 Even in Death, More Barriers

• The family fought again—this time for burial benefits.
• But the VA required receipts up front. They were told: “You can’t apply unless you’ve already paid.”
• How many grieving families are asked to turn in invoices instead of being met with dignity?

🩺 The Nurse Who Broke the Silence

It wasn’t the VA. It wasn’t the CVSO. It was Cassie, a nurse who saw the family, saw the need, and acted.

• She contacted a different CVSO.
• She visited the home.
• She helped start the claims process—even knowing the system had swallowed more than a decade of their time.

🧾 Clear and Unmistakable Error (CUE)

“This file isn’t a clerical error. It’s a moral error.”

• The use of the same examiner, lack of informed oversight, and failure of the appeals process to recognize bias all point to a CUE.
• The family—who bore the financial and emotional cost—should receive retroactive compensation, not as a handout, but as a repayment of a debt.

🧭 The Unseen War

What do we ask of our veterans?

Honor. Integrity. Fidelity. Trust.

But in return, what do we give?

• Delay
• Denial
• Silence

The VA claims process has become an unseen warzone—paperwork is the new weapon, and abandonment the new casualty. For those with no family like this veteran’s, the system is not just confusing—it is crushing.

📢 Call to Action

1. End the use of the same examiner for reexaminations leading to reductions.
2. Require independent review when cognitive conditions or inconsistent testing are present.
3. Hold contracted examiners accountable—if they can remove benefits, they must support them when appropriate.
4. Reform the appeals system to explicitly flag ethical red flags like examiner continuity.
5. Fully fund and train CVSOs, especially in rural communities.
6. Declare CUE in cases like this—and provide retroactive compensation to families who bore the burden.
7. Rebuild the burial benefits system—no more grief-by-form. Treat death with the dignity service demands.

🧠 Closing Thought

“The battle burden is not only a warzone. It’s the silence that follows.”

This family’s story is not just a case study—it’s a moral marker.

We can no longer call ourselves a nation that honors service if we allow service to be discarded with paperwork. We can’t speak of fidelity and trust while families are left to beg for burial costs.

The system must do better. And for this veteran—and for the thousands like him—it must begin now.

Respectfully submitted, in the name of every veteran and family still waiting for justice,

— Your Advocate