jazeera america. >> on "america tonight": unfinished business. in the obama administration's final year, the tough issues still on the table. >> it took us 12 hours to get here from mexico but just less than five minutes to unload. we have been told there were about 30 unaccompanied miles an hour on that bus. >> immigration, what to do with guantanamo bay and giving america's veterans the help they deserve. thanks for joining us, i'm joie chen. headed into the final year of his administration the president's performance is

getting sharp scrutiny. both from those who hope to succeed him and those he promised to serve. top of the list this veterans day are the people who make the greatest sacrifice for our nation. troubled over the past several years of increasing reports of management failures and poor treatment in the va system. president obama changed its leadership last year but he admits even as late as this veterans day, things aren't up to snuff. as "america tonight's" christof putzel found, shocking flaws in the system. >> marv and linda lost their son jason last august. the 35-year-old former marine didn't die in a combat zone overseas, he died at the time toma medical center in wisconsin. >> he was sleeping with his hand on his side on his head and i said jason what's the matter with you, he was like sh sh sh

sh. i said jason i can't understand you. i went back to the nurse's station and said what's wrong with him, he can't even talk. she said we gave him some medication for migraine, he'll be all right. but he wasn't all right. the toma va told them jason's headache had been caused an aneurysm. but the to tox report was different. >> all told, the medical examiner found 13 different medications in jason's system. >> at the end they had him so drugged up he took a drug to get up in the morning and keep him going and he had to take many drugs to go to sleep. it was ovicious circle. >> it was a difficult situation

for jason after his four years in the marines ended in 2000. he got married and had a daughter and joined marv in the family construction business, building homes in stevens point wisconsin. but an addiction to pain medication, the result of an injury in the service led him to years of service in the toma va. one witness to jawfn's last day. >> i saw him sit up in bed, he seemed fine, he was mumbling but i didn't think anything of it. he was on a ward that people don't die. in and out ward. >> kristen knew the toma va not just as a worker, but as a patient. >> i took his trash out, shut his door, two hours later he was dead. a nurse had gone in there just to check him and just like that.

he was dead. >> reporter: so after he died did you have to go back into his room? >> um -- it was like a zoo. it was really bad. they -- running around everywhere, the nurse staff so confused, screaming, yelling. i had to stay -- i stayed out of the way, watching the whole thing, though. giving him cpr, the blood everywhere. >> the death of jason and a subsequent report from the center for investigative reporting set off a fire storm. in jan bok mcdonald, secretary of veterans affairs, announced a comprehensive review at toma, including overmedication and allegations of retaliation. at the heart of the allegation

he, chief of staff dr. david heuhoulihan . >> did you have any interaction with dr. houlihan? >> he called me and expressed his condolences for my son jason and i think a day or two after we got the autopsy report back too. he says i'm kind of puzzled on this. did you by any chance give your son any extra meds? i'm like no, i'm fighting for a reduction in meds and he's asking me that. >> it turns out months before jason's death, the va had looked into dr. houhilan. in march 2014 the va found that dr. houlihan and one of his nurse he had been prescribing

high levels of narcotics. kristen saw patients every day whom she thought seemed overmedicated. >> the patients a lot of them were just walking around like zombies. i couldn't understand why there were so many patients that were just being in their bed all day long. >> jacob called the toma va candy-land and he referred the dr. houlihan as the candy-man. >> her son was also treated at toma. >> he liked dr. houlihan. he liked drugs. >> what was your interaction with him? >> he was pretty short, he said

he was the doctor and that's how he did things. >> according to data obtained for the center for investigative reporting, since 2004, the year before dr. houlihan became director, fewer veterans were seeking care at the facility. stephanie is the public affairs director at the toma va center. >> five months earlier the inspector general released a report saying the chief of staff here in toma was prescribing an abnormal amount of opiates to patients. shouldn't that have been a red flag? >> we took very seriously the issues raised in the oag report and we took actions to address the oag report recommendations including redirecting the chief of staff and a contradic psychie

practitioner. >> we actually then put a pain management physician to oversee the highest -- the patients with the highest opiate usage at the facility. to make sure that we're separating their psychiatric care from their pain care. >> reporter: would you say it worked? >> i think we've seen tremendous strides in how the facility's addressing opiate usage with our veteran patients. >> reporter: did you voice your concerns to the toma va about how many medications he was prescribed. >> yes yes. >> was there a discussion about reducing? >> i always fought to reduce his meds but seems like i always lost. >> the former chief of staff

david houlihan was kicked out. we reached out to his attorney and didn't hear back. hopes legislation will be passed in his son's honor to address the overprescribing of opiates to veterans. it is a bill that is still stalled on alcohol. >> next, beyond borders. also on the to-do list the president's immigration policy facing a new hurdle. later, in limbo from inside guantanamo, a voice making itself heard. and hot on "america tonight's" website now, taking a shot, do fewer state gun laws mean fewer gun deaths? find out at aljazeera.com/americatonight.

