Page 55 - ACTL_Fall23

POVAT Summary Table
Pre-POVAT Post-POVAT Disability % Disability %
0 90
0 90
90 100
30 100
80 80
0 60
50 100
90 100
Increased Lifetime Benefit in US Dollars
569,186
609,627
366,006
875,960
--
456,673
720,448
328,440
491,918
Case DOB
BW 06/26/68 JS 03/07/69 BT 12/08/67
WM 06/09/68 AC 09/17/70 JR 10/09/78 SL 09/16/72 CW 04/05/66
Life Expectancy
80.48 80.36 80.60 80.49 n/a 79.07 79.80 80.90
Additional Married Dependents
NO NO YES NO YES YES YES NO n/a n/a YES YES YES YES YES YES
VA downgraded his disability rating eighteen months later from 100% to 30% as the result of a “reassess- ment” that lasted a total of seven minutes conducted by a nurse. That downgrade meant that Markham was no longer eligible for VA medical benefits. Moreover, the VA then used the downgrade to claw back $10,000 from Markham for purported “overpayments.”
At that time, Markham knew very little about the VA disability or appeal process. To obtain some expert as- sistance, Markham contracted Jeffrey O’Hara, a well- known Newark, N.J. trial lawyer and a Fellow of the College. O’Hara, in turn, brought in Dr. Mark Mc- Laughlin, a renowned neurosurgeon. That began a multi-year process during which Markham, O’Hara and McLaughlin worked together to have Markham’s original 100% disability rating reinstated. Finally, in November 2019, the VA reinstated Markham‘s original 100% disability rating and made that rating permanent.
That experience led Markham, O’Hara and McLaugh- lin to co-found POVAT to assist other disabled veter- ans in obtaining the benefits that they are rightfully
AVERAGE INCREASED BENEFIT
due. During its first three years of existence, POVAT has assisted 100 veterans in seventeen different states and Japan. The vast majority of claims that POVAT is handling are still stuck in the VA disability adjudication process, but POVAT’s record of success on resolved claims is impressive. The results POVAT obtained for the first eight veterans it helped are summarized above.
With the $100,000 grant awarded by the Foundation, POVAT hopes to assist approximately twenty addition- al veterans. The Center for Forensic Economics has es- timated that, with POVAT’s assistance, those disabled veterans should be able to obtain total additional life- time economic benefits of approximately $9.8 million. That’s a return on the Foundation’s grant that even Wall Street investors would envy.
David Hensler
ACTL Foundation President
FALL 2023
JOURNAL 54
Our thanks to the many Fellows who contribute to the Foundation because, for these disabled American veterans and many others, justice can’t wait . . .