Filmmakers Convicted of Fraud Took Advantage of Wounded Marines

Filmmakers convicted of defrauding government with school to teach wounded Marines
LA Times
By TONY PERRY
July 10, 2015

Court documents put the alleged
fraud from the VA at up to $1.2 million.

A longtime filmmaker-cinematographer and his wife were convicted Friday of defrauding the federal government of several hundred thousand dollars while running a program billed as preparing wounded Marines for jobs in the film industry.

A federal court jury in San Diego convicted Kevin Lombard and Judith Paixao, both 61, of conspiracy to commit fraud, theft from an organization receiving federal funds, and filing false claims. Paixao was also convicted of mail fraud involving the Bob Woodruff Foundation.

Prosecutors said the pair fraudulently billed the Department of Veterans Affairs for personal expenses, including cellphone bills for relatives, a Caribbean vacation, meals in fancy restaurants, and a New Year's Day sailing outing around San Diego Bay.

The VA was charged up to $88,000 per veteran for the 10-week course, according to evidence presented at trial.

The pair "capitalized on the misfortune of wounded Marines in their time of vulnerability and took advantage of the VA's commitment to serving wounded veterans," said U.S. Atty. Laura Duffy.
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Combat therapy one key at a time

Pianist Teaches Veterans How to Play Instruments for Therapy
ABC News
By BOB WOODRUFF
Nov. 19, 2012

Cpl. Tim Donley was on patrol in Afghanistan Feb. 9 when he stepped on an improvised explosive device. The blast caused the loss of both his legs and severe injury to his arm.

But when Donley stepped on stage at the 6th annual Stand Up for Heroes benefit this month, it wasn't his wounds the crowd noticed, but his remarkable voice and ability to rule the stage.

Donley, like many other veterans, is thankful for the gift of music, which can lift a veteran out of pain, depression and boredom. That is the goal of Music Corps, a program at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., started by the pianist Arthur Bloom.

Bloom teaches hundreds of wounded warriors to play instruments as a form of therapy.

"We try to figure out what people's backgrounds are, their musical interests and then whatever they want to do -- we try to move heaven and earth to make that happen," Bloom said.

"When they were injured, everything gets blown up," Bloom said. "Their life gets blown up in every sense of the word. And what we are trying to do, is not just come in and do 'Kumbaya,' but to re-inject a sense of excellence and working on musical material that is challenging and productive and rigorous, so that over time they see real progress."
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PTSD Iraq veteran becomes filmmaker to help others

Veteran Pursues Career in Filmmaking
ABC News
By BOB WOODRUFF
Oct. 31, 2012

Michael Chan's life changed when the Sept. 11 attack on the World Trade Center hit close to his lower east side Manhattan home.

"It was pretty horrific. You could hear the fire ambulances on FDR Drive," Chan said in ABC's Stand Up For Heroes series. "I thought to myself, you know, I want to make a difference. I knew on my 18th birthday, I would enlist."

"I think it was more of a shock at first," he added. "I didn't really understand what was going on. But I knew that I had to learn quick."

While many of Chan's peers were pursuing a higher education, he joined the Marines. Chan served two tours in Fallujah, Iraq, where he served as explosive ordinance security, combat security detachment for the U.S. Army, artillery support for the Al Anbar province and provisional infantry on foot.

Chan served in Fallujah from April 2004 to April 2008, during some of the hottest moments the area experienced.

"I guess we were mentally prepared, but at the same time, it's different when you're actually there in the fight," he said.

Since returning home from duty, Chan suffers from post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
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Former Army Ranger, filmaker trains with the best

Wounded Warrior Project commercials popping up all over the place. What is going on here? If you watch their commercials you'll notice that while they talk about the veterans of war coming home, they never really say what they do for them.

The latest one is the Brawny commercial we've all seen on TV and they say that they will donate $1 up to $250,000 to Wounded Warrior Project on this video.

Bob Woodruff, the reporter on this story, has a foundation ReMIND.org and on their site there is a group of partners they list. Wounded Warrior Project is not on it.

There is another list

Leadership Partners

Our corporate partners have made a strategic investment in the Nation’s most effective model for assisting our injured service members as they reintegrate back into society.

The following companies have made an annual contribution of more than $100,000 or more.

GFI Group, Inc.
H.C.S. Foundation
Lockheed Martin Foundation
TriWest Healthcare Alliance
The Art of Grace, Inc.
The Paul E. Singer Foundation

There are great groups out there but then there are some that have become moneymakers plain and simple.

It has gotten to the point where I go to watch a great report like this about an Army Ranger wanting to go into film and having George Lucas as a mentor that I almost didn't watch it. As soon as I saw the commercial for Wounded Warrior Project, I wanted to close the site but I really like Bob Woodruff, so I forced myself to get beyond the ad for WWP. I hope you do the same. I know how my readers feel about them, so please, just shut your eyes for the commercial and watch this report.

Former Soldier, Future Filmmaker
ABC
Former Army Ranger Hank Hughes aspires to be a filmmaker
04:20
07/31/2012

Textbook for War Surgeons citizens should face

They were afraid the American public couldn't take "looking at the pictures" when the troops, medics and surgeons along with the people of Iraq and Afghanistan have to see it all in real life? I've seen the pictures. All it takes is to do a few Google searches on the image link and there they are. This is what happens in war. There are body parts blown off and that is why there are so many amputations. Battlefield medical advances have saved lives that used to be lost. Are the pictures horrific? Absolutely, but considering the public does not even want to see the coffins or read the reports of how they died, anymore than they want to see the pictures of the wounded at Walter Reed and Bethesda, they are not very apt to read this either.

