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Books by Jordan
Flaherty
Floodlines:
Community and Resistance from Katrina to the
Jena Six.
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NOPD Verdict Reveals Post-Katrina History
By
Jordan
Flaherty
8 August 2011
In an historic
verdict with national implications, five New Orleans
police officers were convicted on Friday of civil rights
violations for killing unarmed African Americans in the
aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and could face life in
prison when sentenced later this year. The case,
involving a grisly encounter on the Danziger Bridge, was
the most high-profile of a number of prosecutions that
seek to hold police accountable for violence in the
storm’s wake.
The officers’
conviction on all 25 counts (on two counts, the jury
found the men guilty but with partial disagreements on
the nature of the crime, which could slightly affect
sentencing) comes nearly six years after the city was
devastated by floodwaters and government inaction. The
verdict helps rewrite the history of what happened in
the chaotic days after the levees broke. And the story
of how these convictions happened is important for
anyone around the U.S. seeking to combat law enforcement
violence.
The results of this
trial also have national implications for those seeking
federal support in challenges to police abuses in other
cities. New Orleans is one of four major cities in which
the Department of Justice has stepped in to look at
police departments. Any success here has far reaching
implications for federal investigations in Denver,
Seattle, Newark, and other cities.
The Danziger Bridge
case begins with Hurricane Katrina. As images of
desperate survivors played on television, people around
the world felt sympathy for people waiting for rescue
after the storm. But then images of families trapped on
rooftops were replaced by stories of armed gangs and
criminals roaming the streets. News reports famously
described white people as “finding” food while depicting
black people as “looting.” Then-Chief of Police Eddie
Compass told Oprah Winfrey that “little babies (are)
getting raped” in the Superdome. Then-Gov. Kathleen
Blanco announced she had sent in troops with orders to
shoot to kill, and the second in charge of the police
department reportedly told officers to fire at will on
looters.
Evidence suggests
that the NOPD acted on these instructions. On Sept. 2,
just days after the storm, a black man named
Henry
Glover was shot by a police sniper as he walked through
a parking lot. When a good Samaritan tried to help
Glover get medical help, he was beaten by officers, who
burnt
Glover’s body and left it behind a levee. The next
day, a 45-year-old named Danny Brumfield, Sr., was
killed by officers in front of scores of witnesses
outside the New Orleans convention center when he ran
after a police car to demand that they stop and provide
aid.
The following
morning, two families were crossing New Orleans’
Danziger Bridge, which connects Gentilly and New Orleans
East, two mostly middle-to-upper-class African American
neighborhoods. Without warning, a Budget Rental truck
carrying police officers arrived and cops jumped out.
The officers did not identify themselves, and began
firing before their vehicle had even stopped.
Officers had heard
a radio call about shootings in the area, and according
to prosecutors, they were seeking revenge. James
Brisette, a 17-year-old called studious and nerdy by his
friends, was shot nearly a dozen times and died at the
scene. Many of the bullets hit him as he lay on the
ground bleeding. Four other people were wounded,
including Susan Bartholomew, a 38-year-old mother who
had her arm shot off of her body, and her 17-year old
daughter Lesha, who was shot while crawling on top of
her mother’s body, trying to shield her from bullets.
Lesha’s cousin Jose was shot point-blank in the stomach
and nearly died. He needed a colostomy bag for years
afterwards.
Further up the
bridge, officers chased down Ronald Madison, a mentally
challenged man, who was traveling with his brother
Lance. Ronald was shot in the back by one officer and
then stomped and kicked to death by another. Lance was
arrested and charged with firing at officers, and spent
weeks behind bars.
At the time, the New Orleans
Times-Picayune reported that officers “sent up a cheer”
when word came over police radios that suspects had been
shot and killed.
A cursory investigation by the NOPD
justified the shooting, and it appeared that the matter
was closed. In fact, for years every check and balance
in the city’s criminal justice system failed to find any
fault in this or other officer-involved shootings from
the days after the storm.
Eddie Jordan, the city’s first
black district attorney, pursued charges against the
officers in late 2006. When the cops went to turn
themselves in, they were greeted by a crowd of hundreds
of officers who cheered for them and called them heroes.
Before the case could make it to trial, it was dismissed
by a judge with close ties to the defense lawyers, and
soon after that Jordan was forced to resign.
After the dismissal of Jordan’s
charges, the story of police violence after Katrina
remained untold. Jordan believes an indifferent local
media bears partial responsibility for the years of
cover-up. “They were looking for heroes,” he says. “They
had a cozy relationship with the police. They got tips
from the police; they were in bed with the police. It
was an atmosphere of tolerance for atrocities from the
police. They abdicated their responsibility to be
critical in their reporting. If a few people got killed
that was a small price to pay.”
