Undercover Veteran. The Battle for Treatment Week In Week Out

Scarred by conflict, veterans are turning to a Welsh charity. I would

recommend any soldier to stay away from them. We go undercover to find

out how this charity says it is helping. There are questions about

the qualifications of this therapist. He lied to my face. And

where has the money raised for veterans actually ended up?

It just creeps up on you. Just nightmares, flashbacks of what

happened through training and things like that. The scariest thing is

when you don't understand why you are having these nightmares. Nearly

a decade of Army service has left its mark on Justin Martyr in. --

Justin Martyr in. I was at the end of my tether, I could not cope. Me

and my wife were arguing and I felt as though my insides were shutting

down so I walked to a local train track, sat on the bridge and that

was the first time I attempted suicide. He heard about Healing the

Wounds, a charity which promises to help veterans with post-traumatic

stress disorder. He took up the offer of therapy, it is a decision

he now regrets. It was a lot of therapy, going back in your mind to

the time you feel most vulnerable, and shares and scared. They tried to

offer techniques on how to get rid of those feelings. I was so

confused, scared, I felt a lot worse than I did walking in.

The therapy is controversial. It is called NLP, all neuro-linguistic

programming. Its aim is to change patterns of mental and emotional

behaviour. I did two full days and I thought on the third day, my wife at

the time came to collect me, and as I walked through the doors, it was

such a relief. I was left feeling worse than I did before I attended

Healing the Wounds. I was suicidal. There are 250,000 war veterans in

Wales and some of them still have physical and mental scars that are

putting a strain on mainstream services and the NHS. As a result,

charities have sprung up in recent years to fill the gap. Tonight, we

will be investigating one of them and asking, does it do what it says

on the tin? Healing the Wounds has raised almost

?500,000 in recent years but they are using techniques which are

causing concerns. None of them are keyword, as far as I can see, after

three days treatment. Some have been made very unwell as a result of

going there and needed a lot of support from the NHS and charities.

Doctor Kitchener deals with soldiers would need treatment. More and

shares, depressed, self harming, suicidal and being very chaotic and

very difficult to be around and live with. The NHS has been trying to

persuade Healing the Wounds to move away from mental health treatment.

We have asked them to stop it. We have showed them the evidence from

the NHS, we have shared our concerns with them, and yet they continue to

operate in the way they do. The charity has been saying in

recent months that it no longer treats PTSD patients, it supports

them. We asked someone to go undercover for us to find out

exactly what Healing the Wounds is offering. He does not have PTSD but

he ran the charity and describe some symptoms. I explained my symptoms

were getting quite angry, could not sleep, drinking too much, using

drink to get to go to sleep, and that my wife had thrown me out.

Healing the Wounds had told him that if you went to a GP, they would

probably put him on a waiting list, but they could see him straightaway.

I was a little bit surprised that she did not ask if she could for my

GP. -- phone. Healing the Wounds operates in one wing of the Rest Bay

Hotel in Porthcawl. Filming secretly, our veteran has arrived

for a three-day course of therapy. This is Carol Richards, co-founder

of the charity. She saw him for a consultation the

week before when he told her he had not had any previous treatment for

PTSD. Carroll appears to be steering him

away from the NHS, even though she has not done any checks with his GP

to find out about his true mental and physical condition. To start

treatment for any mental health condition, there must be a

diagnosis. Lieutenant Colonel John Skipper has been very worried about

Healing the Wounds. He is an Army veteran anti-co-wrote a report and

visited the charity. I asked what happens, how long is your course, I

asked if there are any failures or whether they were any who did not

respond to treatment. I was told it was 100 present successful, which I

thought, actually, with mental health and treatment is lasting

three days, undiagnosed conditions, was fanciful, to say the least.

So who is behind Healing the Wounds? It was set up by Carol and her

husband, Kevin Richards. Here they are three years ago making the case

before Assembly Members for a Welsh home for war veterans.

