Success Story

Thanks to LAFLA Sleuth, Disabled Veteran Puts Life Back Together

In November 1999, a man woke up on a table in the psychiatric ward at UCLA. he had no idea who he was or what he was doing there. Neither did anyone else. He was discharged, given a bus voucher and a list of shelters and sent to Skid Row, where he ended up at Transition House. With nothing to go on, a staff member at Transition House called LAFLA's Homeless Veteran's project for help.

Paralegal Rick Little went right to work. He got "John Doe" admitted to the Volunteers of America detox unit. John Doe wasn't using drugs, but it was the only option available. Without an ID a homeless person can't get into some homeless shelters, which receive funding based on Social Security numbers.

In the weeks that followed, the Homeless Veterans Project talked extensively with the man. They examined his tattoos and recognized one that signaled an Army infantry unit. The man remembered something about Las Vegas. Rick called two Las Vegas hospitals to see if any John Does had come in with a head injury. A nurse at the second hospital remembered seeing such a man in August. She had only the first name - Bob*.

Checking Fingerprints
The Homeless Veterans Project pressed on with the little that they had, a first name and a tattoo. They called Army Headquarters in Washington, D.C. A desk sergeant suggested trying Fort Irwin, an army base in the desert near Barstow. Rick drove Bob there. An officer used Bob's fingerprints and plugged them into the army's central database. Now he had a full name: Bob T. Bob had served five years in the army and been discharged honorably in 1988.

Establishing his identity was crucial. Now the Homeless Veterans Project could help Bob get a Veteran's ID, which opened up more doors. He could get a bed at a homeless shelter, he could apply for County General Relief benefits, and he could access the VA hospital for healthcare. More information was needed, however, before he could set about finding a job and take full control of his life.

With help from the Internet, they found Bob's mother in Saint Lucie, Florida. However, Bob was not yet ready to talk to her. He first needed to remember the things he was being told about himself.

Rick gave Bob an employment aptitude test. He scored off the charts in math. With this information, Bob's past began to trickle back to him. It wasn't pleasant.

Bob had married, then divorced and had two children. His ex-wife had refused visitation, and he subsequently started on a downward spiral of drinking and drug abuse. His VA medical tests indicated he suffered from a form of mental illness. Bob moved to LA where he was robbed and struck on the head. The blow severed a nerve behind his nose, causing him to lose his sense of smell and taste.

Bob had owned a measuring and estimating business in Wisconsin and worked at a carpet store in Las Vegas. Rick checked on carpet businesses in Las Vegas and found one that confirmed that Bob had indeed worked there. Now they had enough to put together a resume.

They went to the Private Industry Council's center on Skid Row where homeless people can get help compiling and printing resumes. The Salvation Army provided Bob a presentable outfit for job interviews. With his first GR check, Bob purchased a beeper with voice mail so he had a number to give to prospective employers. He also bought a blue plastic folder to keep his resume from getting crumpled in his backpack.

Getting a job is not easy when you are homeless. You have no place to leave your things. You can check your belongings in or out of a shelter only once a day. And you have to come up with information—address, telephone numbers, references—not readily available to homeless people.

Bob gave his address as the Milner Hotel and Rick as his reference. One day Bob got called for an interview at Home Depot. But it was too late to check his backpack. He worried that the interviewers would realize he was homeless.

"The biggest problem," says Bob, "is that you know you are homeless. You put on a facade that says you belong in society, but you don't feel like you belong. You know you are leaving the job interview to return to Skid Row."

Getting to Work
But Bob convinced Home Depot personnel that he would make a good employee, and they offered him a job in the measuring department at the Western and Sunset store. His first paycheck didn't come until three weeks after he started.

That three-week period was particularly tough. On the first day of work, he didn't have a voucher for the bus or the $1.35 to ride the Redline subway. He took a chance and boarded it anyway. As luck would have it, a transit police officer asked to see his fare. He begged the officer not to put him off the train. The officer issued a ticket, but told him he could continue riding. When he got back to Skid Row, he asked the Homeless Veterans Project for more bus vouchers.

To get to work at 8 a.m. Bob had to get up at 4 a.m. to take a shower before the other shelter residents started lining up. He had to leave before breakfast was served in the morning and returned after the last meal in the evening. He was starving. He finally told Rick he was hungry and Rick got him some vouchers for a shelter cafe. He also had great difficulties with his clothes. He had to go to the Volunteers of America every night to wash and dry his only presentable outfit. That took him until nine at night.

Even after he started getting paid, he remained on Skid Row so he could save money for rent. For two months he turned his paychecks into money orders and gave them to a counselor at a homeless shelter in downtown Los Angeles to hold. Bob had cash stolen from his pocket once before and knew that it wasn't safe to carry money.

Housed
One day, two women appeared at Home Depot and told Bob that they needed someone to measure the floor of a small house they were getting ready to rent. It was a charming craftsman cottage near Silverlake and Sunset. After he had taken the measurements, Bob asked if he could rent it. The owners agreed, and they worked out a deal allowing Bob to supplement the rent with repair work. He painted it and furnished it with a couch that someone down the street was throwing away. He managed to purchase a small ten-inch TV and, most importantly, a telephone. He was finally ready to call his mother.

Others on Skid Row have told Bob that he is unusual. Many take as long as 15 years to get out of homelessness. He hit Skid Row in November but was out by the following April. He gives much of the credit for the speed of his recovery to LAFLA paralegal Rick Little and the Homeless Veterans Project. Not many would have persisted in finding out his identity. He still calls the Project whenever he feels overwhelmed. And Rick thinks he has a solid claim to Veteran's benefits, which he is pursuing.

Though his ordeal was painful, Bob says that in some ways it made him a better person. "Before I landed on Skid Row I was proud and arrogant and looked down on anybody who didn't have a car as nice as mine. But pride is the first thing to go on Skid Row. You can almost always get food—it's the things that keep you decent like a toothbrush, socks and underwear that are hard to come by. And you can't always find a bathroom."

It was a humbling experience. Now he knows that a little bad luck can send even the best person into poverty. He is letting a friend he met at the shelter stay with him until he gets on his feet again.

In the nine months that LAFLA and Inner City Law Center have run the Bill Smith Homeless Veterans Project, we have learned that the process of obtaining Veterans' benefits can take months or even years. In order to stabilize the veterans so they will be around to collect their benefits, a myriad of services must be provided. Sometimes it even means finding out who they are.

*Bob's name has been changed to protect his privacy.

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