Other elected officials, like the
city coroner, went along with the police version of
events. For example, the coroner’s office never flagged
Henry Glover’s body, found burned in a car, as a
potential homicide.
But the Madisons,
the Bartholomews, and the
Glovers, along with family
members of other police violence victims, refused to be
silent. They continued to speak out at press
conferences, rallies, and directly to reporters. They
worked with organizations like Safe Streets Strong
Communities, which was founded by criminal justice
activists in the days after Katrina, and Community
United for Change, which was formed in response to
police abuses. Monique Harden, a community activist and
co-director of Advocates for Environmental Human Rights,
helped to bring testimony about these issues to the
United Nations. Another post-Katrina organization,
Peoples Hurricane Relief Fund, presented the charges to
an international tribunal.
Activists worked to
not only raise awareness of specific issues of police
violence, but to say that these problems are structural
and that any solution must get at the root causes. “This is about an
entire system that was completely broken and in crisis,”
says former Safe Streets co-director Rosana Cruz.
“Everyone’s job in the criminal justice system depends
on there being a lot of crime in the city. The district
attorney’s office doesn’t work on getting the city
safer, they work on getting convictions at any cost. As
long as that’s the case, we’re not going to have
safety.”
Former District
Attorney Jordan feels that investigators should pursue
charges up to the very top of the department, including
Warren Riley, who was promoted to police chief shortly
after Hurricane Katrina and served in that role until
2010. “Riley, by his own admission, never even read the
report on Danziger,” Jordan points out. “It’s so
outrageous, it’s unspeakable. It’s one of the worst
things that anyone can do. It’s hard to understand why
he’s not on trial as well.”
“Fish starts
rotting at the head,” adds Jordan. “This was all done in
the backdrop of police opposition at the very top. It’s
not surprising that there was a cover-up. You just have
to wonder how far that cover-up went.”
In 2008, journalist
A.C. Thompson did what New Orleans media had failed to
do, and seriously investigated the accusations of police
violence. His reporting, published on ProPublica and in
The Nation, spelled out the shocking details of
Glover’s
killing and pointed toward police coordination with
white vigilantes in widespread violence. It brought
national attention to the stories that had been ignored.
Activists took advantage of the exposure and lobbied the
Congressional Black Caucus and the Justice Department
for an investigation.
In early 2009, a
newly empowered civil rights division of the Justice
Department decided to look into the cases. Federal
agents interviewed witnesses who had never been talked
to, reconstructed crime scenes, and even confiscated
NOPD computers. They found evidence that the Danziger
officers had radically rewritten their version of what
happened on the bridge that day. When FBI agents
confronted officers involved in the Danziger case, five
officers pleaded guilty and agreed to testify about the
conspiracy to cover-up what happened. They revealed that
officers had planted evidence, invented witnesses,
arrested innocent people, and held secret meetings where
they worked to line up their stories.
Before last week’s
verdict, the Justice Department had already won four
previous police violence convictions, including of the
officers who shot
Glover and burned his body, as well as
of two officers who killed Raymond Robair, a pre-Katrina
case in which officers beat a man to death and claimed
(with the support of the city coroner) he had sustained
his injuries from falling down. About half a dozen other
investigations are ongoing. The Justice Department is
also looking at federal oversight of the NOPD, a process
by which they can dictate vast changes from hiring and
firing to training and policy writing.
The Danziger trial
has been the most high-profile aspect of the federal
intervention in New Orleans, and this verdict will have
far-reaching implications for how the effectiveness of
federal intervention is perceived. The convictions and
guilty pleas in the case reveal a wide-ranging
conspiracy that reaches up to sergeants and lieutenants.
Marlon Defillo, the second-in-charge of the NOPD, was
recently forced to retire because of his role in helping
cover-up the
Glover killing.
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Most
importantly, the verdict has helped shift
the narrative of what happened in those days
after Katrina.
The
defense team for the Danziger officers was
steadfast in describing their clients as
heroes. Attorney Paul Fleming described the
cops as “proactive,” saying, “They go out
and get things done. They go out and get the
bad guys.” Police attorneys in the
Glover
and Danziger trials also sought to use the
so-called “Katrina defense,” arguing that
the exceptional circumstances following the
storm justified extra-legal actions on the
part of officers. With these convictions,
the juries have definitively refuted this
excuse.
In her
closing arguments, Bobbi Bernstein, deputy
chief of the Justice Department’s Civil
Rights Division, fought back against the
claim that the officers were heroes, saying
the family members of those killed deserved
the title more. Noting that the official
cover-up had “perverted” the system, she
said, “The real heroes are the victims who
stayed with an imperfect justice system that
initially betrayed them.”
Officers went out with a mission to deliver
“their own kind of post-apocalyptic
justice,” she added. “The law is what it is
because this is not a police state.”
In
comments immediately after the verdict,
family members of those killed on the bridge
expressed gratitude for those who had helped
them reach this point, but stressed that
their pain continued.
