Ex-homeless Vietnam vet finally gets full benefits

Could someone tell Bill O'Reilly this is how they end up homeless to begin with?

That took Israel's final call to resolve. "It shouldn't take a member of Congress to make phone calls and pester the VA to get him his benefits," Israel said. "I'm proud of what we've done, but I'm not proud that we had to do it."

Ex-homeless Vietnam vet finally gets full benefits

BY MITCHELL FREEDMAN | mitchell.freedman@newsday.com
8:27 PM EDT, March 28, 2008
Valentine's Day will always be important for Joseph Soukup Jr., but not for the reason that most people remember the holiday.

For the former Marine, it was the day his life almost came to an end.

Yesterday, with that day still a vivid memory, Soukup smiled as he held up a big symbolic check for $57,834 -- the benefits owed to him by the Veterans Administration.

"I trust him," Soukop said of Rep. Steve Israel (D-Huntington), who had fought for those benefits and held a news conference in Hauppauge on Friday.

The benefits were the final chapter of a journey Soukop took back into life, that started on Valentine's Day 2007.

Homeless for three years, he had been living in his red Ford F-150 truck, parked at the Mayfair Shopping Center in Commack. "It was near my post office box," he explained.

The weather report that day was for snow, ice and freezing temperatures. In the past, he would have driven to an underpass for protection from the weather. But, he realized there was not enough gas in his tank to keep warm through the night.

He thought he would freeze to death. So, he made a choice that -- for years -- he had previously rejected. He drove to the Veterans Administration hospital in Northport where he was put into a program for veterans suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. "I said to myself 'I was going to die'. But something inside me said 'go to the VA," Soukop, 61, explained.
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