Casey's next-of-kin (his mother, Cindy Sheehan) received $500,000 for his death. She got a $12,420 Military Death Gratuity at the time of his death and $87,580 paid retroactively in 2205 and $250,000 SGLI at the time of his death, plus $150,000 also paid retroactively for anyone KIA since 10/7/2001. All such payments were tax-free.
href="http://www.moaa.org/mygroup/mygroup_sf/lac_factsheets_survivor_3.htm
That's $500,000! -- a half a million dollars tax-free. There's no reason for her not to pay any bill associated with Spc. Sheehan's funeral, unless she's a callous, shallow, self-centered crook.
$500,000. Wow.
Thanks for posting that. I suspected it was up there, but didn't know it was that much.
an excerpt from: A Markerless Grave in Vacaville
By Cindy Sheehan
I am so tired of the Rovian, heartless, and ignorant smear machine attacking me and my family at every turn of my back.
The latest abomination in their scrutiny of my life is the fact that Casey has no "tombstone." As if it was anybody’s business but Casey’s family. I am sure every last person who has a problem with this has buried a child and they know what we are going through.
I am being smeared because I have a new car and I have "blown" through "$250,000.00" dollars of Casey’s insurance money. I am sure that they have ready access to my bank accounts, too. I know I am writing this to compassionate people who would rather focus on an administration who lies, tortures, kills innocent people using conventional and chemical weapons, spies on its citizens without due process, and is treacherous in outing a CIA operative for petty-high school like revenge thereby endangering her, her family, and her fellow CIA agents. If it wasn’t for these criminals my son wouldn’t need a tombstone...
Thanks for the correction. And she says it's all gone.
Yep-a lot of people don't know, but they upped the SGLI death benefit a few months into the war and increased the death payment from $12K+ to $100K.