Leave No Veteran Behind: US Veterans in Prison, 2010.

The word on vets in prison is that a lot of them are dying these days. 65% of veterans in prison are over 55 years old. A good many of them are Vietnam War vets dying from the complications of Hepatitis C. Yeah, being a Vietnam era vet is a risk factor for the disease, though it's likely due to the high incidence of IV drug use in particular among vets of that generation. 

Interestingly, there doesn't appear to be a higher incidence of drug use among vets in prison than the rest of the prison population. That may not be saying much, though. Most people in prison are there for drug-related convictions.

The news on what our vets are in prison for is not good. Most are in for violent or sexual offenses. It's possible that veterans with lesser offenses are just being cut more slack in sentencing, concentrating the violent offenders among them in prison. The verdict on how PTSD affects this population is still out, but there's a clear correlation between military service and violent crime.

The US DOJ is overdue for a new statistical report and analysis. We've had over nine years of war, with soldiers going out on multiple deployments, since the last big study they put out in 2000. There's a particular need for an examination of women veterans in prison. Here's the 2007 press release on the DOJ's updated figures, nonetheless. Keep in mind it was from statistics gathered in 2004.

Here's the link to the UK's Howard League recent study on veterans in US prisons. It's also very informative. We really should be studying this more ourselves, though.

Remember our Buddies in Prison.

Seen over the Loop 202; Phoenix. Veterans' Day, 2010.

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Bureau of Justice Statistics
SUNDAY, APRIL 29, 2007	Contact: Stu Smith 202/307-0784
www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs	After hours: 301-983-9354

MALE VETERANS LESS THAN HALF AS LIKELY AS MALE NON-VETERANS TO BE IN PRISON IN 2004

Veterans Older, Better Educated Than Other State and Federal Prisoners

WASHINGTON—There were an estimated 140,000 veterans held in state and federal prisons in 2004, the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. State prisons held 127,500 of these veterans, and federal prisons held 12,500.

Almost all veterans in prison were male (99 percent). Among adult males in the U.S. population in 2004, veterans were half as likely as non-veterans to be in prison (630 prisoners per 100,000 veterans, compared to 1,390 prisoners per 100,000 non-veteran U.S. residents). The difference is largely explained by age. Two-thirds of male veterans in the U.S. population were at least 55 years old, compared to 17 percent of non-veteran men. The incarceration rate of these older male veterans (182 per 100,000) was far lower than for those under age 55 (1,483 per 100,000).

In 2004, the percentage of state prisoners who reported prior service in the U.S. Armed Forces (10 percent) was half of the level reported in 1986 (20 percent). BJS began surveying federal prisoners in 1991, and federal inmates showed a similar decline in reporting military service – from 20 percent in 1991 to 10 percent in 2004.

Despite the declining percentages of prisoners with prior military service, the estimated number of veterans in state and federal prison increased by more than 50,000 between 1985 and 2000. This increase coincided with a rapid growth in total prison populations. Since 2000, the number of veterans in prison has fallen 13,100 or 9 percent.

The average length of military service of veterans in prison was about four years, and six in 10 received an honorable discharge. The majority of veterans in state (54 percent) and federal (64 percent) prisons served during a wartime period, but a much lower percentage (20 percent of veterans in state prisons, 26 percent of federal) reported seeing combat. Vietnam-era veterans (36 percent) were the largest group of wartime service veterans in state prisons, followed by veterans of the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War (14 percent). Only 4 percent of the veterans in state prison had served since operations began in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Over half of veterans (57 percent) were serving time for violent offenses, compared to 47 percent of non-veterans. In particular, veterans (23 percent) were twice as likely as non-veterans (9 percent) to have been sentenced for sexual assaults, including rape. Among violent offenders, a higher percentage of veterans reported victimizing females (60 percent for veterans compared to 41 percent for non-veterans) and minors (40 percent for veterans compared to 24 percent for non-veterans).

Veterans were much older than other inmates; the median age of veterans in State prison was 45, compared to 33 for non-veterans. Veterans in state prisons were also more likely to be white (54 percent) than non-veterans in state prisons (33 percent). Veterans were much better educated than other state prisoners. Nearly all veterans (91 percent) reported at least a high school diploma or GED, compared to 60 percent of non-veterans in state prisons. College attendance was three times higher among veterans in state prison as well (33 percent compared to 10 percent of non-veterans).