>> what could prove a big stumbling block in the president's immigration policy? for republicans to seek to replace mr. obama, in the gop debate, path to citizenship again drew fire but in an in depth look from south of border, lori jane gliha reports migrants from central america migrants are still make their way north.

>> san pedro sula, honduras, this is the scene a few blocks from our hotel. we just got a call there was another murder in san pedro sula. under that yellow tarp there that's the fourth murder of today. the victim, still bleeding when we arrived, was shot twice in the head and a neighbor said thrown from a car into the ditch. the locals presume the normal: gang violence. so the investigators are here on the scene. this morgue-person has just arrived, what they're going to do is start investigating the body. and what they do is they're going to count how many bullet holes he has, whether or not there's any evidence of him being tortured, they're going to start to look for bullet casings and then they'll move the body out of here.

>> police told us they see at least 15 killings like this every week. in a city ranked as the most murderous in the world. many people are fleeing because of the persistent violence here. but so many of them are quickly deported right back home, caught in mexico's increasing migrant crack down. we know that the bus is filled with deportees from mexico are going or the headed this way shortly so we're going to try to catch the migrants when they arrive. for few relatives also waiting for buses at this government run shelter, the anticipation is great. many of them were prepared to never see their children again. but they will get another chance. cameras aren't allowed up close

but so many tiny fit skip off the buses coming from the migratory station in tapachula, mexico. children deported back to a country they thought they'd never return to. they're some of the most visible examples of mexico's migrant crack down. the buses arrive here three times a week. it took that bus 12 hours to get here from mexico but just less than five minutes to unload. what's happening now everybody is in that room, they're being processed, it could take up to an hour and a half. we're told there were about 30 unaccompanied minors on that bus. this 24-year-old woman and her eight-year-old child say they almost made it to the u.s. but were caught near the border. i asked them if they'll try again. very soon, she tells me. these young men say they live a few hours out of san pedro sula.

they are trying again too, tomorrow, he says. a deportees streamed out of the shelter, we met 17-year-old katia and her mother. i asked her why she sent her daughter on the journey north, alone. her shirt is filled with good-bye messages from her friends. people she felt she might never see again. are you going to try again? why did you want to go to the u.s?

we arranged to meet katia the next day. thithis is the area where katia lives. it is much too dangerous to bring our camera equipment inside because it's controlled by gangs. we decided to meet katia at another location. katia tells us she already tried to reach the u.s. two other times. she paid a coyote 4500 to reach the united states. >> what happened when you paid the coyote?

can you leave the house to have fun? katia's father is dead. her mother said there's no future for her daughter here. she wants her to go north, even if it means making a dangerous journey with a smuggler. >> it's possibly the last time you're going to see your mother. is it worth it? >> "america tonight's" lori jane gliha joins us here. i know you went down there, you spent a lot of time with the young women seeking a life north

of the border. they've kept in contact. what's going on with them now? >> what's interesting, everybody we contacted when they got off the bus, said yes we're going to try again. i don't know how many days it was, the girl we featured in the peace, we got a message she was trying again. >> immediately? >> yeah, probably within a few days if not a week. she had met another girl on this trip too, that was trying to go and reunite with her mother who had abandoned her when she was three and living in the united states. those two they don't live near each other in honduras, but they complete and teamed up again and they're actually in the united states they did cross the border. and they turned themselves in to the migration authorities and they are both now in shelters right now, one in chicago and the other in texas. >> why would they turn themselves into shelters? >> as a youth you have a little bit more understanding, they will take you in. the one girl katia just turned

18 a custom days ago. there are different rules for when you're an adult versus a youth. you have to prove certain things but you play have the ability to stay here. they must consider whether or not sending you back would put you in danger. >> we did refer to the president's overall attempt to reform immigration. the legal hurdle doesn't affect katia and her friend. >> this does not affect the unaccompanied minors but several million living in the united states. the president's plan would protect parents who are undocumented but have children who are legal residents. it would have expanded or delayed their deportations. right now it was stalled in courts. the obama administration has said yes we want to appeal this to the supreme court, but timing-wise, it's possible that no resolution would happen until after he's out of office. so this would then be in the hands of -- >> of the next president whoever that is. >> uh-huh. >> we will see, "america

tonight's" lori jane gliha. thanks. flex, thnext, the voices tht remain, a new stumbling block threatens to keep them inside guantanamo. >> and sheila macvicar on the west.'s coming shakedown tomorrow.

