Injured Marine Helped By Gary Sinise Charity Speaks With 10News

This story has it all but most people are talking about a group of Marines doing something awful in Afghanistan.

This story is about what is possible when someone is helped and given hope, cared about by the Marines he served with and about love.

This is the kind of story that is played out everyday in Afghanistan and happened in Iraq but few ever know about it.

Injured Marine Helped By Actor's Charity Speaks With 10News

Fundraiser Will Be Held March 1; Tickets On Sale At Old Town Temecula Community Theatre

POSTED: 11:19 am PST January 13, 2012
SAN DIEGO -- His left arm and both legs were ripped from his body, his ear drums shattered. He wasn't one of the "lucky" who lose consciousness. Corporal Juan Dominguez remembers it all.

"I woke up with a bad feeling that day, I knew something was going to happen," said Dominguez.

The 27-year-old Marine Corporal was on foot patrol in Sangin, Afghanistan assigned to a battalion from Camp Pendleton. A rifleman on the front line-safeguarding the way for others- when he stepped on a 30 pound improvised explosive device. It threw him 15 feet in the air.

"It was a Saving Private Ryan moment where everything was in slow motion. I saw dirt flying and I saw my legs. It looked like mangled raw meat. I knew at that time I was a double (amputee) but I didn't notice my arm right away. I was screaming for God to take the pain away. I was saying please if you are going to take me, take me now. If you are going to keep me on this earth, please make me numb God," Dominguez said.

Within minutes his fellow Marines found him in a cloud of smoke and they refused to let him die.


"They kept screaming at me saying this was my ticket to go home and see my daughter. They were bawling, these guys were my best friends," according to Dominguez.

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Veterans discharged after 2002 with PTSD to receive health care for life

This is good for these veteran but what about all the others?

Veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder to receive health care for life
By Michael Doyle - Bee Washington Bureau
Friday, Jan. 13, 2012

WASHINGTON -- A federal judge has quietly approved a settlement that will deliver better benefits to nearly 2,100 veterans who've been medically discharged since 2002 with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Under the settlement, one of several similar efforts now under way, affected veterans discharged with PTSD will get lifetime health care and post-exchange privileges. The affected veterans had been discharged with disability ratings that were too low to receive such benefits.

Anthony Koller, for one, is an Army veteran who lives in Little Elm, Texas, about 50 miles north of Fort Worth. He survived 14 months in Iraq before being discharged with PTSD. His initial low disability rating, though, left the married father of three adrift.

"We live on a month-to-month basis," Koller said in a court declaration.

Under the recently approved class-action settlement, Koller's family will receive health care under TRICARE, and he can apply for special compensation payments, among other benefits.

Chris Crotte of Sacramento was medically discharged with PTSD in April 2008 after two tours in Iraq as a forward observer with the 17th Field Artillery Brigade. His back, he said, was "messed up." He slept poorly. His mind was jumpy. Officials marked him as only 10% disabled and cut him loose.

"I got out, and hit the road," Crotte said. "I constantly bounced around; I was moving from state to state for a while."

Now, he's studying auto mechanics and living in West Sacramento. "Getting medical care would be good," he said.

From December 2002 to October 2008, the military medically discharged about 4,300 soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines with PTSD and disability ratings below 50%.
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Iraq veteran with rifle killed by police in Kansas

Veteran with rifle fatally shot by Raytown police
BY DONALD BRADLEY
The Kansas City Star

The man shot to death by Raytown police Thursday while threatening officers with a rifle was a veteran of the Iraq war who had recently learned he was being sent to Afghanistan.

In describing events that led up to the shooting of 26-year-old Robert G. Long, Raytown police Capt. Ted Bowman on Friday said he did not want to suggest that Long’s military service was responsible for what happened. In talking with officers during the ordeal, Long, a reserve medic, said he was proud of serving his country.

Long and a roommate began drinking about 7 a.m. Thursday, first at a residence then moving to a bar. In early afternoon, employees at the bar removed the two men after they became confrontational. When Long and the roommate attempted to re-enter the bar about 2 p.m., the police were, Bowman said.

An officer then drove Long to a residence in the 900 block of East 79th Street. Shortly after that, neighbors called police when they saw Long staggering in the yard with a handgun. He reportedly fired a round into the house.
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Discharge haunts walk to aid veterans

Discharge haunts walk to aid veterans
BY KATIE THISDELL

A Stafford County man walking across the country to honor veterans was less than honorably discharged from the Marine Corps in 1988, records show.

For the past several months, Leonard “Mac” McQuown has been the face of the Florida-based Project Foot, an organization to help homeless veterans and military families. Last month, a Virginia agency released a warning about Project Foot, saying that required paperwork to verify charitable donations had not been submitted.

McQuown, 50, has touted his record with the Marines as part of a 15,000-mile, five-year walk across the country.

He previously listed an honorable discharge as part of his online biography on projectfoot.org, but told The Free Lance–Star this week that he actually received a bad-conduct discharge. He is still eligible for VA benefits.

Records from the Marine Corps show that during the last year of his active service, he had 200 days in unauthorized absences and confinement.

Donors should know McQuown’s background, said a Marine spokeswoman.

“When you look at this whole picture, I feel like the whole picture wasn’t there for most folks, and I feel like it’s significant enough” to be shared, said Maj. Shawn Haney, public affairs officer for Marine Corps Manpower & Reserve Affairs at Quantico.
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Veterans, Neighbors Clash Over Proposed VA Facility for PTSD

When will people ever get it? These veterans are troubled and need help but they are not dangerous. Aside from spending the last 30 years of my life with one of them, I have never met a veteran I felt I needed to be afraid of. These men were willing to die for the sake of someone else. The average person has no idea what most of these veterans are like because all they read about is one of them being arrested. The only way for people to learn is for them to meet these veterans face to face and listen to them.

Veterans, Neighbors Clash Over Proposed VA Facility

New Psychiatric Facility Would Provide Help To Veterans

SAN DIEGO -- Nearly 150 people packed the Mission Hills Town Council meeting Thursday night to hear the Veterans Administration proposal to put a psychiatric facility at the now vacant Thomas Jefferson School of Law building in Old Town.

The new facility would provide single room residences for 40 veterans suffering from the emotional stresses of their tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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