Former Phoenix VA head gets probation for ethics violations

A federal judge sentenced the former head of the Phoenix VA hospital to two years’ probation earlier this week. Sharon Helman was at the center of the 2014 controversy over deadly long wait times for veterans at the Phoenix VA. But her sentencing was unrelated to that scandal. The court found Helman guilty of an ethics violation for accepting gifts worth thousand of dollars from a lobbyist friend and failing to report them.

Helman admitted in a letter to U.S. District Court Judge Steven Logan that she accepted the gifts, which included a trip to Disneyland, a car, plane tickets, and tickets to a Beyoncé concert. She said she didn’t realize at the time accepting the gifts violated ethics laws.

Helman’s former supervisor-turned-lobbyist, Dennis “Max” Lewis, gave her the gifts. At the time, Lewis worked for Jefferson Consulting Group, which the Phoenix VA ultimately hired for advice as it expanded into multiple medical clinics. The firm said it instructed Lewis he could not do business with any clients in Phoenix, given the potential conflict of interest. It has since fired him.

Logan said he didn’t buy Helman’s excuse that she didn’t know accepting the gifts was an ethics violation. “When you wrote me that letter and tried to explain to me that you didn’t know what you did was wrong, I had a problem,” Logan said. He concluded she must have known deep down taking the gifts was wrong because she kept them secret.

Helman cried in the courtroom when the judge announced her sentence.

The VA fired Helman in November 2014, more than six months after whistleblowers revealed the Phoenix VA was falsifying records to hide long wait times for veterans. An investigation found nearly 40 veterans died while waiting for appointments there. Helman was on paid administrative leave for months before the agency finally fired her, and the VA gave her a nearly $10,000 bonus, which a judge later said it could not take back. The bonus was reportedly for meeting her performance goals in 2013.

In addition to accepting the lobbyist’s gifts, Helman lost her job because of whistleblower retaliation, according to the VA. Earlier this week, one of those whistleblowers reached a financial settlement with the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Brandon Coleman said he was mistreated by his VA superiors for going public with allegations of misconduct. Coleman, an addiction therapist, filed a complaint saying the Phoenix VA wasn’t adequately monitoring veterans who said they were suicidal. He also said the hospital wasn’t adhering to the official VA policy that stipulates one employee must be assigned to every suicidal veteran.

The financial terms of the settlement, to which Coleman agreed through mediation, are private but the resolution did include Coleman getting his job back. He started working again May 1 as an addiction therapist at a suburban VA clinic north of Phoenix.

A year and a half after the scandal broke, repercussions continue to ripple through the VA. Three other Phoenix VA officials officially lost their jobs two months ago in connection with the wait-time cover-up, after months of administrative leave and ultimately returning to work.