Removing Disgraced Veterans
Soldiers from the 3d U.S. Infantry Regiment
Senators seek to make it easier for VA to exhume ‘disgraced’ veterans
By Karen Jowers
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators wants to make it easier to exhume and remove the remains of veterans convicted of serious crimes from national cemeteries.
“The burial grounds of our national cemeteries should be reserved for the bravest and most honorable among us,” said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, in a statement announcing the bill introduced Tuesday. The legislation would give the Department of Veterans Affairs extended authority to disinter the remains of any “disgraced veteran” who wouldn’t be deemed eligible for burial under the standards and practices of current law, Cornyn said.
Under current law, the VA can only reconsider a veteran’s eligibility for burial in national cemeteries for cases dating back to 2013. Families and victims’ advocates who want the VA to disinter someone buried before that time who had committed a serious crime must advocate for a law to be passed directing each individual’s exhumation and removal. That is “creating unnecessary delays and inequities,” senators stated.
The senators’ proposal would give the VA retroactive authority dating back to June 18, 1973, when the National Cemeteries Act was signed into law. A law took effect in 1997 that prohibits the burial of veterans who have committed serious crimes in national cemeteries.
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“Rather than setting an arbitrary cutoff for disinterment requests, this legislation will help ensure that the process is available to everyone,” said Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, in the announcement.
There are at least seven active disinterment petitions, in Hawaii, Alaska, Pennsylvania, Florida and California. Recent examples include the remains of Fernando V. Cota, a convicted rapist and alleged serial murderer, and George E. Siple who was convicted in the 1969 murder of Bertha Smith and died in prison 30 years later.
Category: Big Pentagon
Reading the article, I’m a bit on the fence here but seeing Senator Hirono at the end helps solidify my opinion. I 100 percent guarantee the first usage of this law would be to go after the Babbit funeral. There better be narrow interpretations written into the legislation to prevent politically driven usages.
This 100% ^
Yeahhhhh I’m gonna need more than just a vaguely worded “committed serious crimes”. We’re gonna go on allegations, not convictions? Ted Kennedy would have to go if it’s allegations, he had a serious string of sexual harassment and assault.
If only it was just that. The guy spent the Korean War serving on the front lines in France, leaves a woman in a submerged vent for over 8 hours while he sleeps it off, and not only did he not go to jail, he was reelected multiple times. And now this sack of shit is occupying prime real estate at Arlington National Cemetery.
I was starting with his lower level transgressions
Correct me if I am wrong, but where there Front Lines in France during the Korean War?
If there were front lines in Korea, you would’ve heard about it because France would have surrendered.
Brothers, too from all I’ve read. See what Dorothy Kilgallen reported in her biography of the Kennedys. She was invited as their guest to many sorriees at residences in and around the and her writings were legendary. The family loved publicity…until it didn’t. Strangely, Ms Kilgallen was discovered unalive on her bed with a couple of empty sedative bottles on her bedside table, but no prescription labels on them. Mysteriously untraceable… NO coroner’s report was released until all the other Ks had passed into the great beyond. Huuuuh? Ms K had arranged a meeting to provide the results of her research to a confidential source in NO la, but didn’t, for reasons. Strange,
isn’t it?
Point I intended but failed to make …sorry. There must be new standards legislated to prevent these scoundrels being buried in our beautiful and sacred military cemeteries. That they are considered deserving of a gravesite, military escort and funeral mocks the patriotic and courageous sacrifices of those who distinguished themselves and are buried and honored in US military cemeteries around the world. As Jesus himself said “…many are called but few chosen”. I pray as a country will continue to keep our Standards high! 🇺🇸
Indeed he dis. So did JFK.
So did brother JFK. Photos of Marilyn Monroe and him ‘horsing around’ in the White House indoor pool wearing just their birthday suits remain in scrapbooks of once adoring teenagers across our country. But to witness the moral decline throughout America is alarming.
You remember when we were in young school started with the Pledge of Allegiance and a reading of Scripture? I always longed to be a Flag Bearer. Then one wonderful day, it came my turn!
Oh, the joy! I still get goosebumps at military parades and hearing our National Anthem, 87y/o! God bless America, land that I love.🇺🇸
Was coming here to say the exact same thing
What is the summary of the Babbit funeral? As far as I know she was murdered by a government employee, within the confines of the U.S. Capitol.
She was a Air Force veteran. Her cause of death was not service related.
Is she being recommended for reinterment in Arlington?
Usually, when I see the name Maize Hirono the topic DOA and beyond ignorants.
This is a game…
unfortunately anyone who disagrees with the woke mob
or who ever history deems a dirt ball
will be looking for a new resting spot
It best read “CONVICTED” not accused.
But I think that they will screw the pooch on this.
Bi partisan just means there is 1 or 2 of the opposite party on board with whatever they are trying to cook up. It might start as a good intention, but the chance for shenanigans is just begging to be used and to some, too great to not use.
I don’t have a dog in this fight because I don’t want to be interred. I say let sleeping dogs lie.
Da Nang Dick Blumenthal is taking a nap?
“Served bravely and honorably” and “committed a serious crime” are not mutually exclusive.
Men who stepped into direct machine gun fire, blocked splinters from a grenade/IED with their body, dragged wounded comrades over 100 meters under a flurry of bullets to save their lives …
— then returned to the United States and …
beat up their wives … molested a child … defrauded their family and neighbors .. stole a car … robbed a bank … sold drugs, etc. etc.
have always existed, and they will always exist.
A serviceman’s performance DURING HIS TERM OF SERVICE should determine what honors — if any — should be afforded him, at his burial following his death, in a military cemetery.
Look to the Old Testament, where King David himself, who as a young man met and defeated Goliath in single combat, nevertheless spied a woman, bathing and summoned her … she became pregnant. (The text in the Bible does not explicitly state whether Bathsheba consented to sex with David.)
Whatever slings and fortunes of outrageous fortune may accrue to a soldier:
De mortuis nil nisi bonum.
This is another tool the Drats are forging to wield against veterans they don’t like.
Crimes? Disgraced veterans? What will the litmus test be, and who will define it’s limits? And who will enforce this? The VA? The same VA that can’t seem to reconcile the fact there are hundreds of thousands who had or still do receive benefits to which they are not and never were entitled?
side note – I’m still waiting for someone to explain why the VA does not require DD214’s from, and only from, the NPRC.
This is a terrible idea, though I do understand the sentiment. It is the same one that is still my knee-jerk, thankfully and despite so many examples of the exception to the rule, that “veteran” denotes a core character that is honorable and decent.
Will we then disinter the majority of “unattended” burials who have living family but no one would claim because of that veterans’ post-service life choices and events? Are any of you aware how many of those sad, unattended interments are of individuals who spent serious time in prison for crimes against the society they once swore to protect?
A Class X, or certain category of crimes, i.e., violence against a child or woman, “veterans” may still qualify for some VA benefits, to include burial at a National Cemetery.
Even then, unless their DD214 is noted or attached to their conviction in some way, they get interred. Cemetery administrators aren’t cross-referencing every interment request against some all-inclusive list of individuals with Class X felonies.
The only way I can support this is if the disgrace or crime occurred while they were active duty. Otherwise, we are at the top of a very long slippery slope with catchall terms like “disgraced”.