New Orleans Cops Charged In Alleged Katrina Shootings And Cover-Up

Jul 13, 2010 1 Comment ›› Pat Dollard

New York Times:

NEW ORLEANS — Six current and former New Orleans police officers have been charged in connection with the killing of unarmed civilians on the Danziger Bridge in the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina, federal law enforcement officials announced here on Tuesday.

Four of them — former Officer Robert Faulcon, Sgt. Kenneth Bowen, Sgt. Robert Gisevius and Officer Anthony Villavaso — were charged with killing 17-year-old James Brissette and wounding four others, all members of the same family, when they came across a group on the bridge in eastern New Orleans and opened fire.

In addition, Mr. Faulcon, who was arrested by F.B.I. agents in Fresno, Tex., on Tuesday morning, was charged with shooting Ronald Madison, a 40-year-old man with severe mental disabilities, in the back as he tried to flee.

All four of the men could possibly face the death penalty.

The 27-count indictment, which was handed down by a grand jury on Monday, paints a harrowing picture of the events on the Danziger Bridge on Sept. 4, 2005, when much of the city was still underwater.

But the Danziger case is just the most high-profile of at least eight incidents involving New Orleans police officers that are being actively investigated by federal law enforcement officials.

In May, at the formal invitation of the city’s newly inaugurated mayor, Mitch Landrieu, Justice Department officials announced they were conducting a full review of the police department, a process that often ends in a consent decree, a legally binding agreement for systemic reform.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., who spoke at a news conference here on Tuesday, put the indictment in that context.

“It will take more than this investigation to renew the New Orleans Police Department and to allow it to thrive,” Mr. Holder said, adding later, “We want to look at this in a holistic way.”

The four men who were charged with killing Mr. Brissette are in custody, federal officials said, who added that the investigation was continuing. Two others charged on Tuesday received summonses, said a spokeswoman for the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

“We’ve known it was coming for at least six months and suspected it was coming for a year,” said Frank DeSalvo, a lawyer for Sergeant Bowen. “It’s not a shock. We’re ready.”

Eric Hessler, a lawyer who represents Sergeant Gisevius, said federal officials should have considered the chaos that the police were operating in during the first few days after Hurricane Katrina.

“The federal government has clearly forgotten or chosen to ignore the circumstances police officers were working under and clearly chose not to factor in any of those circumstances when they decided to charge them with an intentional act of murder,” Mr. Hessler said in an interview.

Lawyers for the other men who were indicted could not be reached or did not return calls seeking comment.

Starting in February, former police officers, often one at a time, began to plead guilty to lesser charges like conspiring to obstruct justice in the Danziger case; five former officers and a civilian have done so to date. The details of the shootings on the bridge that began to emerge, and which were elaborated on in the indictment unsealed Tuesday, were ghastlier than many in the city had expected.

Responding to a call that the police were under fire, officers drove to the bridge over the Industrial Canal in eastern New Orleans in a Budget rental truck. Some were armed with assault rifles, others with a shotgun or a semiautomatic pistol.

Mr. Brissette and five members of the Bartholomew family were walking across the bridge to get food and other supplies from a supermarket, the indictment reads, when the officers opened fire. Susan Bartholomew, at the time 38, lost part of her arm. Jose Holmes, a nephew of the Bartholomews, was shot in the stomach. Mr. Brissette, who was killed, was shot seven times.

Some officers then traveled to the other side of the bridge and found two brothers, Ronald and Lance Madison, who were on their way to check on a dentist’s office that belonged to their oldest brother, Dr. Romell Madison. According to the indictment, Mr. Faulcon then shot Mr. Madison to death with a shotgun. Afterwards, it continues, Sergeant Bowen kicked and stomped on Mr. Madison as he lay dying on the ground.

Lance Madison was arrested at the scene and later held on eight counts of attempted murder of a police officer. He was never formally charged and released after being held in custody for three weeks.

“Our family has waited a long time for justice in this case,” Dr. Madison said in a statement. “These indictments represent another step forward towards that goal.”

The three officers and Mr. Faulcon were also charged along with two homicide detectives, Sgt. Arthur Kaufman and Sgt. Gerard Dugue, who were assigned to investigate the shootings, in connection with a cover-up of the shootings. Sergeant Kaufman faces up to 120 years in prison, while Mr. Dugue, who recently retired from the force, faces up to 70.

The cover-up described in the indictment is methodical and blatant. It recounting a scene in the guttedSeventh District police station where, it says, Sergeant Kaufman and Mr. Dugue met with other officers to ensure that their stories were consistent. Sergeant Kaufman is also accused of creating fictional witnesses and planting a pistol at the scene of the shootings.

In 2006, the Orleans Parish district attorney charged the four men now indicted in the killing of Mr. Bissette and three others with murder and attempted murder. In 2008, a judge dismissed those charges, citing improprieties in the handling of the case.

Shortly after, Jim Letten, the United States attorney for the district that includes New Orleans, announced that his office would open an investigation, along with the F.B.I. and the Department of Justice.

The other federal probes are continuing.

Last month, five police officers were indicted in connection with the murder of Henry Glover, a 31-year-old man who was shot to death in the Algiers neighborhood in the days just after Katrina, and whose body was later found in a burned car behind a police station.

Thomas Perez, the assistant attorney general for civil rights, said at the news conference that he and Mr. Holder discussed the New Orleans police force in one of their first conversations after Mr. Perez joined the Justice Department in October 2009.

Justice Department officials began considering the possibility of stepping in and systemically reforming the department, and Mr. Landrieu, who was elected mayor in February, began discussing such a step with federal officials before he even took office.

Two days after his inauguration, he formally requested federal involvement in the New Orleans police force, describing it as “one of the worst police departments in the country.”