We saw the need for a facility in Wales. There is no fixed facility to

send these guys from the Armed Forces.

Mr Richards had ambitious plans. He even wrote to Princes William and

Harry asking them if they would like to be patrons of what he would like

to become Britain's largest military charity. A year later, they launched

an appeal to buy this building near Ammanford. Their first target was to

raise ?200,000. We need assistance from the government to say, we

support these troops and we want them to give us some money to start

the process going. The dilapidated 156 bedroom mansion and its 150

acres was up for sale for ?2 million. A highly ambitious appeal.

Part of the grand plan was for 11 houses in this courtyard to be named

after fall in Welsh soldiers, including Craig Barber who was

killed in Iraq. They said we could even have a villa in memory of

Craig. We could have a villa in memory of other servicemen who had

died, and I felt such a buzz and it lifted my spirits. I thought, what a

wonderful opportunity to do something good in his memory. But

she was also taken aback by the way he asked her to get involved. He

said, we want you to hit the public in the gut with your emotional

story. You don't say that to a mother who has just lost their son.

Villagers helped her raise thousands for a villa in Craig's memory, but

then came a phone call from the Richards. He wanted me to give him

the many for the mansion appeal and I said, I can't do that. I can't

give you that money. Its thousand pounds had been raised for the

villa. She wanted the money ring fenced in Craig's memory. She then

received a solicitor's letter demanding the money. She said they

were two visits from the police. She said Kevin Richards denied he ever

promised her a villa named after Craig. There was no mention of the

Craig Barber villa. He told you you had made that up? He said it had

never even been discussed, that was the biggest shock. Not the fact I

had a supposedly stolen their money but there was no villa. So why was

he quoted in this newspaper as saying exactly that? The police

investigated and took no action. She remains deeply upset by her dealings

with the Richards. I am so shocked that these people are doing things

like this. I never want anything more to do with them. She gave all

the money raised for the villa to another military charity instead.

Healing the Wounds now concedes they had indicated that an apartment was

to have been named after Craig. But back in January 2011, Kevin and

Carol's dream of taking over the mansion collapsed so they set up a

new charity instead called Healing the Wounds, with ?120,000 they had

raised towards the purchase of the mansion.

Across Wales, people had been doing their best to raise money, first for

the Golden Grove appeal and then for Healing the Wounds. We would help

them in any way we possibly can. Kevin Richards has been busy too,

setting up various companies. One was dissolved, leaving debts of

?288,000. He has also created this price comparison website which

promises to donate net profits to veterans charities including this

one. The use of the word foundation is such that a general member of the

public might well look at it and think, a foundation is automatically

a charity. Martin Price is the chair of the Institute, fundraising can

read, and found out the foundation is a private company listing Kevin

Richards as a director. It is inappropriate to do that because it

could mislead the general public if they are being asked for funds. We

know from Healing the Wounds's accounts that they have raised

almost ?500,000 over three years, from bucket collections to donations

from private companies and tens of thousands of pounds in grants from

public bodies, but it is more difficult to find out what they have

spent that money on. Does any of this make sense to you? No. It does

not make any sense at all. All their accounts for the past three years

were filed on the same day. He says that is not good and that is not

all. This will show you some of the costs. They have allocated

fundraising costs and costs of goods sold down to charitable activity

again, so this is charitable activity but these are clearly not

charitable activities. We know what money has been spent but what we

can't tell is how much money has been spent on counselling and

post-traumatic stress disorder work with ex-servicemen. These accounts

have not been produced to the recommended practice for charities.

Healing the Wounds is not giving you that nice warm feeling that the

money is going to the right place. Healing the Wounds told us that

using the word charity was an error and they thanked us for bringing it

to their attention. They added that the foundation has been dissolved

and all references to it will now be removed. Meanwhile, back at Healing

the Wounds, Carol still has not made any attempt to contact our

veteran's GP to find out about his physical or mental health.