Speaking outside the courthouse after the
verdict, Sherrel Johnson, the mother of
James Brisette, said that the officers,
“took the twinkle out of my eye, the song
out of my voice, and blew out my candle,”
when they killed her son.
Jacqueline Madison Brown, the sister of
Ronald Madison, told assembled press,
“Ronald Madison brought great love to our
family. Shooting him down was like shooting
an innocent child.” Commenting on officers
who had testified for the prosecution in
exchange for lesser charges, she added, “We
regret that they did not have the courage
and strength to come forward sooner.” |
Kenneth Bowen (top
left), Robert Gisevius (bottom left), Anthony Villavaso
(bottom right), and [Robert] Faulcon (middle left), the
officers involved in the shooting, could receive life
sentences. Sergeant Arthur Kaufman (bottom middle), who
was not on the bridge, but was convicted of leading the
conspiracy, could receive a maximum of 120 years.
Sentencing is scheduled for December, but will likely be
delayed.
Jordan Flaherty
is a journalist and staffer with the Louisiana Justice
Institute. His award-winning reporting from the Gulf
Coast has been featured in a range of outlets including
the New York Times, Al Jazeera, and Argentina's Clarin
newspaper. He is the author of
Floodlines:
Community and Resistance from Katrina to the
Jena Six. He can be
reached at
neworleans@leftturn.org, and more info can be found
at
floodlines.org. For speaking engagements, see
communityandresistance.wordpress.com.
Source:
ColorLines
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5 NOPD officers
guilty in post Katrina Danziger Bridge shootings,
cover-up
By The
Times-Picayune
5 August 2011
A jury this morning
convicted all five New Orleans police officers accused
in the
Danziger Bridge shootings, which took place amid the
chaos after
Hurricane Katrina and claimed the lives of two
civilians, and a cover-up of startling scope that lasted
almost five years.
The verdicts were a huge victory for federal
prosecutors, who won on virtually every point, save for
their contention that the shootings amounted to murder.
The jury rejected that notion, finding that the officers
violated the victims' civil rights, but that their
actions did not constitute murder.Sentencing for the
five officers, all of them likely facing lengthy prison
terms, has been set for Dec. 14 before
U.S. District
Judge Kurt Engelhardt.
Four of the five
officers—Kenneth Bowen, Robert Gisevius, Robert Faulcon
and Anthony Villavaso—have been in custody since their
arraignment. The fifth, retired Sgt. Arthur "Archie"
Kaufman, who was not involved in the shootings but
headed the police investigation into them, remains free
on bail.
In remarks on the
courthouse steps shortly after the verdicts were
rendered, lead prosecutor Barbara "Bobbi" Bernstein said
she was "in awe" of the relatives of the bridge shooting
victims. Without their persistence, she said, the truth
about the incident would never come to light.
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Lance
Madison, whose brother, Ronald, was shot and
killed on the bridge, and who was jailed for
allegedly shooting at police, thanked the
jury and the federal authorities who brought
the case, while noting he will never get his
brother back. "We're thankful for closure
after six long years of waiting for
justice," Madison said.
The
landmark civil-rights case—one of four major
federal cases involving use of force by New
Orleans police to result in indictments so
far—has been closely watched around the
nation. Because of its sheer magnitude, the
Danziger case was the most high-stakes of
the nine civil-rights probes into the NOPD
the Justice Department has confirmed. Before
today's verdicts, five other former
officers, all of whom testified during the
six-week trial, had already pleaded guilty
to various roles in the shootings and the
subsequent cover-up
photo right: Lance Madison is
shown being arrested on Sept. 4, 2005, after
gunfire erupted on the Danziger Bridge in
East New Orleans. |
 |
The two other cases
to go to trial so far—involving the deaths of
Henry Glover and Raymond Robair at the hands of police—both
resulted in convictions, although two officers accused
of different roles in the
Glover case were acquitted,
and a third officer who was convicted recently had that
verdict vacated. While today's verdicts close the book
on most aspects of the Danziger case, one officer
charged in the cover-up still faces charges: retired
Sgt. Gerard Dugue, who is set to be tried Sept. 26.—NOLA
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Deliberations Begin Today
in Danziger Trial
Jury to weigh two very different perspectives of
police and Katrina
By Jordan
Flaherty
3 August 2011
With closing statements completed on Tuesday, focus in
the Danziger incident now turns to the jury, which began
deliberating today on the 25 charges faced by the
officers, after receiving final jury instructions from
U.S. District
Judge Kurt Engelhardt. The 12-person jury
is evenly split between men and women, but has only one
African-American member. The jury is drawn from thirteen
parishes in the greater New Orleans area.