Veterans were less likely to report drug use in the month before their offense (42 percent) than other state prisoners (58 percent). Veteran status was not related to inmate reports of alcohol dependence and abuse.

The report, Veterans in State and Federal Prison, 2004 (NCJ-217199), was written by BJS statistician Margaret E. Noonan and BJS policy analyst Christopher J. Mumola. Following publication it can be found at http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=808.

For additional information about the Bureau of Justice Statistics please visit the BJS Web site at http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/.

The Office of Justice Programs (OJP), headed by Assistant Attorney General Regina B. Schofield, provides federal leadership in developing the nation’s capacity to prevent and control crime, administer justice and assist victims. OJP has five component bureaus: the Bureau of Justice Assistance; the Bureau of Justice Statistics; the National Institute of Justice; the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention; and the Office for Victims of Crime. Additionally, OJP has two program offices: the Community Capacity Development Office, which incorporates the Weed and Seed strategy and OJP’s American Indian and Alaska Native Affairs Desk and the Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering and Tracking (SMART) Office. More information can be found at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov.

When Johnny Comes Marching Home...

We've known for 20 years how to solve a lot of these problems on a large scale, and abolitionist reforms are a big part of that agenda. Anyone clued into what the VA in AZ is doing about homelessness and incarcerated vets? I should know that by now without having to dig.


Anyway, hit the link at the bottom for an article about veterans dying for lack of health care.

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From the Barracks to the Homeless Shelter
Homelessness Among Vets Persists
New America Media, News Report
Aaron Glantz , Posted: Nov 11, 2009



SAN FRANCISCO – Fifty-four-year-old David Harness carries a red, white and blue Department of Veterans Affairs’ identification card around his neck. His face weathered, his mustache speckled with grey, he looks past the reporter standing in front of him and off into the street.

“Tonight I’m on the street because I don’t have a place to stay,” he says.

Harness has been homeless for much of the last two decades. When he first got out of the Navy in the late ‘70s, he found work at San Francisco’s Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, repairing a host of war vessels and commercial ships that came in for repair.

Since the shipyard shut down in 1994, Harness has hardly had any work.

“It’s hard for veterans because if you don’t have a place to clean up, take a shower, do what you got to do, how you gonna get a job?” he asks.

Harness is not the only veteran in this difficult situation. A new study released Tuesday by the National Alliance to End Homelessness found that approximately 131,000 veterans were homeless at some point in 2008. One out four homeless people, and one out of three homeless men, is a veteran.

According to the report, veterans were more than twice as likely to be homeless as those who never served in the military. And while most of the veterans sleeping on the street had fought in earlier wars, a growing number of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans reported receiving homeless services from the VA.

Black veterans are largely over-represented. Despite making up only 10 percent of the veteran population, they make up 45 percent of the homeless veterans population.

The number of homeless veterans is “shocking,” according to Steve Berg, the alliance’s vice president.

“Our report shows that the problems that we’ve had for 20 years have not been solved,” says Berg.

If nothing is done, Berg says he expects the number of homeless Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans to rise in the future. That’s because hundreds of thousands of veterans of current wars are coming home with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression and other mental injuries that – if left untreated – can create a downward spiral that may take years to fully realize.

“We have a lot of work to do if we’re going to prevent the problems of the previous generation from repeating themselves,” he says.

There was some good news in the report, however. The alliance reported that the number of homeless veterans had actually dropped since 2007 – from 195,000 to 131,000 in 2008.

That drop was primarily attributed to the government’s early intervention to help veterans before they became homeless – by handing out transitional housing assistance, emergency rent payments, and facilitating “rapid re-housing.”

The report comes one day after Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki told reporters in Washington that, “President Obama and I are personally committed to ending homelessness among veterans in the next five years.”

In addition to homeless services, the administration’s plan includes “preventive measures” like planning for incarcerated veterans re-entering society, supportive services for low-income veterans and their families and a national referral center to link veterans to local service providers.

“Our plan enlarges the scope of the VA’s efforts to combat homelessness,” said Shinseki. “In the past, the VA focused largely on getting homeless veterans off the streets. Our five-year plan aims also at preventing them from ever ending up homeless.”