After a few minutes, Carol then asks him to go for a walk in his mind,

back to some troubling events in his life. She tells him not to relive

the memory but to describe the emotions associated with it.

Stop when you think there is work to be done.

relaxation techniques, sitting back in a chair, closing your eyes and

trying to put things away, like your thoughts and whatever memories you

had, put yourself in a happy place. And all that type of stuff. The

National Institute for clinical excellence does not recommend using

this therapy for PTSD sufferers. It is used as a motivational tool.

Then it is being used on psychiatric populations and this is where the

evidence base does not support its use at all. We have problems with

its use with veterans particularly with PTSD. You need to learn to let

go of this feeling at this time. My understanding is they have gone to

do their training which is approximately two weeks and have

come back from that training and have set themselves up as master

practitioners in neurolinguistic therapy. Two weeks. Do you think

that is appropriate? I think it is very rapid based on the people we

employ in our service in the NHS who have completed three or five years

of training to be a mental health professional. How long have you

trained? 11 years and I am still training. Two years ago when this

veteran went to Healing The Wounds he was told to stop taking

antidepressant pills prescribed by his GP. When I got there I had a

debrief and they told us to stop taking the medication because it

would get in the way of the treatment they were going to offer.

At Kings College London they have some of the UK's top experts on

PTSD. We asked one of them to look at our evidence. You said the time

unconscious is somewhat confusing. Let your unconscious tell you what

to do is unhelpful because it does not tell you what to do. This

professor is worried about their approach and was concerned to hear

that the veteran's GP had not been contacted and another one had been

told to come off his medication. If this group who are not medically

qualified and do not know a person's history because they have

not got it, that could cause problems and could be dangerous. Our

veteran told Carol he had never had PTSD treatment before. I went to my

GP first of all and they did not know how to deal with it. Through

Internet searches they came up with Healing The Wounds. That was the

quick fix I was looking for and they promised a lot. What did they

promise? To eradicate PTSD. Other variants on the same technique

should not be used as a first line treatment. There are plenty of

evidence -based treatments that work and trying to direct people towards

non-evidence -based interventions is concerning and could be dangerous in

some cases. The charity denies telling veterans to stop taking

their medication and it says it does tell them to get advice from their

GP. Healing The Wounds says they have helped 39 veterans who have

asked them for help having exhausted all other help from the NHS. They

say they offer more than therapy and plays veterans into training and

employment. It uses volunteers to work with vulnerable veterans and

one, a councillor, has been investigated by regulators. We have

discovered that he was falsely described as a paramedic on the

charity's website and has also been described as a clinical

psychologist. This man helps veterans with issues like housing. I

met with them and the person they told B was their clinical

psychologist. The housing section had to make the checks and they

found he was not registered as a clinical psychologist. I went to the

pleas and I said I think this man is committing a fraud. The police

referred it to the regulator of the use of professional titles. He says

he was mistakenly described as a paramedic on the website. But Paul

was not the only one who complained about him. He looked me in the eye

and told me I am a clinical psychologist. He lied to my face and

whether he lied to Healing The Wounds, or whether they took him at

face value, they certainly could not have checked appropriately his

qualifications as they would have found out he was not a clinical

psychologist. The regulator found that John Yandle had not been

complying with the rules although he has promised to do so in the future.

He has told us healing the wounds did not check his qualifications

before he started cancelling veterans. Back at Healing The Wounds

after an hour and a half of therapy Carol says that is it for the day.

Go back and enjoy your afternoon. You have got my number anyway. I

have, yes. As this is a residential course, Carol sends him to a hotel

for the night. The surprising thing for me is I was completely left to

my own devices. When the door closes behind you, you start to think you

have got 20 odd hours on your own in a strange hotel room. Veterans we

interview to have PTSD told us that being left alone after the therapy

was the worst part of the course. I remember feeling tired and agitated

and that night was one of the worst night I ever had. I was having

nightmares, I wet the bed. Cold sweats. I felt so scared and so

alone. I had the overwhelming urge just to end it all. Although he was

unhappy Justin did not complain, but this man said he did. One night I

was having a really bad time so I went into the Fourier and asked them

if they could get hold of somebody. I was maybe a bit louder than I

would be normally, but that was because I had had flashbacks and a

panic attack. The charity told us that veterans welcome the chance to

have time to themselves and they are given 24 hour contact numbers and

they are unaware of any veteran feeling unhappy with their servers.

