[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 8501-8502]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




              BERTIE'S RESPECT FOR NATIONAL CEMETERIES ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Barletta) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, our national military cemeteries are 
hallowed ground. And I ask my colleagues to agree and support my bill, 
H.R. 2490, Bertie's Respect for National Cemeteries Act.
  On October 15, 1969, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, a man named George 
Emery Siple shot and killed Bertha Smith, known to everyone as 
``Bertie.'' Siple was convicted of the murder and sentenced to life in 
prison without parole. Thirty years later, he died in prison. Because 
he was a military veteran, he was buried in Indiantown Gap National 
Cemetery in 1999.
  He was buried there despite a Federal law that was passed in 1997. 
That law said that veterans convicted of Federal or State capital 
crimes are not permitted to be buried in Veterans Affairs national 
cemeteries or Arlington National Cemetery.
  For Bertie Smith's family, this is a heart-wrenching situation that 
has gone on for three decades. Jackie Katz, Bertie's daughter, has 
called it ``hell'' and a ``horror'' to live with the fact that George 
Siple was memorialized and buried with full military honors.
  When I first began to look into this issue, it was clear to me that 
it was as frustrating as it was heartbreaking.
  Back in 1997, led by our Pennsylvania Senators, Congress passed a law 
that said that veterans found guilty of capital crimes could not be 
buried in our national veterans cemeteries. At the time, you may 
remember, the country was still reeling from the Oklahoma City bombing. 
And veterans everywhere were justifiably appalled that Timothy McVeigh, 
a military veteran, could be buried with full military honors.
  Now, McVeigh did not receive that burial. But a major problem we 
discovered was that the law was not actively enforced for others until 
2006.
  Since then, the VA has relied on an ``honor system,'' which requires 
family members to willingly report their relative's criminal record.
  In 2013, Congress once again sought to protect our VA national 
cemeteries

[[Page 8502]]

by passing a law to explicitly allow the VA to remove veterans from 
cemeteries if they had been convicted of a Federal or State capital 
crime. However, this law does not extend to veterans buried between 
1997 and 2013, a time period that includes George Emery Siple.
  That is why I have introduced Bertie's Respect for National 
Cemeteries Act. What this law will do is require Veterans Affairs to 
take every reasonable action to ensure that a veteran is eligible to be 
buried, including searching public criminal records. It will clarify 
Congress' original intent by providing Veterans Affairs the explicit 
authority to remove veterans convicted of capital crimes who were 
wrongly buried after 1997. And it will specifically provide for the 
removal of George Emery Siple from Indiantown Gap National Cemetery.
  This bill really only reaffirms what Congress intended in the first 
place. And it enjoys the support of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.
  There were precedents for the removal of convicted murderers from 
veterans cemeteries--from Arlington National Cemetery and VA cemeteries 
in Michigan and Oregon, to name just a few.
  Additionally, nothing in the bill would withdraw previous military 
honors, such as Purple Hearts or medals for valor, otherwise earned by 
the deceased veterans.
  The discussion of military veterans who have been convicted of murder 
often raises the issue of mental health treatment and posttraumatic 
stress disorder. There is no question that PTSD is a real condition 
affecting many servicemen and -women, and I have always stood for 
funding the evaluation and treatment of those who may be afflicted.
  That said, those who have been convicted of capital murder by our 
judicial system have been declared guilty of the worst offense 
possible, and any mitigating factors would have been considered at 
trial and sentencing.
  I don't think it is too much to say that murderers should not be 
buried next to true American heroes. And the memories of victims like 
Bertie Smith should not be disregarded.
  I ask my colleagues for their support in saying that real, true honor 
really means something in our national military cemeteries.

                          ____________________