* Disability Rights Advocates (DRA) filed a class action lawsuit July 23, 2007 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against the US Department of Veterans Affairs to prohibit the department and other named agencies from continuing the a number of "improper practices" in handling claims for health care and disability services and supports.  

* The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Veterans for Common Sense, a volunteer non-profit based in Washington, DC with 11,500 members and Veterans United for Truth, a volunteer non profit organization based in Santa Barbara and includes veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. [Jim Cook, Retired US Marine Colonel and Northern California director for Veterans United for Truth,  is pictured above at San Francisco press conference, July 23, 2007 announcing the lawsuit. ] 

* The suit claims that most veterans with disabilities - including those soldiers disabled in the Iraq or Afghanistan wars,  cannot receive medical treatment without a disability claim approval and that the US Department of Veteran Affairs now has a backlog of over 600,000 claims - a practice by the US Department of Veteran Affairs that the suit alleges violates US constitutional rights and laws of veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) by denying procedural safeguards, access to the judicial process, mandated medical care, and benefits as a result of their disorder. 

* The suit says that a decision on a claim can take up to twelve to fifteen years. Some pending claims, the suit alleges,  go back to the Vietnam era.

* The suit says that many veterans with disabilities - including those with mental health needs,  give up in despair or frustration, fall into drug or alcohol dependency, or commit suicide. .