We have also heard from a number of veterans who have said the charity

has helped them. It is our veteran's second day of therapy. He

asks Carol how quickly the treatment can work. What is the shortest one?

20 minutes. He has seen quite a view of his mates. I did a bit of work

with him and told him to concentrate on the new guys coming in. He went

back to Afghanistan. My average patient probably sees me for

anything from four months to a year to treat their PTSD and other

problems. It is not a quick fix. Complaints have been made about

Healing The Wounds to the charities commission and the Welsh government,

but because there are no controls in place, the charity is free to carry

on. The chair of the Assembly's cross-party group on the Armed

Forces is not using -- ruling out certain uses of neurolinguistic

therapy, but more scrutiny is needed. Anyone can set up as a

practitioner and the quality of their work is not monitored by

anybody, so that puts potential risks out in the field. What we need

is some proper arrangement for the oversight of the quality of the work

that is being done by any charity that is giving some support to

veterans. When our undercover veteran was filling in forms he met

Kevin Richards. Can I just fill in these forms for Carol. Healing The

Wounds is collecting data to prove its treatment works, but experts say

the therapy must be subject to randomised controlled trials. We

know treatments that work for PTSD and we know how to investigate

whether the treatment is effective or not. It has not been investigated

by proper, rigorous trials to show it works. Just because somebody gets

to the end of a session is no guarantee they will feel good in the

future. Given the fact we know these therapies have a potential to harm,

we need to do these trials. Healing The Wounds says it has supported

more than 130 veterans and their charity plays a vital role. Is it

time these charities got together and worked out these differences in

the interest of veterans? To a large extent they are. The well-being

service is doing a major role in coordinating the efforts of the

state funded institutions and charities in pulling all of that

together. They could do more and they could be more inclusive of some

of the charities, but it is moving in the right direction. You said you

would like to see them amalgamated. I would love to see them

amalgamated. There are concerns that the NHS is not filling a growing

gap. Should you not be admitting that the NHS is falling very short

when it comes to treating the veterans and their mental health

problems? I think that is a fair point. There is a vacuum. Whenever

there is a long waiting list, people are going to look elsewhere. If

somebody is going to offer you a three-day, quick fix, which does not

cost any money, that is effective. Whereas if you want to see me, you

might have to wait six months before you can see that evidence -based

treatment. The Welsh government says it has pumped half ?1 million into

the service and it says were treatment is offered it should be in

line with evidence -based guidelines. It is the end of therapy

for our undercover veteran and the charity insists it is safe and

effective. They also say they are completely open and transparent. We

wanted to interview Kevin and Carol Richards, but they declined to

appear and they added, healing the wounds is a small, but busy charity

which has as its main priority the needs of veterans and PTSD

sufferers. Tonight a military charity has told Healing The Wounds

to remove its logo from the website to show that no endorsement is

implied. The charities commission is also investigating. The battle to

overcome PTSD continues for many veterans, including those we spoke

to. I feel I am on the right road now. If I had continued with Healing

The Wounds, I would be on the slippery slope again. When you first

meet them they promise you the earth, we will help you with this,

we will do that, but like I said I could have sat down with anybody and

they could have done the same thing that they did. I thought every

charity and everybody willing to help people with PTSD were like

Healing The Wounds. Thankfully I found otherwise, but it could have

been too late. They served their country and some have wounds to

heal, but what they all want and deserve is peace of mind. Next week

we investigate road rage. That is Week In Week Out, next Tuesday at

10:35pm.