Department of Veterans Affairs

 Office of General Counsel (024)

810 Vermont Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20420

  Re:   FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT ADMINISTRATIVE APPEAL

 Joseph Average Veteran

C- file # 123-45-6789

To Whom It May Concern:

 §§ 5701(b)(1) and 5702; 38 C.F.R. §§ 1.525, 1.526, and 1.577 (2011), and the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. § 552.

You have now prepositioned yourself for a Writ of Mandamus at the CAVC if the VA remains recalcitrant and ignores you. We have had this happen as I mentioned to Leigh Ann, one of our very own members. I suggested she bypass any more of the standard letters above because, after two years, it’s more than obvious they’re plumb funning her. Leigh Ann followed my advice and they contacted a very able attorney who did just that. I enclose some of her (and VA’s) correspondence as well as a scathing denouncement of VA’s actions following the filing of the request for the Writ.

On July 13, 2013, petitioner Leigh Ann filed through counsel a petition for extraordinary relief in the nature of a writ of mandamus seeking to have VA provide to her attorney both a photocopy of her claims file and contact information for the VA employee responsible for supervising the photocopying process. She also requests attorney’s fees. Ms. Leigh Ann argues that she requested a copy of her claims file on April 25, 2012, and that the Baltimore regional office (RO) sent her a June 20, 2012, letter acknowledging her request and explaining that she would receive a prompt response. Despite the RO’s letter, she argues that she has not received a copy of her claims file. She also alleges that, between July 30, 2012, and June 17, 2013, she has sent requests for her claims file to the Baltimore and Detroit RO, VA Office of General Counsel, and Office of Government Services. Petitioner’s Brief Ex. A-M. She states that these letters, and various telephone calls to the Detroit RO, have been unanswered. Before proceeding to adjudicate the merits of the petition, the Court requests a response from the Secretary that addresses the allegations in the petition and provides supporting documentation. On consideration of the foregoing, it isORDERED that the Secretary, within 30 days from the date of this order, file an answer to the petition addressing its specific allegations and providing any documentation necessary to aid the

Court’s resolution of this matter.DATED: August 21, 2013

This is napalm to the VA. Their good name has now been besmirched by Leigh Ann even if she and the attorney refrained from using the pejorative “raised by wolves”. VA officials in DC tend to drop everything they are doing, come back from their three-martini lunches and roll up their sleeves. AT&T’s fiber optics heat up as they get to bottom of it. Some lazy daughter of a gun up in the Detroit RO has to apologize and fall on her sword. She is forced to pick up the phone and actually call Leigh Ann to ask her where to mail the c-file. No explanation for the horrendous delay. No apology. Nothing. Just a rude  “Where d’ya want this sucker, babe?” Leigh suggested that, under the circumstances, it might be appropriate to send it to the gentleman who requested it- that being her attorney of record. And then we have Gen. Shinseki’s response about the product shipped from Detroit. Apparently Leigh Ann and her attorney were not very helpful. Mr. Snyder failed to return the VA employee’s phone call. Shocked. I am shocked. What boorish behaviour on her attorney’s part.

The Secretary advises the Court that personnel from the Detroit RO, Ms. Littles, contacted Petitioner by telephone on August 22, 2013, requesting an alternative address to her Post Office (P.O.) Box number because the United Parcel Service (UPS) could not deliver a package (containing the copy of the claims file) to a P.O. Box. See Exhibit. Petitioner informed Ms. Littles that the copy should be sent to her attorney, Mr. Snyder. Id. Ms. Littles then called Mr. Snyder and left a voicemail message for him requesting that he contact her concerning the delivery of the claims file copy. Id. Mr. Snyder did not respond to the voicemail message.ld. UPS tracking information reflects that the package containing the copy of the claims file was delivered to Mr. Snyder on August 27,
2013, at an address in Rockville, Maryland, and that Mr. Snyder signed at the time of delivery.

And:

With regard to a delay in providing a copy of the claims file, the undersigned was informed by personnel at the Baltimore RO that the causes for such a delay included a high level of inventory, high volume of mail, and workload prioritization at the Baltimore RO. Personnel at the Detroit RO informed the undersigned that the claims file was forwarded to the Detroit RO as part of a special initiative to assist the Baltimore RO with claims processing and completion.