On Monday, Berg of the National Alliance to End Homeless declared that he was “cautiously optimistic” about Shinseki’s proposals.

On the streets of San Francisco, Harness, the Navy veteran, offers a reality check to policymakers in Washington.

“I’m seeing a lot of young people on the street who are 24 or 25 and they look like they’re really not taking care of themselves,” he says.

They shouldn’t wait for help from the government, he says, because that may never come.

“My advice to them is to keep doing what you know best,” he says. “Just do what you can.”


Related Articles in New American Media:


Over 2,200 Vets Died for Lack of Health Insurance in 2008

Vets, PTSD, Addiction: Criminal?

Why Are We Locking Up Traumatized Veterans for Their Addictions Instead of Offering Them Treatment?
By Penny Coleman, AlterNet
Posted on November 11, 2009

A new report by the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) exposes practices and policies that for decades have unjustly resulted in large numbers of psychically injured and addicted veterans landing in the nation’s prisons and jails.

The report reflects a year’s worth of outreach to veterans and veterans’ advocates across the country, and a distillation of their most creative, innovative and optimistic responses to the problem.

Gen. Steven Xenakis, MD, Special Advisor to the Joint Chiefs of Staff for Warrior and Family Support, brought a message of official support to a teleconference announcing the release of the report:

“250,000 soldiers is a large number of Soldiers, Marines, Sailors and Airmen who have been affected,” he said. “It is so important that people are made aware of the issues, and that we follow up with the best action plans we can find … We in this country have a responsibility to assist and support them.”

Specifically, the report recommends changes in state and federal statutes that now prioritize punishment over treatment for veterans who commit nonviolent drug-related offenses as a result of their addiction and other mental health issues.

“Courts, as a way of dealing with large numbers of people with substance abuse problems, are a very slow and expensive way to go,” explained Dan Abrahamson, the Drug Policy Alliance’s Director of Legal Affairs. “You need a courtroom and a judge, and all the players from prosecutors to defense attorneys. Providing treatment straight up requires far fewer resources and far less investment for far greater returns.”

The report also calls for the adoption of overdose prevention programs, and the expansion of veterans’ access to medication-assisted therapies to treat opioid dependence.

Overdose is an on-going problem among veterans, as are other self-destructive behaviors that inflate the official and unofficial tally of suicides among active duty troops and veterans. (Veterans, often compromised by alcohol or drugs, are an astonishing 148 percent more likely to die in a motorcycle crash than civilians of comparable age, race, and sex.)

Guy Gambill, a long-time veterans advocate who was instrumental in shaping the report, reminded the teleconference participants that “one of the hallmark symptoms of PTSD is the tendency to self-medicate.”

“In the aftermath of Vietnam, self-medication and its collateral behaviors landed tens of thousands of veterans in prison. This time,” Gambill suggests, “let’s be smarter than the problem.”

Gambill is a veteran of Nuclear Duty forces in Europe and of Reagan’s South American military ventures. He makes no secret of the fact that he has done time in jail and under bridges, kicked a serious drug habit, and managed to live with the mental health issues that are a result of his service.

For the last decade, his first-hand experiences have fed his efforts to promote the diversion of veterans from incarceration into treatment, and he is convinced that finding ways to deal with addictions is a key part of that effort.

“We are not going to let murderers off the hook, or sex offenders. We’re not going to let people who have 16 aggravated DUIs and killed somebody off the hook. Those guys aren’t getting out of jail any time soon.

“So who do we have room to help? People with drug offense charges. In cases where a veteran has combat-related psychological trauma and non-violent drug offenses, there is a lot of political will to give these guys a break.”

A great litmus test for that political will would be the immediate repeal of the 2002 VA directive barring treatment for incarcerated veterans. This almost incomprehensibly myopic policy is, as the report states, “a missed opportunity for the VA to provide critical services and support for veterans to recover from the psychological wounds that caused their criminal activity in the first place.”

Currently, the most successful mechanism for diverting veterans from incarceration and into treatment was conceived by Judge Robert Russell. His veterans’ court in Buffalo, NY, is a hybrid version of the drug and mental health courts that since the 80s have had a dramatic impact on the conversation about who and under what circumstances should be sent to prison.

