https://www.ozy.com/rising-stars/she...-get-their-due

While Le Roy Torres was serving in Iraq, the fires raged. Using jet fuel as an accelerant, military contractor KBR indiscriminately incinerated discarded plastics, medical waste, spent munitions and biological remains. Joint Base Balad, where Torres served, had the largest burn pit operation in U.S.-occupied Iraq, but just one of many across Iraq and Afghanistan run by contractors DynCorp International, Fluor Intercontinental and KBR. Their toxic smoke and ash cloaked the bases and nearby population centers for days on end.

Since returning home in 2008, Torres, now 47, has been diagnosed with constrictive bronchiolitis, a chronic lung disease, and more recently a toxic brain injury. It’s cost him his job with the Texas Department of Public Safety. His wife, Rosie, left her position at the Department of Veterans Affairs — a job she held since high school — to stave off foreclosure by tapping into their federal thrift savings account, which remained off-limits while she was on the job, and secure a grant from Feherty’s Troops First Foundation. “By no means did I want to retire in my early 40s,” she says.