So if we understand this, the concerned raters at the Baltimore VARO, which is inundated in work, shipped it off to Detroit’s VARO which is in deeper claims shit that Baltimore. And:

The undersigned was further informed that following the issuance of the June 2013 rating decision the claims file was mistakenly forwarded to the scanning vendor on June 10, 2013. Pursuant to the special initiative, all claims files from the Baltimore RO were forwarded to the vendor for scanning after completion of the claims process. However, the undersigned was informed that Petitioner’s claims file should not have been sent to the scanning vendor in light of Petitioner’s request for a copy of her claims file. Personnel at the Detroit RO, as well as the Secretary, apologize for mistakenly forwarding the claims file to the vendor and further delaying Petitioner obtaining a copy of her claims file.

And the best of all:

The Secretary submits that where a claimant achieves the result desired in a petition because of a voluntary change in the Secretary’s conduct, rather than through a confession of error or a finding of error by this Court, the claimant is not a prevailing party for EAJA purposes.

So, from reading this, Ms. Littles, the tired, overworked, overbonused Detroit VA employee who drew the short straw, had to actually call a Veteran and ask her where to mail the c-file because she couldn’t be bothered to look up the correct address herself (in the c-file she was holding). I can almost hear that Steve Martin- ” Well. Excuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuse me! You mean you want me to look up the address? Are you mad?”

Last but not least, we have the petitioner’s response to this insanity. Lawyers are great for taking the phrase “Raised by wolves” and ameliorating it such that it doesn’t grate on the ears quite so rudely. It’s also an opportunity to inject some irony into the conversation and make yourself appear to just be a bumbling law dog striving to comply with the ever changing VA rules. I pluck from the response the low-hanging fruit:

Further, from the Respondent’s September 19th response,
it is not clear whether the papers sent to the undersigned
were copied from the original claims file or from a “scanned” file prepared by an unknown vendor on an unknown date. It is not known where the original claims file is held although the undersigned did receive a telephone call from a Baltimore VA Regional Office employee who implied he had the original file. Telephone calls to that employee by the undersigned to address these issues went unanswered and unreturned.

And of special interest to all of you when you request a complete, certified, unredacted copy of the original c-file:

What is known is that copies of portions of the claims file previously sent directly to the veteran are not contained in the copy sent by the Detroit VARO. For example, the veteran initiated several Congressional inquiries for which she received some replies but these replies and memos from various VA personnel regarding her requests are not part of the records sent the undersigned. This suggests that VA withholds certain items in the original claims file prior to scanning or selects only certain records to be scanned.

Whoa. Say it ain’t so. Selective copying of a c-file (certified) to include redacting certain items? And that niggling little problem of another Vet’s records polluting your own?

Finally, the copy sent to the undersigned contains a record from another veteran. Who is the point of contact to request that this record be removed from the Petitioner’s original and scanned file and associated with the correct file?

This laissez faire approach to copying claims files may be endemic to the system and we simply are unaware of it. As I have pointed out more than once, VA is the keeper of this file if you neglect to. Therefore, the file contains whatever VA says it does. It is also presumed to be correct due to the Presumption of Regularity. Who are we to say differently? Or, in VA’s favorite parlance-“Prove it.” If you rebut the evidence and prove the c-file is contaminated or missing certain documents, the Presumption of Regularity is overturned and the whole file is open to re-inspection with all evidence being possibly tainted or corrupted. A very important concept to know.

And here’s an important update to consider too:

https://asknod.wordpress.com/2015/01/12/2015-va-updates-on-getting-your-c-file/

And lastly, I add on March 12th, 2018:

Of course, if the  VA attorney you hire has access to the VA’s Veterans Benefits Management System (VBMS), via remote computer, they can view your records in real time rather than wait the six months you currently suffer before they are copied and mailed to you. I finally switched over to this as it’s the cat’s pajamas. You wonder how you ever managed with green firewood, wet blankets and smoke signals from mountaintops in the past thirty years. We’ve come a long way, baby.