Who was Vaughn A. DeVoile ?

Sunday I was talking to one of the few people from the old days I still consider a friend. We talk on the phone, or occasionally meet up for breakfast, swap news of people from the old neighborhood, we catch up. He asked if I had heard about the homeless guy killed in a camp off some walking trails in Waldo. He said the guy was Vaughn, from the old neighborhood where we all came up. I wanted to be sure so I sent an email to James Hart of Crime Scene Kansas City, he was kind enough to send me this.
Police released the identity of a homeless man killed in a fight near the Trolley Track Trail on July 10. The victim, Vaughn A. DeVoile, 57, a Vietnam War Army veteran, was buried Tuesday with military honors. Residents told police that DeVoile and the man he fought with July 9 had been living in woods by the trail, just south of 83rd and Main streets.Police arrested the other man, who had not been charged as of Thursday.DeVoile had lived with his mother until she died in 1999.

Vaughn was about 7 years older than we were. I met him in the mid 70's. He lived with his mother even way back then, in a brick bungalow near 83rd and Main st, where he would meet his end years later, homeless and living in the woods not far from his old home. Let that sink in for a second. He must have passed his former home daily, and may well have been able to see the warmth of someone else's lamps illuminating windows that he once looked out of.

My buddies and I spent a couple of summers stopping by Vaughn's house, he couldn't have been much older than 23 or 24, not much more than a few years out of Vietnam. He was a little odd at times, withdrawn I suppose, other times he seemed like the rest of us. It was a place for us to hang out for a few hours, drink cheap beer , smoke weak weed, and act like we were really about something. Back then Vaughn often wore army olive drab fatigue pants, and boots too if I recall correctly. He talked about his time across the pond occasionally, but a bunch of 15 year old hard heads don't pay much attention to war stories, when there is beer to drink and posing to do. So I don't really remember much of what he told us, I just remember he would go quiet afterwards, and drink some more.

We finally reached the age where we could drive, and we didn't have much time or use for Vaughn. I would see him from time to time as he walked in or out of a bar or walking down the street, but I never stopped to say hi. Some years passed, not sure how many, but sometime in the late 80's his name resurfaced. He made the news, something about blowing up his truck, that some girl was using. I believe it happened in a parking lot of a waldo bar, but I wont swear to the exact details. He just snapped, blew up the truck, or maybe tried to. Then he ran home grabbed a couple of guns, and ran off in to the woods near his house, maybe the same woods he would later die in. The cops ended up getting him, and I heard they sent him to the loney bin for awhile. When he got out, I heard he became reclusive, and sank deeper in to the booze and the madness, a Boo Radley of the Waldo area. My friend also told me that after Vaughn's mother died, he ended up losing the house, unable or unwilling to pay the property taxes. So he ended up homeless, so close to home.

Sorry for the lengthy post, I'll try to get to the point of it all. Here was a guy who was irrecovably scarred from a war he didn't ask to fight, in a place he had probably never heard of, at an age when his biggest worry should have been what college to attend or which girl to get engaged to. I don't know if he was drafted or enlisted, and it's a moot point anyway. What really matters is what happened in the years after his service. Where were the people who sent him off to fight their battle? Where was the military that swore him to fight to the death if need be, to remain loyal to the very end? You can argue that he might have refused help, that there was help to be had if he wanted it, but that's a pretty fucking weak argument. Our government and military have never had a problem imposing their will on entire nations, millions of people, yet they turn their back at the least resistance on the very people who served their purpose.

Ive never bought in to the whole, serve your country by dieing on foreign soil routine. Frankly, I think its one of the biggest lines of bullshit ever uttered. That doesn't mean I don't respect and appreciate the men and women who serve in the military, I do. I just don't buy the rhetoric they are sold. I have known more than a few people who have died on the streets. I was closer to most of them than I was to Vaughn, but his death disturbs me more than most of the others. I think it's because the people who fucked him up, never bothered to help straighten him back out when he served their purpose. I think it's because he died homeless, so close to his home. He was buried with military honors, which is a distant second to not being buried,a distant second to being alive.

***Thanks to James Hart Crime Scene Kansas City for the quick response and info******