If our sensitivity is so insulted by having to read reports or view pictures, then we have no business ever sending men and women into combat in the first place. If we refuse to even see the pictures or face what they have to live with then we will never, ever be able to take care of the wounded or understand how so many can end up with PTSD.

I don't post the pictures I see on this blog. Not for the sake of the civilian reader. I dare you to look at the pictures and face the fact that you were not there to see it happen, but they were. I avoid posting them for the sake of the veterans reading this blog. They don't need to be reminded of what they lived with by pictures being posted. People who can't handle the results of war will not even bother to read the book at all.

It's safe to care and not be touched by any of this. I don't have that luxury. I have nightmares and sometimes find it really hard to get the images out of my brain. I never saw it in real life. I never faced having my life on the line in combat or faced with having to take a life. They have!There are times when even I can't get over it easily. I've been looking at the pictures of warfare for over 25 years. The only thing that has changed is the fact more survive now. If you still cannot understand why the rate of PTSD is so high, then you really need to expose yourself to at least some of what they are going through and living with. I believe if every American adult had to see ten pictures, every veteran with PTSD would be taken care of and honored for what we asked them to endure.




Senior Chaplain Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com
www.Namguardianangel.org
www.Woundedtimes.blogspot.com
"The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of early wars were treated and appreciated by our nation." - George Washington

Audio: Textbook for War Surgeons
Dr. Stephen P. Hetz, an author of “War Surgery,” discusses the new textbook and why he thinks it’s needed.

To Heal the Wounded
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr.
Published: August 5, 2008

The pictures show shredded limbs, burned faces, profusely bleeding wounds. The subjects are mostly American G.I.’s, but they include Iraqis and Afghans, some of them young children.

They appear in a new book, “War Surgery in Afghanistan and Iraq: A Series of Cases, 2003-2007,” quietly issued by the United States Army — the first guidebook of new techniques for American battlefield surgeons to be published while the wars it analyzes are still being fought.

Its 83 case descriptions from 53 battlefield doctors are clinical and bone dry, but the gruesome photographs illustrate the grim nature of today’s wars, in which more are hurt by explosions than by bullets, and body armor leaves many alive but maimed.

And the cases detail important advances in treating blast amputations, massive bleeding, bomb concussions and other front-line trauma.

Though it is expensively produced and includes a foreword by the ABC correspondent Bob Woodruff, who was severely injured by a roadside bomb in 2006, “War Surgery” is not easy to find. There were strenuous efforts within the Army over the last year to censor the book and keep it out of civilian hands.

Paradoxically, the book is being issued as news photographers complain that they are being ejected from combat areas for depicting dead and wounded Americans.
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Bob Woodruff Family Foundation Get PR Giant's Help

JWT to Volunteer Services for Bob Woodruff Family Foundation

Will Support Group That Helps Injured Service Members and Their Families
March 03, 2008: 09:00 AM EST

NEW YORK, March 3 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- JWT, the largest advertising agency in the U.S. and the fourth largest in the world, announced today that it will volunteer its broad marketing expertise to support the Bob Woodruff Family Foundation (BWFF), a nonprofit organization that raises awareness of the devastation caused by the "hidden injuries of war", traumatic brain injury (TBI) and combat stress.

Bob Woodruff, an ABC News anchor, was nearly killed in a roadside bomb attack while reporting from Iraq in January 2006. The Woodruff Family launched BWFF to help service members, veterans and their families as they navigate their road to recovery and reintegration back into their local communities.

"JWT has a long history of working with the U.S. Marine Corps, and we're honored to rally behind the BWFF," says JWT chairman and CEO Bob Jeffrey. "This is a chance to use our resources for the greater good and to give back to those brave men and women who sacrifice everything in the line of duty."

JWT has handled the U.S. Marine Corps account since 1946; founder James Walter Thompson was a Marine Corps veteran.
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TBI Struggle for Words Frustrates Woodruff

Woodruff interviews U.S. soldiers in Iraq on Jan. 29, 2006, just moments before a roadside bomb went off, ripping into his skull. His head was unprotected, and the explosion almost killed him. Doug Vogt, an ABC cameraman, was also seriously wounded in the blast.

Struggle for Words Frustrates Woodruff
By Christine Dugas,USA Today
Posted: 2008-02-25 15:56:25
Filed Under: Health News
(Feb. 25) -- One year after Bob Woodruff spoke about his brain concussion on an ABC documentary, he is busy flying around the world on assignments and continuing to draw attention to the signature injury of the war in Iraq: traumatic brain injury.

His recovery seems miraculous, considering how the shrapnel from a roadside bomb had ripped into his skull on Jan. 29, 2006. Woodruff, 46, is back at work at ABC news, although he does not have his previous job as a news anchor — at least not yet.

"I don't know if I could do that," he says. "I think it's possible. But one thing that I know for sure is that I'm going to remain as a journalist because I have always loved journalism."

Woodruff now works with a team to produce more in-depth assignments. He can better cope with longer projects because his traumatic brain injury (TBI) caused a language disorder that makes it hard for him to come up with words. And for a journalist, nothing could be more frustrating.

Woodruff continues to improve and often speaks with ease and confidence. But he still occasionally runs into a roadblock in his brain.

In a recent interview at his office, Woodruff described how reading and writing have helped his brain improve. After he got out of the hospital he was not willing to just sit at home, he said, "watching sports on TV all day long with a — what do you call the thing that controls the TV?" He couldn't come up with the term remote control.

Woodruff has a disorder called aphasia. It happens when a stroke or TBI affects the language side of the brain, usually the left side. The National Aphasia Association estimates that 1 million people in the USA have it.
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