Scott Friedman, NBC 5
Investigates
The Department of Defense confirms to
NBC 5 Investigates that accused Fort Hood shooter Major
Nidal Hasan has been paid more than $278,000 since the Nov.
5, 2009 shooting that left 13 dead 32 injured.
The Department of Defense
confirms to
NBC 5 Investigates that
accused Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Hasan has now been paid
more than $278,000 since the Nov. 5, 2009 shooting that left
13 dead 32 injured. The Army said under the Military Code of
Justice, Hasan's salary cannot be suspended unless he is
proven guilty.
If Hasan had been a civilian defense
department employee, NBC 5 Investigates
has learned, the Army could have suspended his pay after
just seven days.
Personnel rules for most civilian
government workers allow for "indefinite suspensions" in
cases "when the agency has reasonable cause to believe that
the employee has committed a crime for which a sentence of
imprisonment may be imposed."
Meanwhile, more than three years later
soldiers wounded in the mass shooting are fighting to
receive the same pay and medical benefits given to those
wounded in combat.
Retired Army Spc. Logan Burnett, a
reservist who, in 2009, was soon to be deployed to Iraq, was
shot three times when a gunman opened fire inside the Army
Deployment Center.
"I honestly thought I was going to
die in that building," said Burnett. "Just blood
everywhere and then the thought of -- that's my blood
everywhere."
Burnett nearly died. He's had more than a
dozen surgeries since the shooting, and says post-traumatic
stress still keeps him up at night.
Burnett is now fighting a new battle; only
this one is against the U.S. Army.
The Army has not classified the wounds of
the Ft. Hood victims as "combat related" and declines to
label the shooting a "terrorist attack."
The "combat related" designation is an
important one, for without it Burnett and other shooting
victims are not given combat-related pay, they are not
eligible for Purple Heart retirement or medical benefits
given to other soldiers wounded either at war or during the
Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the Pentagon.
As a result, Burnett, his wife Torey, and
the families of other Fort Hood victims miss out on
thousands of dollars of potential benefits and pay every
year.
To Burnett the shooting felt like combat.
"You take three rounds and lose
five good friends and watch seven other people get killed
in front of you. Do you have another term that we can
classify that as?," asked Burnett.
The Army has categorized the shooting as a
case of "workplace violence."
"Sickens me. Absolutely sickens
me. Workplace violence? I don't even know if I have the
words to say," said Burnett.
"They don't need to be treated like this.
They don't need to sit and fight every day for this benefit
or that," said Torey Burnett.
As that fight continues, Burnett was
stunned to see a letter detailing the more $278,000 Hasan
has been paid since his arrest. NBC 5
Investigates received the letter from the
Department of Defense in response to a request under the
Freedom of Information Act.
"There have been times when my wife and I
cannot afford groceries. We cannot afford gas in our
car,"Burnett said. "Literally, times where we ate Ramen
noodles for weeks on end. This [that Hasan is still earning
a paycheck] makes me sick to my stomach," said Burnett.
Burnett isn't alone in his outrage.
"We're giving the defendant in this case
every benefit of the doubt. But yet we're not giving the
benefits to the victims," said Rep. Thomas Rooney (R)
Florida
Rooney, a former prosecutor at Fort Hood,
recently signed a bi-partisan letter urging defense
secretary Chuck Hagel to "...reclassify the victims' deaths
and injuries as 'combat related'..."
The letter said the current situation has
"...resulted in an embarrassing lack of care and treatment
for the victims and their families."
"What happened here is not a case of
workplace violence. What happened here was an attack on our
military by a terrorist element specifically targeting our
military, which just so happened to be in the United States
of America," said Rooney.
Reports from the Federal Bureau of
Investigation showed Hasan was communicating with a member
of Al Qaida prior to the shooting. Additionally, the
government's National Counterterrorism Center lists the
shooting at Fort Hood as a "high fatality terrorist attack."
Rooney said he's also willing to consider
whether Congress should change the rules, so the Army could
suspend the pay of soldiers arrested for crimes against
fellow soldiers.
