Veterans Court Saving Lives One At A Time

Ex-Marine's path to sobriety began with Veterans Court
Green Bay Press Gazette
Paul Srubas, Press-Gazette Media
January 31, 2015

"Veterans Court attempts to use the power of the court to enforce treatment plans, training, sobriety and whatever else qualified participants need. It's like probation on steroids"

Jeff Vanstraten distinctly remembers the feel of the gun in his hands, the process of filling the clip, the sound of chambering a round, and looking at the police outside his home and thinking how easily he could pick one of them off.

It was about 9:30 p.m., Jan. 15, 2012. Vanstraten, then 40, had consumed his usual 30-pack of beer and was well into another. It must've reacted badly with the pain medication he had been taking for his bad back, because he can't remember many other details of what went on that day in his west-side Green Bay rental home.

He learned later that a buddy, concerned he was suicidal, called the police, who dispatched a SWAT team that surrounded his house. Vanstraten kept drinking and loaded his gun.

"I don't know if I wanted to die that day ...or what," he said. "When I picked up the gun, I don't know if I felt invincible or what, but I remember every detail of handling that gun. I don't know if that's a military thing or not."

"You're in the Army 3½ years and in your mind, time stands still," said Tom Hinz, former Brown County Executive, who mentors in the Veterans Court. "You come back, find all your friends are married, have jobs, kids and mortgages. You're different, too, but sometimes you don't understand that. Or while you were away, your significant other learned to take care of everything, pay the bills, take the kids to school, and when you come back, where do you fit in?"
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