Military advocates are supposed to help vulnerable veterans but the system is largely unregulated and, as Peter Alchin and married couple Brenton and Liane Lawrence found out, not protected from fraudsters.

Warning: This story contains details of suicide.

All three fell victim to a convicted criminal who was never vetted by the Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA).

A judge had previously labelled John Simmons a "fraudster, con-man and a liar", but unknown to him, and after three years of trying to access his veteran entitlements, former army apprentice Mr Alchin turned to him for help.

And initially things were good.

After Mr Alchin met Simmons he believed things had begun to move in a positive direction.

For each successful compensation claim lodged on his behalf, Mr Alchin paid Sim

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