Kenneth Bowen, Robert Gisevius, Anthony Villavaso, and
Robert Faulcon, the officers involved in the September
4, 2005 shooting, could receive life sentences if
convicted. Sergeant Arthur Kaufman, who was not on the
bridge, is charged only in the conspiracy and could
receive a maximum of 120 years. Justice Department
investigations of other incidents are continuing, and it
is likely that some form of federal oversight of the
department will be announced in the coming months.
During closing statements of a trial that has brought
international attention to this city’s violence-plagued
police department, lawyers for defense and prosecution
directed what often sounded like personal attacks
against each other as well as key witnesses while laying
out very different versions of what happened on that
fateful day.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Theodore Carter said that
officers deliberately did not follow procedure, and that
if they had done what they were supposed to, no one
would have died that day. “It was unreasonable for these
officers to fire even one shot,” said Carter, who
referred to video footage from that day which he said
showed at least “fifty four seconds of gunfire.”
In a spirited defense that seemed to echo Tea Party
themes, police attorney Frank Desalvo told the jury, “We
know that the United States is the greatest country on
earth, and the only thing wrong with it is the people
running it.” Depicting Justice Department attorneys as
furthering an anti-cop agenda, he told the jury that the
prosecutors in this case do not represent the United
States and that they are the true Americans.
Desalvo also accused the prosecution of speaking
“meaningless, emotional drivel,” and giving ammunition
to “a segment of the community that believes police are
always brutal.”
The trial, which began five weeks ago, focuses on an
incident that occurred days after Hurricane Katrina, as
two families were fleeing the storm's flood waters,
crossing New Orleans’ Danziger Bridge to get to dry
land.
In what prosecutors have described as a “hail of
gunfire,” two people were killed and four were wounded.
Ronald Madison, a 40-year-old mentally challenged man
described by family members as gentle and loving, was
shot several times in the back and died at the scene.
James Brisette, a high school student who friends called
nerdy and studious, also died on the bridge. The wounded
included Lesha Bartholomew, who was 17 at the time of
the incident, as well as her father, cousin and mother,
who lost her right arm in the incident.
The case has presented two radically different
narratives of not just the shootings, but the overall
period after Hurricane Katrina. Defense attorneys have
said that their clients were facing a violent and
lawless city, while the prosecution has painted a
picture of civilians facing a violent and lawless police
force.
Defense attorneys filled the nearly five hours allotted
for their closing remarks with what they said were
questions the prosecution had left unanswered.
Both prosecution and defense spoke often about the
testimony of
Robert Faulcon, the only defendant to
testify. Prosecution attorneys noted that
Faulcon had
admitted that Lance and Ronald Madison were unarmed, and
that police officers had continued shooting dozens of
shots after any threat had been “neutralized.” Most
damning for the defense, Faulcon admitted under
cross-examination that there had been a cover-up.
Paul Fleming, one of Faulcon’s attorneys, said that he
had been “tricked” by Bernstein in her
cross-examination.
“He’s not as smart as Bernstein. Neither am I,” said
Fleming, who also called FBI agent William Bezak, the
lead investigator on the case, “smug.”
Lindsey Larson, another attorney for Faulcon, said that
his client was tired and hadn’t known what he was saying
when he admitted to the cover-up, saying it was “like
when you’re arguing with your spouse” and you just say
yes to whatever they say. “He wasn’t even listening,” to
Bernstein’s questions, added Larson.
Tim Meche, attorney for Officer Anthony Villavaso,
implied that Lance Madison, a key prosecution witness,
had colluded with government to change his story. “After
he got with the government and all lawyered-up and all
that he changed his mind,” said Meche.
Desalvo also levied accusations at Madison, saying that
he had a gun, and that the Bartholomew family was also
armed. Suggesting that Madison may have thrown his gun
in the industrial canal, Desalvo added, “Did he really
care about his brother, or was he just trying to get
away?” The Madison family, including Lance, filled
nearly two rows at the closing, and many seemed visibly
upset during defense arguments.
In a breathless 40-minute rebuttal to the defense, Bobbi
Bernstein, Deputy Chief of the U.S. Justice Department’s
Civil Rights Division, said that attorneys for the
officers had engaged in outright lying on behalf of
their clients, saying that the accused had “delivered
their own kind of post-apocalyptic justice,” and called
at least one of the cops, officer Bowen, “a cold blooded
murderer.”
She also mocked the defense for complaining about the
“big bad government.” Saying that the DOJ had to
intervene because the victims were denied justice from
every local source, Bernstein declared “The law is what
it is because this is not a police state.”
Pacing back and forth, speaking quickly, and gesturing
pointedly to illustrate her arguments as she attempted
to respond to as many defense arguments as possible,
Bernstein also refuted the claim that the officers were
heroes, saying the family members of those shot that day
deserved the title more. Noting that the official
cover-up had “perverted” the system, she said “the real
heroes are the victims who stayed with an imperfect
justice system that initially betrayed them.”
