Hoe To Get A Lawyer Anytime From Day One

[Guest elizabeth]

Hi i just want to state va will not let you get a lawyer before it goes to bva WRONG YOU CAN NOT HIRE A LAWYER FOR YOURSELF BUT someone can hire a lawyer for you they and you must sign a statment you are not paying them anything so you can have a lawyer from the first day you file a claim ELIZABETH :(

[Guest elizabeth]

Hi i just want to state va will not let you get a lawyer before it goes to bva WRONG YOU CAN NOT HIRE A LAWYER FOR YOURSELF BUT someone can hire a lawyer for you they and you must sign a statment you are not paying them anything so you can have a lawyer from the first day you file a claim ELIZABETH :(

terry you are wrong you are talking about va law on lawyers and fee you missed the point i state anyone no you can hire a lawyer foy you they must sign a agreement you are not paying this person any money to do this for you va doesn;t enter the picture at all some else does the hireing for the lawyer agrees to pay this lawyer for your case this is a fact because i have a lawyer who worked for va 30 years and he;s my lawyer and that;s how it done we are going that way now remeneber this has nothing to do with va everything has a loop hole an that;s hoe you get around va ELIZABETH :(

[john999]

If vets could hire lawyers from day one I bet this backlog and horrible mess of a VA system could be turned around in a hurry. If it was like SSA there would be lawyers advertising on TV for veteran claims. Not paying interest on wrongly denied claims is a moral crime. If the VA just had to pay interest on back pay that would make a difference. As it is there is no incentive for the VA to not deny claims forever. Also, having the claim die with the veterans is BS. The spouse is left to try and get DIC on a wrongly denied or delayed claim. What a crime.

[SLEDGE]

Ken Carpenter is my lawyer.

We got TDIU and nobody owed him anything because nobody hired him.

A GIFT is allowed if it's not tied to anything the lawyer has done for the vet.

After the BVA issued a decision in my case I actually hired Carpenter.

We are still fighting for my back pay.

If lawyers were to be alloweed from the start veterans would benefit across the board.

The VA would lose.

Congress would lose.

The DoD would lose.

The president would lose.

As long as the VA is not legaly responsible to any court we will never enjoy the same rights under the law as any normal private citizen, someone who never served their country.

We were all ready to die for our country.

We did not, however, know that serving our country meant that we would be treated like crap by the country we served if we got injured.

Don't write your congressman, run for congess.

sledge

[Guest fla_viking]

Dear Fellow Veterans & Friends.

Actully we do have the same rights to courts and lawyers as everyone else does. ITs just no one knows it.

3 years ago the RO when it denied my back pay. Went into the computer and changed my direct deposit bank # and lost my check. I had 4 days before I was being evicted. I wrote my congressman Rick Keller the VA administraton and lawyers. I warned them if lost my home or the lights were shut off. I would surrender to a Fed Jury trial in progress for my own safety. This would get me arrested where I would have my own day in court with a real judge, jury, lawyer and ill tell them everything I know about your criminal acts. 4 days latter my check was in my mail box.

This illegal wall congress built around the court to keep vets out is no more legitimate than the berlin wall was. Once you cross on the other side its a whole new ball game. Just think of it the way Cubans do. If they are caught in the ocean. They are deported back If they put one foot on US soil. They have constitutional rights to courts lawyers ect. Once you place your foot in that court room and declare your need for protection. Man you just open up a can of worms for the VA, the courts, and raise interestng issues of what do we do with 3 rd class citizens who wont take that any more.

Terry Hggins

[Berta]

Just a thought on this-

I have a great lawyer- last time we talked it was primarily about his recent VA SC claim.

A local former vet rep helped him ( the guy was canned by AL so I dont know why he got involved with this guy-but as a major local attorney he doesnt want to go to my vet reps at the VAMC-many people know hom and he seems reluctant to have anyone see if at the VA-long story there) this former rep had failed to note specific medical records he had , 2 GSWs in Nam and some other stuff in his SMRs-and the claim seemed to lack pertinent data the way it was stated. OK---

He is civil, and criminal attorney as well as handles numerous other stuff like wills, estate planning etc-

I had to explain to him a lot of the basic claims criteria when I re-did his claim-

my point- who is going to train these attorneys to represent us even if we could hire one right from the git go-my lawyer is brilliant-has great reputation- but he would have to go through extensive training to even begin to help a vet properly.

Also I am waiting to hear on this one-

I have a vet who finally won at the BVA. The VARO then lowballed him at 40% so we immediately NODDed that as his evidence shows TDIU.

His CAVC lawyers were supposed to get over $8,000 bucks from his retro.

I read the VA's letter on that very carefully-

the lawyers have to fulfill 5 conditions for payment-long story -sorry -but I believe that the NOD I prepared on that for him- with VA case law attached- will lower that to 4,000.

And guess what- they didnt do a SINGLE thing to help his claim. This claim was a decade old. My vet rep asked me to help

and brought him over here because the POA with them was void due to the attorney involvement.

