Joshua Omvig Veterans Suicide Prevention Act of 2007
![handle is hein.journals/hjl45 and id is 623 raw text is: JOSHUA OMVIG VETERANS SUICIDE PREVENTION ACT
OF 2007
Joshua Omvig was a twenty-two-year-old veteran Army specialist from
Gillette, Wyoming, who served an eleven-month tour of duty in northern
Iraq with the 339th Military Police Company.' Omvig returned from Iraq in
2005, less than a week before Thanksgiving.2 While his family members
celebrated the holiday and shared stories of the year's events, Omvig-
Josh to his family-kept his thoughts on his experience overseas to him-
self.3 He soon began to show signs of depression, suffering from flashbacks
and nightmares, and he ultimately confided to his family that he believed he
had post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).4 While his parents encouraged
him to seek help, Josh never sought professional counseling because he wor-
ried that doing so would damage his career. In December 2005, finally, over-
whelmed by his pain, Josh told his mother he had felt dead ever since [he]
left Iraq, sat in his truck in his parents' driveway, and shot himself.' Al-
though he was only one of many veterans who have experienced debilitating
mental health problems and whom the system of care has somehow ne-
glected,6 Josh has become the human face behind a legislative attempt to
address the growing problem of suicide among veterans.7
Recently, veteran suicide and mental health issues have been gaining
more widespread visibility.8 The mental health problems facing veterans of
Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) and Operation Enduring Freedom
(OEF) first attracted attention in 2002 after four Special Forces veterans
committed suicide and killed their wives in Fort Bragg, North Carolina,
'Jane Norman, Bill Aimed at Preventing Vets' Suicides Gets OK, DES MOINES REG., Oct.
24, 2007, at I IA, available at http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/
20071024/NEWS09/710240386; see also Whitney Woodward, Parents of Iowa Veteran Hope
Legislation will Help Prevent More Military Suicides, QUAD CITY TIMES, Jan. 27, 2008, avail-
able at http://www.qctimes.com/articles/2008/01/27/news/local/doc479ade23a463e9546484
42.txt.
2 Oversight on Mental Health Issues: Hearing Before the S. Comm. on Veterans'Affairs,
110th Cong. (2007) (statement of Randall Omvig, father of Joshua Omvig) [hereinafter Mental
Health Issues Hearing], available at http://veterans.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?pageid= 16&
releaseid = 10814&subreleaseid = 11263 &view= all.
3 See id.
4 Id.; see also Woodward, supra note 1.
' See Woodward, supra note 1.
6 Ken Dennis committed suicide in his Washington state apartment in March 2004. ILONA
MEAGHER, MOVING A NATION TO CARE: POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER AND AMERICA'S
RETURNING TROOPS 25 (2007). Mike Bowman, of Illinois, ended his life in 2005. See Stopping
Suicides: Mental Health Challenges Within the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs: Hearing
Before the H. Comm. on Veterans' Affairs, 110th Cong. (2007) (statement of Mike and Kim
Bowman), available at http://veterans.house.gov/hearings/Testimony.aspxTID= 11136. Greg
Morris, of New Mexico, also ended his life in 2005. See Kimberly Hefting, Data Sought on
Veterans' Suicide, USA TODAY, Dec. 12, 2007, available at http://www.usatoday.com/news/
topstories/2007-12-12-1553356403_x.htm.
See MEAGHER, supra note 6, at 64.
Despite incidents linked to PTSD that occurred soon after U.S. troops invaded Afghani-
stan, the media did not give much attention to PTSD until 2006. Id. at xxiii.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/hjl45&div=24&collection=journals&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Joshua Omvig Veterans Suicide Prevention Act of 2007
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