Post-Katrina Police Prosecutions in New Orleans Face Setbacks
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON, NYT
NEW ORLEANS — Even before the arrests started in 2010, it was becoming clear that this was going to be one of the most wide-ranging federal campaigns against police wrongdoing in the country.
In addition to a deep yearlong investigation into the culture and practices of this city’s Police Department, the Justice Department that year charged 18 current and former officers with crimes relating to the deaths of residents in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Between plea agreements and convictions over the ensuing months, officers were collectively facing over 250 years in prison. But recently that campaign has faced a series of stunning reversals, most recently on Wednesday night when a federal jury acquitted David Warren, a former police officer who was on trial, for the second time, on charges of shooting and killing an unarmed man. This acquittal came three months after a federal judge threw out the convictions and ordered new trials for five other officers in connection with the shooting of six unarmed civilians on the Danziger Bridge.
As a result, rather than the clear-cut strike at criminal behavior by law officers envisioned three years ago, the post-Katrina prosecutions have proved to be a far more difficult and problematic undertaking.
(More here.)
NEW ORLEANS — Even before the arrests started in 2010, it was becoming clear that this was going to be one of the most wide-ranging federal campaigns against police wrongdoing in the country.
In addition to a deep yearlong investigation into the culture and practices of this city’s Police Department, the Justice Department that year charged 18 current and former officers with crimes relating to the deaths of residents in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Between plea agreements and convictions over the ensuing months, officers were collectively facing over 250 years in prison. But recently that campaign has faced a series of stunning reversals, most recently on Wednesday night when a federal jury acquitted David Warren, a former police officer who was on trial, for the second time, on charges of shooting and killing an unarmed man. This acquittal came three months after a federal judge threw out the convictions and ordered new trials for five other officers in connection with the shooting of six unarmed civilians on the Danziger Bridge.
As a result, rather than the clear-cut strike at criminal behavior by law officers envisioned three years ago, the post-Katrina prosecutions have proved to be a far more difficult and problematic undertaking.
(More here.)
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