I got his BVA denial and printed it off the VA web site- BINGO-

his problem was his nexus and here it was in the first BVA paragrph and No one, not even his attorneys even found it. It was right there-

I spent the whole weekend expanding on the nexus and he got an IMO ( no one had suggested that to him either in 10 years-longer story- he succeeded-

My point- your average lawyer-and I sure love lawyers- does not get well versed into Title 38 in bar school-

you all here know by far more about the 38 CFR and USC regs then they do.

I have worked claims for over a decade and I still read the VBM and check each reg as I need it-

If I prepare a NOD for a local vet or an appeal it usually takes a good bit of my time-because I go over all their paperwork -and an SOC response or a I-9-that takes even more time-because I carefully argue each negative point with a referal to evidence.

But I am not getting $125 an hour like a lawyer would get-that can add up even before they get their sec to type it all up-

where are the lawyers out there who would know enough about 38 regs, BVA appeals, and the medical criteria and SC nexus to properly give claims help if we could hire them?

I believe that if vets got the actual C & P results attached right to the SOC,

made the C & P doc carefully go over the issues -at the C & P itself

and were willing to attach copies of evry reg that helps their claim as well as med treatices, CAVC decisions-

etc- we would not need lawyers-

that isnt the problem-

it is the fact that your paperwork is collecting dust at these VAROS who say they are overwhelmed and therefore they just skim through it all-

it is by far easier for them to deny the claim then to try to understnd your reasons for the claim.

With Lawyers or not- we are still going to be forced to wait years for decisions in many cases- decisions that could have been resolved much sooner if we had the proper attention to our claims in the first place.

And if the medical evidence or the nexus is lacking- a lawyer cannot perform a miracle there either. Berta

Edited May 17, 2006 by Berta

[Guest elizabeth]

Just a thought on this-

I have a great lawyer- last time we talked it was primarily about his recent VA SC claim.

A local former vet rep helped him ( the guy was canned by AL so I dont know why he got involved with this guy-but as a major local attorney he doesnt want to go to my vet reps at the VAMC-many people know hom and he seems reluctant to have anyone see if at the VA-long story there) this former rep had failed to note specific medical records he had , 2 GSWs in Nam and some other stuff in his SMRs-and the claim seemed to lack pertinent data the way it was stated. OK---

He is civil, and criminal attorney as well as handles numerous other stuff like wills, estate planning etc-

I had to explain to him a lot of the basic claims criteria when I re-did his claim-

my point- who is going to train these attorneys to represent us even if we could hire one right from the git go-my lawyer is brilliant-has great reputation- but he would have to go through extensive training to even begin to help a vet properly.

Also I am waiting to hear on this one-

I have a vet who finally won at the BVA. The VARO then lowballed him at 40% so we immediately NODDed that as his evidence showsT

His CAVC lawyers were supposed to get over $8,000 bucks from his retro.

I read the VA's letter on that very carefully-

the lawyers have to fulfill 5 conditions for payment-long story -sorry -but I believe that the NOD I prepared on that for him- with VA case law attached- will lower that to 4,000.

And guess what- they didnt do a SINGLE thing to help his claim. This claim was a decade old. My vet rep asked me to help

and brought him over here because the POA with them was void due to the attorney involvement.

I got his BVA denial and printed it off the VA web site- BINGO-

his problem was his nexus and here it was in the first BVA paragrph and No one, not even his attorneys even found it. It was right there-

I spent the whole weekend expanding on the nexus and he got an IMO ( no one had suggested that to him either in 10 years-longer story- he succeeded-

My point- your average lawyer-and I sure love lawyers- does not get well versed into Title 38 in bar school-

you all here know by far more about the 38 CFR and USC regs then they do.

I have worked claims for over a decade and I still read the VBM and check each reg as I need it-

If I prepare a NOD for a local vet or an appeal it usually takes a good bit of my time-because I go over all their paperwork -and an SOC response or a I-9-that takes even more time-because I carefully argue each negative point with a referal to evidence.

But I am not getting $125 an hour like a lawyer would get-that can add up even before they get their sec to type it all up-

where are the lawyers out there who would know enough about 38 regs, BVA appeals, and the medical criteria and SC nexus to properly give claims help if we could hire them?

I believe that if vets got the actual C & P results attached right to the SOC,

made the C & P doc carefully go over the issues -at the C & P itself

and were willing to attach copies of evry reg that helps their claim as well as med treatices, CAVC decisions-

etc- we would not need lawyers-

that isnt the problem-

it is the fact that your paperwork is collecting dust at these VAROS who say they are overwhelmed and therefore they just skim through it all-

it is by far easier for them to deny the claim then to try to understnd your reasons for the claim.

With Lawyers or not- we are still going to be forced to wait years for decisions in many cases- decisions that could have been resolved much sooner if we had the proper attention to our claims in the first place.

And if the medical evidence or the nexus is lacking- a lawyer cannot perform a miracle there either. Berta

the lawyer is mr lenord his phone number is free he also has his own wed so what do you have to lose?1-877 657-5803 don;t make statments you cannot back up anything va states i would doubt so call jhon lenord and find out yourself you might learn something ELIZABETH