Russell’s court was the first in the country to cater specifically to the needs of veterans with addiction disorders and/or mental illness who are charged with nonviolent criminal offenses. After almost two years, Russell’s court boasts an astonishing recidivism rate of zero, compared to the 60 to 70 percent nation average.

Such courts are now springing up across the country, but they are seriously limited by their ability to attract and process large numbers of cases. Last year, Judge Russell’s court processed under a hundred cases.

“And they’re not getting any current conflict vets,” Gambill told me in a phone interview. “It’s a lot of Vietnam vets, and it’s great that they are getting help, but the intent of all this is not to have another generation go through the same bullshit. It doesn’t mean anything if we don’t get some significant numbers of veterans to participate in the program.”

One serious problem, he explains, is that the specialty courts, drug, mental health and veterans’, are voluntary. “Consider a 23 year-old who gets arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct on a Friday night. The cops throw him in jail, but before he is arraigned on Monday morning, the public defender offers him the choice of a $600 fine, $500 suspended, pay $100 down. 90 days, 87 days suspended--time served 3 days, and you walk out today.

Or of matriculating into the veterans’ court for a year or so of court-supervised treatment, at the end of which time the charges against him will be thrown out.

“Which one do you think a 23 year-old guy on a roll is going to choose?

“That’s what is happening all over the country,” Gambill explains, “That’s why the numbers are so low and why the specialty courts cannot be expected to solve the whole problem.”

Furthermore, “the whole problem,” as Tom Tarantino, a legislative associate with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), pointed out, is of an entirely unknown magnitude.

“We don’t really know how many veterans are in jail right now. The numbers cited in the DPA report are from a survey done in 2004. In 2004, there were over a million fewer veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan than there are today.”

Tarantino offered a simple solution to the absence of that information: “The Department of Defense has lists of people who have been in the military and the Department of Justice quarterly collects lists of people who have been arrested. We just need them to compare lists.”

But even armed with that data, there are, all told, only about a dozen veterans’ courts in operation or in the planning stages in the entire country. Even if more soldiers and veterans can be persuaded to make use of them, there are hardly enough courts to handle the daunting wave of new veterans who are expected to run afoul of the law.

The DPA report is, however, more interested in interventions that can occur before veterans become entangled in the criminal justice system. Presently, most prison diversion programs, including many, if not all, of the emerging veterans’ treatment courts, require veterans to plead guilty to criminal charges before being directed to treatment.

The consequences of an arrest and conviction can be devastating, the report explains, including denial of employment, housing or public benefits. And an estimated 585,000 veterans are denied the right to vote because of their felony convictions.

And even when all charges are finally dismissed, electronic information that has been released, cannot always be recovered. Data harvesting has become a big business, and any arrest, regardless of outcome, can resurface to compromise a veteran’s future.

So the report emphasizes “front-end diversion practices,” or ways keep veterans out of prison in the first place. Gambill describes some encouraging experimental programs in Chicago and Los Angeles that make use of veterans who are specifically trained to ride along with police when they get disturbance calls.

These “peer intervention specialists” can recognize another vet by his bearing and behavior. Speaking a common language and referencing a common culture, these intervention specialists are far more likely to convince a freaked-out vet to back down, and then talk him into accepting a treatment option.

Some of the suggestions made in this report will require the coordinated efforts and funds of multiple agencies. But some are so simple and obvious, even cheap, that it is sort of mind boggling that they even warrant discussion.

For, example, Dr. Bob Newman, MD, Director, Rothschild Chemical Dependency Institute at the Beth Israel Medical Center in New York, wants to know how TRICARE, the Defense Department’s health insurance plan for active duty soldiers, can justify its refusal not to pay for methadone and other medication therapies for addicted veterans.

“I want to stress,” Newman said on the teleconference, “that we are not talking about some hypothetical, new Idea as to how to approach the problem of opiate addiction. It is endorsed by the World Health Organization, the National Institute of Drug Abuse, the World Health Organization, and the Institute of Medicine.

“And our Department of Defense has an insurance plan that simply excludes maintenance treatment. No explanation. It just says, we don’t pay for it. And I understand that could be changed with the stroke of a pen.”