Jordan Flaherty is a journalist and staffer with
the Louisiana Justice Institute. His award-winning
reporting from the Gulf Coast has been featured in a
range of outlets including the New York Times, Al
Jazeera, and Argentina's Clarin newspaper. He is the
author of
Floodlines:
Community and Resistance from Katrina to the
Jena Six. He can be
reached at
neworleans@leftturn.org, and more info can be found
at
floodlines.org. For speaking engagements, see
communityandresistance.wordpress.com.
Source:
BraveNewWorld/
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Defense rests in Danziger Trial, insisting victims were
armed
By Jordan
Flaherty
30 July 2011
After less than one full week and
having presented the testimony of only one of the five
defendants, the defense in the Danziger police violence
trial rested their case on Thursday.
Much of the defense
relied on the scenario that there were armed civilians
on or near the bridge firing at officers, or that
officers could reasonably have believed that was the
case. Shawn Gasaway, a paramedic on the scene that day,
testified that he saw people on the grass beside the
bridge firing up at officers. The defense also read
grand jury testimony from Heather Gore and Donald Haynes
III, two officers on the scene who have not been charged
in the killings or cover-up. Haynes testified that he
saw two Black males “facing the officers with their
hands extended.” Haynes admitted he didn’t actually see
weapons in their hands, but he insisted the males must
have had guns that they were firing at police. “Standing
toe to toe with the officers like that I believed he was
shooting,” said Haynes.
Gore, who was the
last cop to exit the Budget rental truck that carried
officers to the bridge, testified that she saw a “Black
male with an assault rifle” pointing his weapon at
officers and then running up the bridge. Gore said she
only saw the man briefly and couldn’t say for sure he
was not an officer; however, she insisted that he
couldn’t have been with law enforcement because his gun
had been pointed in the direction of police.
However, the
prosecution repeatedly raised doubts about the
credibility of defense witness accounts, pointing out
that the various stories did not match up and accusing
Haynes and Gore of lying to protect their fellow
officers. Prosecutor Cindy Chung also said that the
other paramedics traveling with Gasaway that day
disputed his version of events and had said that gunfire
had ended by the time they arrived on the scene.
Perhaps the most
powerful testimony for the defense was a recording
played in court of a conversation between officers
Barrios and Villavaso. Barrios, who pleaded guilty and
is cooperating with the prosecution, secretly recorded a
conversation with Villavaso, his friend and former
partner. On the tape, Barrios repeatedly tries to get
Villavaso to admit that civilians on the bridge were
unarmed, but Villavaso refuses to budge, insisting that
the victims had guns.
The taped
conversation also revealed that Villavaso and Barrios
feel that the alleged cover-up crafted by Sergeant
Kaufman and others unfairly directs the blame at them,
as well as at Officer Faulcon. Some observers at the
trial have speculated that the cover-up exonerated white
cops at the expense of Black officers, although there
are other factors aside from race that divide the
officers, such as rank, place of work, and social
circles.
This element of the
story also unfolded earlier in the trial, during the
testimony of Jeffrey Lehrmann, a former NOPD
investigator and current government witness. Lehrmann
admitted that the report he helped write noted that
Villavaso fired an AK47, but failed to mention that
Bowen also fired the same type of weapon.
The so-called “Danziger
Seven” includes three white cops; Sergeant Kenneth
Bowen, Sergeant Robert Gisevius, and Officer Michael
Hunter; and four Black officers; Robert Barrios, Anthony
Villvaso, Robert Faulcon and Ignatius Hills. Villavaso
and Barrios were the only two officers not from the
seventh district. Faulcon had been with the seventh, but
left the force weeks after Katrina.
Hunter, Hills and
Barrios have since pleaded guilty, while the four
remaining officers are currently on trial along with
Sergeant Arthur Kaufman, who was not part of the
shooting but is accused of leading the cover-up.
Officer Faulcon was
the only defendant to take the stand. Speaking
confidently, Faulcon testified to seeing armed men
firing at him, saying that he returned fire “until the
threat was neutralized.” During a contentious
cross-examination by government prosecutor Bobbi
Bernstein, Faulcon refused to admit to almost any laws
or restrictions on police use of deadly force.
Asked repeatedly
about situations when an officer may or may not fire or
whether it was necessary to shout a warning first,
Faulcon responded, “It’s hard to say yes and it’s hard
to say no, that’s up to that individual.” When asked if
an officer should follow guidelines on use of force he
had been trained on in his years in the military and
NOPD, he responded, “According to textbook, yes.
According to reality, not necessarily.”
Bernstein also
questioned Faulcon’s denial that he had collaborated
with the other defendants in conspiring to change their
stories. She listed several dates when Faulcon had
apparently spoken on the phone with the other
defendants, including several calls during the days in
January of 2006 when officers gave their official
statements for the NOPD internal investigation of the
incident. When Faulcon claimed to not have the phone
numbers of some of the other officers, Bernstein asked,
“Can you sometimes talk to people on the phone even if
you don’t have their phone number?”
