As Captain Willard in Apocalypse Now, Martin Sheen was ordered to “terminate with extreme prejudice” an Army Special Forces colonel who'd gone over the deep end in Vietnam. As Martin Sheen, the actor-activist is scheduled to execute with extreme prejudice a live theatrical reading in Anaheim Thursday for troubled military veterans.
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Sheen has been tabbed to perform a dramatic reading of Sophocles' Ajax as part of the Theater of War: Soldiers and Citizens Tour stop at Justice For Vets' second annual Vet Court Con at the Anaheim Marriott.
Thursday's 8 a.m. reading of the ancient Greek tragedy about the suicide of a great, respected warrior is to be followed by a panel discussion about the ways communities can better meet the needs of struggling veterans. A combat veteran from Iraq and Afghanistan and a judge who helped create a Veterans Treatment Court to keep veterans out of jail and in treatment will be part of the panel.
Vet Court Con, billed as the nation's only conference dedicated to justice-involved veterans and the emergence of Veterans Treatment Courts, was scheduled before the recent revelations about the shoddy medical and psychological care of military vets, by the way.
Justice for Vets Senior Director Melissa Fitzgerald is scheduled to kick off the conference at 8 a.m. Wednesday, when she will be joined by featured speakers who include former Drug Czar and retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, White House Office of National Drug Control Policy Acting Director Michael Botticelli and National Association of State Department of Veterans Affairs Director Admiral Clyde Marsh.
Other scheduled speakers include Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America Chief Policy Officer of Tom Tarantino, Vietnam Veterans of America National President John Rowan, former AMVETS National Commander John Brown and veterans who have completed the program.
For more information on the conference, visit nadcp.org or AllRise.org.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.