I’m not so sure the VA is the only guilty party here. What is the VA supposed to do if the bodies sitting in a county morgue haven’t been identified? Are they to assume that every Jane or John Doe who dies is a veteran and to be buried with military honors? I would assume that LA County, which has a long history of incompetence as well, would be doing everything they could to get the bodies in question identified and out of their custody.
There is probably more to this story.
As you note-—there must be another part to this story. I’m guessing the bodies in LA County morgue aren’t even vets unless they happen to have died on the street. Having helped bury several old War Horses in my own family I’ve seen how the system is supposed to work. When a Vet dies in a Vet Hospital the body is turned over to a private contractor who cleans, dresses, boxes the body for burial/cremation. Families, if known, are given a chance to upgrade the trappings and/or provide for a private plot or burial at sea. If the Vet is indigent the same contractor sucks up any difference and handles the burial in a gummint cemetery. There is absolutely no way that a known Vet should wind up in a county morgue out of custody of a burial facility. Guess I gotta throw the BS flag on most of the story without hearing the details.