While we wont know until the
verdict comes down what the jury thought of Faulcon, his
testimony may have damaged other officer’s cases,
especially Kaufman’s. When asked by Bernstein if he
agreed that there was a cover-up, Faulcon responded,
“Based on what I learned now, yes.”
Jordan Flaherty
is a journalist and staffer with the Louisiana Justice
Institute. His award-winning reporting from the Gulf
Coast has been featured in a range of outlets including
the New York Times, Al Jazeera, and Argentina's Clarin
newspaper. He is the author of
Floodlines:
Community and Resistance from Katrina to the
Jena Six. He can be
reached at
neworleans@leftturn.org, and more info can be found
at
floodlines.org. For speaking engagements, see
communityandresistance.wordpress.com.
Source:
BridgetheGulfProject
* * *
* *
Trial Brings Attention to Corruption in the New Orleans
Police Department
By Jordan
Flaherty
17 July 2011
In New Orleans’ federal courthouse, five police officers
are currently facing charges of killing unarmed Black
civilians and conspiring for more than four years to
cover-up their crime. The trial, brought by the US
Department of Justice, has gripped the city, and daily
coverage in local media has focused attention on a
deeply troubled department that still has a long way to
go before it can regain the trust of residents.
 |
The charges stem from an
incident on New Orleans’ Danziger Bridge on
September 4, 2005, just days after Hurricane
Katrina. Police officers, who apparently had
misheard a distress call on their radios,
piled into a Budget rental truck and sped to
the scene. When they arrived, they came out
shooting. James Brisette, a 17-year-old
described by friends as nerdy and studious,
and Ronald Madison, a 40-year-old man with
the mental capacity of an 8-year-old, were
killed. Four others were seriously wounded,
including Susan Bartholomew, 38, who had her
arm shot off of her body, and Jose Holmes,
19, who was shot point blank in his stomach.
Susan’s son, Leonard Bartholomew, 14, was
shot at by officers, badly beaten, and
arrested. Ronald Madison’s brother, Lance,
was arrested by officers under false charges
that were later dropped.
photo: James Brissette
(l) and Ronald Madison |
Witnesses for the
government include survivors of the harrowing ordeal on
the bridge, as well as several officers who have pled
guilty to lesser offenses in exchange for their
testimony. They have described shocking scenes of
violence—one officer is accused of kicking and stomping
Madison to death after he had already been shot seven
times—and a wide ranging cover-up. “When the shooting
stopped, these men realized they had a problem,” said
federal prosecutor Bobbi Bernstein during opening
arguments. “They lied because they knew they had
committed a crime.”
The New Orleans police department has developed a
reputation as one of the
most
violent and corrupt police departments, and
the revelations in this case has stoked anger and
outrage, especially in New Orleans’ African-American
community. “This case shows the total dysfunction of the
New Orleans Police Department,” says
Malcolm Suber, a longtime activist against police
brutality and project director with the New Orleans
chapter of the American Friends Service Committee. “It
shows they were just going wild after the storm.” Suber
and other activists have called for the DOJ to launch a
wide-ranging investigation into a pattern of abuse they
say goes back decades. “What Danziger represents is for
the first time there’s been acknowledgment that this
police department is rotten to the core,” says Suber.
A Department with a Troubled History
Like most southern police departments, NOPD was
explicitly segregationist for much of the 20th century.
The first Black New Orleans police officer was not hired
until 1950 and it was several more years before Black
officers were allowed to carry a gun or arrest whites.
In 1980, the city was rocked by protests when Sherry
Singleton, a 26-year old African-American mother,
was shot by police while naked in a bathtub, in
front of her four year old child. Police said she was
armed, but a neighbor testified that she heard her
pleading, “please don’t shoot, please don’t shoot.”
The issue of police violence continued to dominate in
the 1990s. Revelations of corruption in the force
inspired both mass protest and Department of Justice
investigations. Federal involvement combined with
aggressive actions on the part of a new mayor and police
chief led to 200 officers fired and criminal charges
brought against more than 60 cops. Two NOPD officers
received the death penalty for killing civilians. One of
those officers,
Len Davis, was caught on a federal wiretap ordering
the assassination of a woman who had complained about
police brutality. As officers were being fired and
disciplined, the city’s murder and violent crime rates
dropped dramatically, and the prosecution of corrupt
officers was widely seen as making the city safer.
Advocates say that
the changes begun in the 90s were cut short when Mayor
C. Ray Nagin became mayor, at around the same time that
the Clinton presidency ended and the Bush administration
begun. Both Bush and Nagin seemed uninterested in
continuing to prosecute police, and New Orleans slipped
back into being the nation’s murder capital, as well as
the capital of police violence.
