My son Aaron died in Utah of medical neglect while under Army orders.
He received no medical care for his seizure disorder after he left our home in Portland, under deployment orders for Iraq, to report to his Utah Army National Guard unit.
Here in our home in Portland in 2003, he was starting a treatment regimen at Providence Hospital paid for by the Oregon Health Plan.
He was sick enough to qualify for OHP coverage, but George W. Bush needed him on the other side of the world.
They held him in Utah under medical review (which included NO MEDICAL CARE OR TREATMENT OF ANY KIND), where he was homeless and too ill to support himself. I went broke that year, trying to keep my son alive in Utah.
After Aaron died, the Army threw a real nice ceremony for him. Too bad he wasn't alive to enjoy it.
Here in Oregon, most people don't believe that Aaron's death was a consequence of the occupation of Iraq, wonder what I'm so worked up and "bitter" about.
I know that my son would have gone to Iraq and given his life gladly for his brother, his unit and his nation. It would have ended his pain, the pain that began with his kidnapping in 1996, and he would have died feeling good about himself, the first time he felt that way since his kidnappers took him away and stuck him in the desert of Mormon Utah.
Aaron had a warrior's heart, a tiger's heart. He got it from me, and I from my father before me.
Here in our home in Portland in 2003, he was starting a treatment regimen at Providence Hospital paid for by the Oregon Health Plan.
He was sick enough to qualify for OHP coverage, but George W. Bush needed him on the other side of the world.
They held him in Utah under medical review (which included NO MEDICAL CARE OR TREATMENT OF ANY KIND), where he was homeless and too ill to support himself. I went broke that year, trying to keep my son alive in Utah.
After Aaron died, the Army threw a real nice ceremony for him. Too bad he wasn't alive to enjoy it.
Here in Oregon, most people don't believe that Aaron's death was a consequence of the occupation of Iraq, wonder what I'm so worked up and "bitter" about.
I know that my son would have gone to Iraq and given his life gladly for his brother, his unit and his nation. It would have ended his pain, the pain that began with his kidnapping in 1996, and he would have died feeling good about himself, the first time he felt that way since his kidnappers took him away and stuck him in the desert of Mormon Utah.
Aaron had a warrior's heart, a tiger's heart. He got it from me, and I from my father before me.
THREE YEARS after his death, the Department of Defense has still not complied with my request for my son's medical records, citing a "large backlog of requests."
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