So simple, and yet like many of the recommendations in this report, so stubbornly resistant to change. One must wonder why?

Untreated combat-related mental health injuries are predictive of substance abuse, and untreated substance abuse is predictive of encounters with the criminal justice system. And the door predictably revolves.

Tarantino wants it made very clear that, for many soldiers, the vicious cycle begins while they are still under military jurisdiction. “It was really alarming how many combat soldiers were given prescription drugs with little or no supervision,” he reported. “To be really blunt, I know crack dealers who are more discriminating with issuing drugs than some of the clinics that I saw in Iraq.”

Many of those drugs have serious known side effects, including suicide. And many of them, drugs to help soldiers sleep and drugs to help them stay awake, are seriously addictive.

“The ease of obtaining prescription drugs in the combat zone,” Tarantino explains, “is not mirrored back in garrison. When soldiers come home, their reliance on those same drugs can create severe problems.”

This report highlights the gross injustice of holding soldiers and veterans entirely responsible for drug reliance that is facilitated, if not encouraged, when it serves military purposes. That injustice is aggravated when it is used as an excuse to kick soldiers out of the military thereby denying them benefits. It is further aggravated when treatment is withheld, both for their injuries and for their addictions, and aggravated further still when it is punished with incarceration.

One must wonder whose interests then are being served?

General Xenakis promises that “our leadership heartily endorses” what this report is hoping to accomplish. They should. Its recommendations are an important step in the right direction.

But they should be held to that promise.

Penny Coleman is the widow of a Vietnam veteran who took his own life after coming home. Her latest book, Flashback: Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Suicide and the Lessons of War, was released on Memorial Day, 2006. Her Web site is Flashback.
© 2009 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/143867/

Combat Veterans: From The Batlefield to Prison

This is more current, and looks more comprehensive. The article is long and the website is worth visiting, so I'm sending you there for the whole thing. This is part of what looks like a very interesting series on veterans and criminal justice:
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From the Battlefield to Prison
Crime Report Blog
by Cara Tabachnick
Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 6:34 am

In a series of articles to mark Veterans Day, the Crime Report examines the impact of returning soldiers on the U.S. justice system. In Part 1, we explore the special tragedy of troubled veterans in prison.

Most of the returning veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan never get in trouble with the law—but the outlook is bleak for those who do. The U.S. justice system is poorly prepared to cope with young ex-military personnel whose post-combat stress or inability to adjust to civilian society pushes them over the line into criminal activity, a special report by The Crime Report shows.


Although the number of incarcerated veterans has not risen dramatically, a Bureau of Justice Statistics report planned for release next year is expected to show that for the first time since the Vietnam War, the majority of veterans now serving prison terms are between the ages of 25 and 34. With no early end of America’s overseas military commitments in sight, U.S. authorities need to devote more attention to the needs of troubled soldiers, says Paul Sullivan, Executive Director of Veterans for Common Sense, a national advocacy group based in Washington D.C..

Improving and expanding treatment and prison counseling programs for needy veterans can “make a tremendous difference” if corrections officials made this a top priority, Sullivan adds “It can save untold lives and billions of dollars.”...

(finish the story at The Crime Report Blog)

Homeless and Incarcerated veterans

From the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans : info on incarcerated Vets from 2000 study at bottom.
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Background & Statistics

                

• Most Often Asked Questions Concerning Homeless Veterans
• Homeless Veteran Fact Sheet
• Incarcerated Veterans
• Number of Homeless Veterans and VA Beds by State