Renewed Outrage Brings Energy for Change
The revelations of post-Katrina police violence have
brought in a new era of outrage. Political and civic
leaders, across boundaries of color and class, have
called for systemic change in the NOPD. “The public has
a right to know what really happened,” says Anthony
Radosti, vice president of the Metropolitan Crime
Commission, which plays the role of an unofficial
watchdog over the NOPD. “The police department failed in
their mission,” adds Radosti, a 23-year veteran of the
NOPD.
Ronal Serpas, who has hired by
Mayor Landrieu to run the
department in 2010, admits that the department has a
long way to go. “Chief Serpas has always acknowledged
that he inherited a fundamentally flawed department,”
explains NOPD spokesperson Remi Braden. “He has done a
lot, but there is much more to be done.”
|
Federal agents are looking into at least 9 cases of
police killings from the past several years, but that is
just one aspect of their involvement. In March, the DOJ
released a
58-page report that describes a department facing
problems that “are serious, systemic, wide-ranging, and
deeply rooted.” The report highlighted a range of areas
in which it found “patterns or practices of
unconstitutional conduct and/or violations of federal
law.”
The bad news keeps
coming out of the NOPD. In just the past two weeks since
the Danziger trial began, scandal has reached the very
top of the department. The NOPD’s second in charge,
Marlon Defillo, was found in an investigation overseen
by the state police to have neglected his duty to
investigate police violence, in effect helping to hinder
official investigations. Three police commanders—the
position under Defillo, and third in the overall NOPD
hierarchy—have
also been the subject of internal investigation. One
commander was accused of directing officers to
specifically target young Black men for questioning
during the city’s Essence Festival, one of the nation’s
largest Black tourism events.
|
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Criminal justice activists have demanded more federal
investigations and a wider scope. “This represents a
real opportunity for New Orleans to raise some
fundamental questions about the nature of police and
what they do,” says organizer
Malcolm Suber. “But unless we talk about the entire
system, this will repeat again.”
Jordan Flaherty is a journalist and staffer with
the Louisiana Justice Institute. His award-winning
reporting from the Gulf Coast has been featured in a
range of outlets including the New York Times, Al
Jazeera, and Argentina's Clarin newspaper. He is the
author of
Floodlines:
Community and Resistance from Katrina to the
Jena Six. He can be
reached at
neworleans@leftturn.org, and more info can be found
at
floodlines.org. For speaking engagements, see
communityandresistance.wordpress.com.
Source:
TheLoop21
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* * *
Autopsy of Ronald Madison
Police convicted
of post-Katrina shootings—6 August 2011—Ronald
Madison, a 40-year-old mentally disabled man described
by family members as gentle and loving, was shot several
times in the back and died at the scene. One of the
officers, Kenneth Bowen, also stamped on him while he
lay wounded. James Brisette, 17, a high school student
who friends said was nerdy and studious, also died on
the bridge. Four others people from the same family were
also wounded. "The officers convicted today abused their
power and violated the public's trust during the
aftermath of Hurricane Katrina - exacerbating one of the
most devastating times for the people of New Orleans,"
attorney-general Eric Holder said in a statement.—ABCnews
* * *
* *
A Katrina
Victory by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund—(New
Orleans, LA--July 6, 2011)—Today,
African-American homeowners and two civil rights
organizations announced a settlement in a post-Hurricane
Katrina housing discrimination lawsuit brought against
the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
(HUD) and the State of Louisiana regarding the “Road
Home” program. The suit alleged that the formula used to
allocate grants to homeowners through the Road Home
program—the single largest housing recovery program in
U.S. history—had a discriminatory impact on thousands of
African-American homeowners. Road Home program data show
that African-Americans were more likely than whites to
have their Road Home grants based upon the much lower
pre-storm market value of their homes, rather than the
estimated cost to repair damage.—SeeingBlack
posted 10 August 2011
*
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 |
Black Rage in New
Orleans
Police
Brutality and African
American Activism from
World War II to
Hurricane Katrina
By
Leonard N. Moore
In
Black Rage in New
Orleans,
Leonard N. Moore traces
the shocking history of
police corruption in the
Crescent City from World
War II to Hurricane
Katrina and the
concurrent rise of a
large and energized
black opposition to it.
In New Orleans, crime,
drug abuse, and murder
were commonplace, and an
underpaid, inadequately
staffed, and poorly
trained police force
frequently resorted to
brutality against
African Americans.
Endemic corruption among
police officers
increased as the city’s
crime rate soared,
generating anger and
frustration among New
Orleans’s black
community. Rather than
remain passive, African
Americans in the city
formed anti-brutality
organizations, staged
marches, held sit-ins,
waged boycotts,
vocalized their concerns
at city council
meetings, and demanded
equitable treatment. . .
