Veteran’s unexpected death leaves a Saucier family in crisis

A veteran’s family is trapped in crisis after the unexpected death of a Saucier father who was under VA care. Sergeant Hank Lee leaves behind three young children and a wife who is struggling to keep a roof above their heads.
“He always told me ‘I don’t ever want to die in the VA.’ And I know his worst fear came true and he was alone.” Sergeant Hank Lee’s ashes sit on his family’s shelf, his two-year-old daughter Alana and nine month old twins, Hunter and Hailey, are left without their father.
“He was an amazing dad. His kids came first with everything.” Wiping away tears, Saucier resident Jamie Lee-Hasted says her husband was a US combat marine who served our country from 2001 to 2005. The veteran suffered a traumatic brain injury and was battling PTSD when he died under VA care March 4th of this year. “Sat down in the chair and they thought he was sleeping and 20 minutes later they check him and he’s gone,” said Jamie.
Because Hank died so suddenly, Jamie says insurance paper work was left unsigned, leaving the family without a plan and without answers to questions about his care. “They’ve got to have something to control how much medicines they give or to properly monitor them.”
Jamie now drives around with #justiceforhanklee on her car because she doesn’t want what’s happening to her to happen to other veteran families. “I just don’t understand how a man that just turned 35-years-old, waiting for a PTSD program can pass away like that with all those people that are supposed to be around him, watching him, and helping him.”
Jamie tells News 25 she’s waiting on a toxicology report to determine Hank’s cause of death, but until then she and their three children are desperate for the community’s help. “I’m going to lose everything, everything that my husband tried so hard to get for me and the kids. I can’t do it by myself.”
If you would like to help, the Lee family’s GoFundMe account can be found at www.gofundme.com/vetswidowincrisis.