It often fails at that task, a Reuters investigation finds.Ī review of individuals' military pay records, government reports and other documents, along with interviews with dozens of current and former soldiers and other military personnel, confirms Aiken's case is hardly isolated. It is responsible for accurately paying America's 2.7 million active-duty and Reserve soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines. This agency, with headquarters in Indianapolis, Indiana, has roughly 12,000 employees and, after cuts under the federal sequester, a $1.36 billion budget. The Pentagon agency that identified the overpayments, clawed them back and resisted Aiken's pleas for explanation and redress is the Defense Finance and Accounting Service, or DFAS (pronounced "DEE-fass"). Further, even after Aiken complained, the Defense Department didn't return the bulk of the money to Aiken until after Reuters inquired about his case. The money the military took back from Aiken resulted from accounting and other errors, and it should have been his to keep. "He would have an outburst … (and) they would treat him as if he was like a bad soldier," says Monica. With short-term and long-term memory loss, he struggled to keep appointments and remember key dates and events. He limped from office to office to press his case to an unyielding bureaucracy. And then you have to fight to get the money back."Īiken's injuries made that fight more difficult. "They just hit one button and they take your whole paycheck away. The couple was desperate from "just not knowing where food's going to come from," he says. At Christmas, Operation Santa Claus provided the family with presents - one for each child, per the charity's rules.Įventually, they began pawning their possessions - jewelry, games, an iPhone, and even the medic bag Aiken used when saving lives in Afghanistan. Aiken took out an Army Emergency Relief Loan to cover expenses of their December move into a new apartment. As their money dwindled, the couple began hitting church-run food pantries. Beyond that, "they couldn't even tell me what the debts were from," he says.Īt the time, Aiken was living off base with his fiancee, Monica, and her toddler daughter, while sharing custody of his two children with his ex-wife. For all of December, his pay came to $117.99.Īll Aiken knew was that the Defense Department was taking back money it claimed he owed. It had started that October, when he received $2,337.56, instead of his normal monthly take-home pay of about $3,300. The Defense Department was withholding big chunks of his pay.
His war-related afflictions included traumatic brain injury, severe post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), abnormal eye movements due to nerve damage, chronic pain, and a hip injury.īut the problem that loomed largest that holiday season was different. Defense Department.Īiken, then 30 years old, was in his second month of physical and psychological reconstruction at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, after two tours of combat duty had left him shattered. Not insurgents in Iraq, or Taliban fighters in Afghanistan - enemies he had already encountered with distinguished bravery. Army medic Shawn Aiken was once again locked in desperate battle with a formidable foe. EL PASO, Texas - As Christmas 2011 approached, U.S.
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