>> it may prove the most difficult promise to keep. when president obama was campaigning for office, he vowed to close the prison facility at guantanamo bay. 122 men, many of them have faced no charges, remain there. one of them has made a way to make his voice heard through a detainee's diary through an

endlesendless sentence of capti. >> the torture was growing day by day. the guards on the block actively participated in the process. they cursed me for no reason. >> a public reading in new york city of a unique work. the guantanamo diary of mohammedu oldslahi. >> this book tells us what happened to a prisoner in guantanamo from his side, from his word, from hi words, his he. >> he maintains his dignity his humanity, he gives us all a model how to move forward when we talk about guantanamo. >> reporter: it's the first published account from a guantanamo prisoner still in detention. >> bring me to the court and i'll answer all your questions, i will tell the team. there will be no court they would answer. are you a mafia? you kidnap people lock them up and blackmail them, i said.

>> slahi was arrested in november 2001 in his native mauritania. he came to the attention of the cia because of what the agency considered to be a series of suspicious connections. he had fought against the sophie yets isophiesoviets. it was alleged he crossed the path with a 9 9/1 9/11 planner. >> so i said, i was working for al qaeda and radio telecom. he seemed happier with the lie. >> but slahi maintains that although he was in afghanistan he gave up the fight long before al qaeda took up arms against the united states. prosecutors at guantanamo never

brought charges against him. >> what have i done? i don't know, you tell me. look, you kidnapped me from my home in mauritania, not from a battlefield in afghanistan. so what's the next charge? it looks to me as if you want to pull any (bleep) on me. >> i put my clothes on and washed my face. my heart started to pound. i hated interrogation. i had gotten tired of being terrified all the time. living in constant fear day in and day out for the last 13 months. >> the process of bringing to diary to publication has been an epic journey in its own right. >> it took nearly search years to get this book out. in september of 12 i received a package hard copy with a letter saying this is a cleared version you can use and every page is stamped unclassified can be

released to the public. >> i hated the sounds of the heavy metal chains. i can hardly carry them when they're given me. people are always getting taken from the block and every time i heard the chains i thought it would be me. >> the book is filled with about 2500 redactions. the black boxes placed over the text by the u.s. government. >> the redactions are the last fingerprint of a 13-year process of secrecy and silencen mohammedu and there are things the governments doesn't want the people to know and the world to know and that must be under those redactions. >> but we know you're a criminal. what have i done? will you tell me? otherwise, you'll never see the light of day. if you don't cooperate, we're going to put you in a hole, and

wipe your name out of our detainee database. >> the resume is as dark as he be any. playing a track very loudly, i mean very loudly. the song was, "let the bodies hit the floor." i might never forget that song. at the same time, redacted turned on some colored blimpgers that hurt the eis. if you (bleep) fall asleep i'm going to hurt you, he said. i had to listen to the song over and over until the next morning. >> what he did is what people do when they're being tortured. they say yes to whatever they're asked. so the torture will stop. and this is one of the problems of torture. and that's what he did. he simply said yes, to whatever they asked him. and it wasn't true. the government knows now that it wasn't true. and they probably knew then that it wasn't true. but they just didn't seem to care.

they just wanted the answers. >> i need you to answer me one question. why am i here? i'm not a lawyer. but common sense dictates that after three years of interrogating me and depriving me of my liberty the government at least owes an explanation as to why to do so, what is my crime? >> there was no justification to bring modelu to guantanamo. we shouldn't torture anyone, innocent or guilty. but this is an innocent man. we have tortured him and left him there. he needs to go home. he just needs to go home. the government should stop fighting and let him go home. >> that is "america tonight." please tell us what you think on twitter or facebook and we'll have more of "america tonight" tomorrow.

>> if it was your own children, you'd have the money to take care of it. >> who does the buck stop with? >> road to democracy. the military in myanmar's current president congratulate aung san suu kyi and endorse her party. will that lead to democracy? doping scandal. >> we need to get rid of this problem. >> russian president vladimir