TVC client, and U.S. Navy veteran enlisted in 1995 and successfully completed Recruit Training graduating second in her class of eighty recruits. She was then sent to Basic Hospital Corps School at the Naval School of Health Sciences in San Diego, where she graduated in the top 10% of her class.  Upon completion of Corps School, she was stationed at the Navy Medical Center in San Diego. She was, by all accounts, well on her way to a successful medical career in the Navy and was chosen for a coveted position in the orthopedic pediatric unit, where she assisted in surgeries at Balboa Naval Hospital. 

It was during this time that she began to receive persistent and unwanted sexual advances from a senior person in her chain of command, though she made it very clear that she felt the advances were inappropriate and she was uncomfortable with the behavior. But the unwanted comments, insulting behavior and sexual harassment continued.

In July of 1996, she attended a party, where she was physically assaulted by the same senior person in her command. Thankfully, she was able to fight off and escape her attacker, but she suffered injuries for which she sought medical treatment. After the incident, her assailant began a campaign of harassment and intimidation towards her on a regular basis. She reported the assault and asked for a transfer, but she was forced to remained at the same post and was forced to see her assailant daily. 

Despite her counselor advising that she be transferred due to the stressful situation, she was forced to continue working in proximity of her assailant for months after the assault. Her mental and physical health continued to decline, and she began using drugs to cope with her continued trauma.  Because of her drug use, she was discharged under Other than Honorable conditions. 

Two years later, Halldora requested reconsideration of her OTH but was told that her records had been destroyed in a fire. Even after working with a VSO and her state senator’s office, she was unable to retrieve any records and she gave up.

Almost eighteen years after her OTH, Halldora went back to a VSO for help. The VSO found out that the records had, in fact, not been destroyed in a fire and requested them again, but the VA wouldn’t release them. Her VSO encouraged Halldora to file a disability claim because the VA would then have to retrieve her records. 

It took over two years to get the records, but she was eventually given disability benefits at a 70% rating for her PTSD. However, she still had her OTH and was told that she was past her 15-year mark and could not apply for an upgrade. 

After moving to Massachusetts, she went to visit her local VSO. There, she found a flyer for TVC’s Discharge Upgrade Program. She called TVC and her case was accepted and referred to TVC Volunteer Attorney, Valerie Sanders, counsel at Eversheds Sutherland LLP

After reviewing the file and speaking with her client, Valerie found that the records told the story. “The trauma and secondary traumas in the veteran’s case were all there. The story was compelling and needed to be told.” Valerie Sanders, Esq.

Valerie was able to create the timeline and show the continuing impact as it existed, by crafting the argument with the facts in the record and contemporaneous sources.  The Board agreed with her arguments and upgraded the veteran’s discharge to fully Honorable. 

Since her discharge, she has become a licensed cosmetologist who has raised and supported three children as a single mother. She has also been assessed by the VA as having 100% service-connected PTSD due to military sexual trauma. She recently married and now gives back to her community as a yoga instructor.