Roberts spoke to Special Agent Raymond Vasil at the VA OIG who assured Roberts that Vasil would look into the alleged fraud, according to the sworn deposition. Roberts took Vasil’s assurance at face value.
Accusing the VA of committing fraud turned out to be a bad move for Roberts’ navigation through the VA bureaucracy, which a veteran’s advocate called a “culture of denial of veterans’ claims, where denying claims gets bureaucrats promoted.”
The veteran’s advocate spoke on background, out of concern for the political sensitivity of the topic.
On March 27, 2004 Special Agent Vasil and Cossairt met with Roberts at his home in Gillett, (Oconto County), Wisconsin, according to Roberts’ affidavit, and asked a string of questions that made it clear to Roberts the focus of their questions pertained to the 1969 aircraft accident at Naples, and not the alleged VA fraud.
The VA’s Vasil reportedly insisted on a subsequent May 31, 2004 interview to be conducted at the Oconto County Sheriff’s office.
At the May 31, 2004 interview, according to Roberts’ deposition, Vasil became immediately abusive to Roberts by making a snide remark that “they brought all their paperwork,” after Roberts had carried in his large file and supporting evidence.
At the meeting, Vasil asserted that Roberts’ 1969 hospitalization after his Shore Patrol incidence was not a valid stressor for the purpose of diagnosing PTSD, though Vasil has no formal authority to issue such a determination, and Roberts had already been diagnosed by medical professionals on this very point.
Vasil called Roberts “nothing but a drunk,” and reportedly, said the documents Roberts had in possession (a Feb. 6, 1969, “Special Enlisted Personnel Performance Evaluation” pertaining to the death of his fellow airman on Feb. 4, 1969 and consistent with Roberts’ said role at the scene) meant “nothing” to Vasil.
Subsequently, after several months of complex machinations through the VA bureaucracy, Roberts’ benefits were severed in November 2004.
While Roberts was appealing the decision through the VA channels and was set to appeal to the VA Appeals Court—the US Court of Appeals for Veteran’s Claims in Washington D.C.—empowered by federal statute to hear the case, the United States Department of Justice, in the office of the US Atty for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Steven Biskupic, indicted Roberts in April 2005 on six counts of mail fraud.
In September 2005, a superseding indictment changed the charges to five counts of wire fraud.
No investigative agent from the Treasury Department, Secret Service or FBI investigated the allegations of federal mail or wire fraud against Roberts.
Only the VA’s Special Agent Vasil conducted an investigation. Though his position title is “special agent,” Vasil has no formal law enforcement training or benefit adjudication experience.
Said one hostile veteran advocate, “A cop Vasil is not, just an idiot with a badge.”
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