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Most Often Asked Questions Concerning Homeless Veterans
Who are homeless veterans?
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) says the nation's homeless veterans are mostly males (four percent are females). The vast majority are single, most come from poor, disadvantaged communities, 45 percent suffer from mental illness, and half have substance abuse problems. America’s homeless veterans have served in World War II, Korean War, Cold War, Vietnam War, Grenada, Panama, Lebanon, Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan), Operation Iraqi Freedom, or the military’s anti-drug cultivation efforts in South America. 47 percent of homeless veterans served during the Vietnam Era. More than 67 percent served our country for at least three years and 33 percent were stationed in a war zone.
How many homeless veterans are there?
Although accurate numbers are impossible to come by -- no one keeps national records on homeless veterans -- the VA estimates that 131,000 veterans are homeless on any given night. And approximately twice that many experience homelessness over the course of a year. Conservatively, one out of every three homeless men who is sleeping in a doorway, alley or box in our cities and rural communities has put on a uniform and served this country. According to the National Survey of Homeless Assistance Providers and Clients (U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness and the Urban Institute, 1999), veterans account for 23 percent of all homeless people in America. 
Why are veterans homeless?
In addition to the complex set of factors affecting all homelessness -- extreme shortage of affordable housing, livable income and access to health care -- a large number of displaced and at-risk veterans live with lingering effects of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and substance abuse, compounded by a lack of family and social support networks.
A top priority is secure, safe, clean housing that offers a supportive environment that is free of drugs and alcohol.
While "most homeless people are single, unaffiliated men… most housing money in existing federal homelessness programs, in contrast, is devoted to helping homeless families or homeless women with dependant children," according to "Is Homelessness a Housing Problem?" in Understanding Homelessness: New Policy and Research Perspectives, published by Fannie Mae Foundation in 1997.
Doesn’t the Department of Veterans Affairs take care of homeless veterans?
To a certain degree, yes. According to the VA, in the years since it "began responding to the special needs of homeless veterans, its homeless treatment and assistance network has developed into the nation’s largest provider of homeless services, serving more than 100,000 veterans annually."
With an estimated 260,000 veterans homeless at some time during the year, the VA reaches 100,000 of those in need -- leaving 160,000 veterans who must seek assistance from local government agencies and service organizations in their communities.
Since 1987, the VA’s programs for homeless veterans have emphasized collaboration with community service providers to help expand services to more veterans in crisis. This partnership is credited with reducing the number of homeless veterans on any given day by more than 40 percent since 2005. For more information about VA homeless veteran programs, go to http://www.va.gov/homeless/.
What services do veterans need?
Veterans need a coordinated effort that provides secure housing and nutritional meals; essential physical health care, substance abuse aftercare and mental health counseling; and personal development and empowerment. Veterans also need job assessment, training and placement assistance.
NCHV strongly believes that all programs to assist homeless veterans must focus on helping veterans reach the point where they can obtain and sustain employment.
What seems to work best?
The most effective programs for homeless and at-risk veterans are community-based, nonprofit, "veterans helping veterans" groups. Programs that seem to work best feature transitional housing with the camaraderie of living in structured, substance-free environments with fellow veterans who are succeeding at bettering themselves. Because government money for homeless veterans is currently limited and serves only one in 10 of those in need, it is critical that community groups reach out to help provide the support, resources and opportunities most Americans take for granted: housing, employment and health care.
There are about 250 community-based veteran organizations across the country that have demonstrated impressive success in reaching homeless veterans. These groups are most successful when they work in collaboration with federal, state and local government agencies; other homeless providers; and veteran service organizations. Veterans who participate in these programs have a higher chance of becoming tax-paying, productive citizens again.
What can you do?

• Determine the need in your community. Visit with homeless veteran providers. Contact your local mayor’s office for a list of providers.
• Involve others. If you are not already part of an organization, pull together a few people who might be interested in attacking this issue.
• Participate in local homeless coalitions. Chances are there is one in your community. If not, this may be the time to start bringing people together around this critical need.
• Send a financial donation to your local homeless veteran provider.
• Contact your elected officials and discuss what is being done in your community for homeless veterans.

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Homeless Veteran Fact Sheet

DEFINITIONS, DEMOGRAPHICS AND ESTIMATED NUMBERS
What is the definition of homeless?
PL100-77, signed into law on July 22, 1987, and known as the "McKinney Act," provided a definition of homelessness that is commonly used because it controls the federal funding streams.