. The first book-length
study of police
brutality and African
American protest in a
major American city,
Black Rage in New
Orleans will prove
essential for anyone
interested in race
relations in America’s
urban centers.
LSU Press |
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|
Floodlines
Community and Resistance from Katrina to the
Jena Six
By Jordan Flaherty
Preface by Tracie Washington
/ Foreward by Amy Goodman
When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, it
was a tragedy. What followed was a
government-sanctioned travesty. Flaherty, a
white New Orleans resident and journalist,
interviews a number of locals about the
recovery effort, outlining a systemic
pattern that includes restrictions of
service, human rights violations, and
destruction of property targeting the city's
African-American majority. |
 |
The behavior of the notorious New Orleans police
department towards this community is appalling, but
even more distressing is Flaherty's reporting on the
failure of the federal government to respond to the
needs of its citizens, and their use of paramilitary
mercenaries to enforce a pattern of brutal
occupation. To learn how profoundly the system
failed (and continues to fail) will be extremely
difficult for some readers, and Flaherty pulls no
punches in his quest to uncover failures,
highlighting how the systems in place for rebuilding
(foundation support, non-profit groups, military
intervention) remain woefully inadequate. Readers
will be compelled, depressed, disturbed, and angered
by what they find in this well-written report.
Crucial reading—Publishers
Weekly
YouTube
- The Jena Six
* *
* * *
 |
Sex at the Margins
Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry
By Laura María Agustín
This book explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work, that migrants who sell sex are passive victims and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest. Laura Agustín makes a passionate case against these stereotypes, arguing that the label 'trafficked' does not accurately describe migrants' lives and that the 'rescue industry' serves to disempower them. Based on extensive research amongst both migrants who sell sex and social helpers, Sex at the Margins provides a radically different analysis. Frequently, says Agustin, migrants make rational choices to travel and work in the sex industry, and although they are treated like a marginalised group they form part of the dynamic global economy. Both powerful and controversial, this book is essential reading for all those who want to understand the increasingly important relationship between sex markets, migration and the desire for social justice. "Sex at the Margins rips apart distinctions between migrants, service work and sexual labour and reveals the utter complexity of the contemporary sex industry. This book is set to be a trailblazer in the study of sexuality."—Lisa Adkins, University of London |
* *
* * *
|
Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in
America
By Melissa V.
Harris-Perry
According to the
author, this society has historically exerted
considerable pressure on black females to fit into one
of a handful of stereotypes, primarily, the Mammy, the
Matriarch or the Jezebel. The selfless
Mammy’s behavior is marked by a slavish devotion to
white folks’ domestic concerns, often at the expense of
those of her own family’s needs. By contrast, the
relatively-hedonistic Jezebel is a sexually-insatiable
temptress. And the Matriarch is generally thought of as
an emasculating figure who denigrates black men, ala the
characters Sapphire and Aunt Esther on the television
shows Amos and Andy and Sanford and Son, respectively.
Professor Perry
points out how the propagation of these harmful myths
have served the mainstream culture well. For instance,
the Mammy suggests that it is almost second nature for
black females to feel a maternal instinct towards
Caucasian babies.
As for the source
of the Jezebel, black women had no control over their
own bodies during slavery given that they were being
auctioned off and bred to maximize profits. Nonetheless,
it was in the interest of plantation owners to propagate
the lie that sisters were sluts inclined to mate
indiscriminately.
|
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* * * * *
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Faces At The Bottom of the Well: The Permanence of Racism
By Derrick Bell
In nine grim metaphorical sketches, Bell, the black former Harvard law professor who made headlines recently for his one-man protest against the school's hiring policies, hammers home his controversial theme that white racism is a permanent, indestructible component of our society. Bell's fantasies are often dire and apocalyptic: a new Atlantis rises from the ocean depths, sparking a mass emigration of blacks; white resistance to affirmative action softens following an explosion that kills Harvard's president and all of the school's black professors; intergalactic space invaders promise the U.S. President that they will clean up the environment and deliver tons of gold, but in exchange, the bartering aliens take all African Americans back to their planet. Other pieces deal with black-white romance, a taxi ride through Harlem and job discrimination. Civil rights lawyer Geneva Crenshaw, the heroine of Bell's And We Are Not Saved (1987), is back in some of these ominous allegories, which speak from the depths of anger and despair. Bell now teaches at New York University Law School.—Publishers Weekly /
Derrick Bell Law Rights Advocate Dies at 80 |
*
* * * *
The White Masters of the
World
From
The World and Africa, 1965
By W. E. B. Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois’
Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization
(Fletcher)
* *
* * *
Ancient African Nations
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The Death of Emmett Till by Bob Dylan
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Only a Pawn in Their Game
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson Thanks America for
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The Journal of Negro History issues at Project Gutenberg
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Haitian Declaration of Independence 1804
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