A joint investigation by the Los Angeles Times and ProPublica revealed that the federal workers' compensation program has failed thousands of foreign-born civilian contractors working in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Foreign nationals working on behalf of the U.S. government "have gone without medical treatment and compensation because they were never informed of their right to the benefits. Widows and children have not received death payments for the same reason," according to the newspaper series.
 

Rey Torres dreamed of a better life for his wife and five children when he left a neighborhood of wooden shacks and burning trash piles to drive a bus on a U.S. military base near Baghdad.

He hoped to send his children to college and build a new home with the $16,000 a year he earned in Iraq — four times what he could make in the Philippines.

Then, in April 2005, Torres, 31, was killed in an ambush by Iraqi insurgents. His widow and children were supposed to be protected by a war zone insurance system overseen by the U.S. government. They were eligible for about $300,000 in compensation.

But Gorgonia Torres knew nothing about the death benefit and did not apply. When she did learn about the insurance, two years later, it was from a reporter. She has since turned down an insurance company's $22,000 settlement offer. Her only hope of receiving full compensation is a legal fight that could drag on for years.

Torres was among tens of thousands of civilian contract workers from poverty-stricken countries hired to support the U.S. war effort in Iraq and Afghanistan. In case of injury or death, they are supposed to be covered by workers' compensation insurance financed by American taxpayers. But the program has failed to deliver medical care and other benefits to many foreign workers and their survivors, a Los Angeles Times-ProPublica investigation found.

Foreign nationals aren't the only casualties in this federal debacle. Many American contractors also have struggled to get medical treatment and compensation for injuries they have suffered on the job. The Los Angeles Times and ProPublica have documented many of those cases