Mom says "The Army killed him with incompetent care"

Dead soldier's doctor is fired
Psychiatrist treated veteran at Fort Knox

By Laura Ungar
lungar@courier-journal.com

The Courier-Journal



A psychiatrist who treated Sgt. Gerald Cassidy, the wounded Iraq veteran from Indiana found dead in his Fort Knox barracks, has been "relieved of his duties," a spokesman for U.S. Sen. Evan Bayh said yesterday.

Bayh press secretary Jonathan Swain identified the psychiatrist as Dr. William Kearney.


The civilian doctor, contracted by the Army, is the fourth person to face job action in connection with the Sept. 21 death. Three soldiers in Cassidy's chain of command have already lost their posts.

Bayh, an Indiana Democrat, has linked the Westfield man's death to inadequate staffing and problems with care at the Fort Knox Warrior Transition Unit, which opened in June and is devoted to healing the wounds of war.

"The fact that (Kearney) has been relieved of his duties confirms the validity of the questions Sen. Bayh and the family have been asking," Swain said.

Although the Army is still investigating the death and its cause, preliminary reports show that the brain-injured National Guardsman may have been unconscious for days and dead for hours before someone checked on him.

Cassidy left a wife, a 5-year-old daughter and a 3-year-old son.

"This was a beautiful young man who did nothing wrong," said Cassidy's mother, Kay McMullen of Carmel, Ind.

She declined to comment specifically on the psychiatrist, but said: "The Army killed him with incompetent care."
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It's about time this was brought out and people are held accountable for what they fail to do. This has happened too many times and very few have been held responsible for any of it.