Excerpt from PL100-77: Sec. 11302:
"General definition of homeless individual
(a) In general

For purposes of this chapter, the term 'homeless' or 'homeless individual or homeless person' includes--
1. an individual who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence; and
2. an individual who has a primary nighttime residence that is--
    A. a supervised publicly or privately operated shelter designed to provide temporary living accommodations (including welfare hotels, congregate shelters, and transitional housing for the mentally ill);
    B. an institution that provides a temporary residence for individuals intended to be institutionalized; or
    C. a public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings."
Who is a veteran?
In general, most organizations use the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) eligibility criteria to determine which veterans can access services. Eligibility for VA benefits is based upon discharge from active military service under other than dishonorable conditions. Benefits vary according to factors connected with type and length of military service. To see details of eligibility criteria for VA compensation and benefits, view the current benefits manual at http://www1.va.gov/opa/feature/.
Demographics of homeless veterans
"The Forgotten Americans-Homelessness: Programs and the People They Serve" -- released Dec. 8, 1999, by the Interagency Council on the Homeless -- is the National Survey of Homeless Assistance Providers and Clients (NSHAPC), which was completed in 1996 and updated three years later. You can visit http://www.huduser.org/ and download the NSHAPC reports.
Veteran Specific Highlights:
23% of homeless population are veterans
33% of male homeless population are veterans
47% Vietnam Era
17% post-Vietnam
15% pre-Vietnam
67% served three or more years
33% stationed in war zone
25% have used VA Homeless Services
85% completed high school/GED, compared to 56% of non-veterans
89% received Honorable Discharge
79% reside in central cities
16% reside in suburban areas
5% reside in rural areas
76% experience alcohol, drug, or mental health problems
46% white males compared to 34% non-veterans
46% age 45 or older compared to 20% non-veterans

Service needs:
45% help finding job
37% finding housing
How many homeless veterans are there?
Accurate numbers community-by-community are not available. Some communities do annual counts; others do an estimate based on a variety of factors. Contact the closest Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center's Homeless Coordinator or the office of your mayor or other presiding official to get local information.
The Urban Institute, in conjunction with the 1996 National Survey of Homeless Assistance Providers and Clients (NSHAPC), expressed the following:

2.3 million to 3.5 million people experience homelessness in America each year. By taking 23 percent of that range, that would indicate there are between 529,000 and 840,000 veterans who are homeless at some point during the year.
To get the full "Helping America's Homeless" report published by The Urban Institute Press in 2001, visit http://www.urban.org/.
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Incarcerated Veterans

In January 2000, The Bureau of Justice Statistics released a special report on incarcerated veterans. The following are highlights of the report, "Veterans in Prison or Jail":

Over 225,000 veterans held in Nation’s prisons or jails in 1998.

• Among adult males in 1998, there were 937 incarcerated veterans per 100,000 veteran residents.
• 1 in every 6 incarcerated veterans was not honorably discharged from the military.
• About 20% of veterans in prison reported seeing combat duty during their military service.
• In 1998, an estimated 56,500 Vietnam War-era veterans and 18,500 Persian Gulf War veterans were held in State and Federal prisons.
• Nearly 60% of incarcerated veterans had served in the Army.
• Among state prisoners, over half (53%) of veterans were white non-hispanics, compared to nearly a third (31%) of non-veterans; among Federal prisoners, the percentage of veterans who were white (50%) was nearly double that of non-veterans (26%).
• Among State prisoners, the median age of veterans was 10 years older than other prison and jail inmates.
• Among State prisoners, veterans (32%) were about 3 times more likely than non-veterans (11%) to have attended college.

Veterans are more likely than others to be in prison for a violent offense but less likely to be serving a sentence for drugs.

• About 35% of veterans in State prison, compared to 20% of non-veterans, were convicted of homicide or sexual assault.
• Veterans (30%) were more likely than other State prisoners (23%) to be first-time offenders.
• Among violent State prisoners, the average sentence of veterans was 50 months longer than the average of non-veterans.
• At year-end in 1997, sex offenders accounted for 1 in 3 prisoners held in military correctional facilities.
• Combat veterans were no more likely to be violent offenders than other veterans.

Veterans in State prison reported higher levels of alcohol abuse, lower levels of drug abuse, than other prisoners.

• Veterans in State prison were less likely (26%) than other State prisoners (34%) to report having used drugs at the time of their offense.
• Nearly 60% of veterans in State prison had driven drunk in the past, compared to 45% of other inmates.
• About 70% of veterans, compared to 54% of other State prisoners, had been working full-time before arrest.
• Incarcerated veterans were as likely as non-veterans to have been homeless when arrested.