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Veteran Affairs building near the White House in Washington, Feb. 14, 2018. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) 14 Jun 2021 The Department of Veterans Affairs is chipping away at a disability claims backlog that ballooned during the pandemic, but it doesn t expect to achieve pre-pandemic levels until late next year, officials said last week. Part of the strategy includes providing staff to support records retrieval and digitization, as well as paying for overtime at the National Archives and Records Administration, according to the VA. Of roughly 520,000 pending VA claims for disability compensation and benefits, 191,000 are considered to be backlogged, or older than 125 days. While the number is down by roughly 10% from earlier this year, it far exceeds the 77,000 cases that were considered backlogged in March 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic struck. ....
Cold case investigators with the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office have identified Gerald (Jerry) Lombard as a possible victim of a serial killer based on DNA from remains found in 1994. According to CCSO, on Feb. 1, 1994, they received a call from a local construction company worker who reported finding a decomposing human body in the woods near Wyandotte Avenue and Tulip Street in northern Charlotte County. There was no identification found with the body and early attempts to identify the person were not successful, so the body was given the name of “John Doe #1.” The cause of death was also undetermined. ....