New Orleans Police Department Needs Reform After Hurricane Katrina
Shootings, Mayor Landrieu Says
The mayor of New Orleans wants to clean up the city's
police department, which has been marred by misconduct and corruption scandals.
NEW ORLEANS -- The Justice Department's push to clean up
New Orleans' troubled police department reached a milestone as a federal judge
sentenced five former officers to prison terms of up to 65 years for their
roles in the deadly shootings of unarmed residents on a bridge after Hurricane
Katrina ravaged the city.
That effort is far from over, however. Now the focus
shifts from the criminal courts to the civil arena, where federal and city
officials are negotiating terms of a consent decree that would impose
court-ordered reforms on the New Orleans Police Department.
Tom Perez, head of the Justice Department's civil rights
division, said after Wednesday's sentencing hearing that he is confident a consent
decree will be finalized in the "near future."
"Culture change does not occur overnight,"
Perez said. "The challenges that we saw manifested in the Danziger Bridge
trial were many years in the making and they will take many years to
resolve."
Police shot and killed two people and wounded four others
on the Danziger Bridge less than a week after the 2005 storm plunged the city
into chaos.
A sweeping criminal probe of police misconduct before and
after Katrina yielded charges against 20 current or former officers, including
the five who were sentenced Wednesday for their roles in the shootings and a
subsequent cover-up that included a planted gun, fabricated witnesses and
falsified reports.
U.S. District Judge Kurt Engelhardt expressed frustration
that he was bound by mandatory minimum sentencing laws to imprison former Sgts.
Kenneth Bowen and Robert Gisevius and former officers Anthony Villavaso and
Robert Faulcon for decades when other officers who engaged in similar conduct
on the Danziger Bridge – but cut deals with prosecutors – are serving no more
than eight years behind bars.
"These through-the-looking-glass plea deals that
tied the hands of this court ... are an affront to the court and a disservice
to the community," he said.
Police gunned down 17-year-old James Brissette and
40-year-old Ronald Madison, who were both unarmed, and wounded four others on
Sept. 4, 2005, less than a week after the storm devastated New Orleans. To
cover it up, the officers planted a gun, fabricated witnesses and falsified
reports. Defense attorneys have indicated they will appeal.
Engelhardt also criticized prosecutors for the different
ways they charged those who didn't cooperate with a Justice Department civil
rights investigation and those who did. The charges were filed in such a way
that they left judges with little discretion in handing out sentences in each
set of cases, Engelhardt said.
Faulcon received the stiffest sentence of 65 years. Bowen
and Gisevius each got 40 years while Villavaso was sentenced to 38. All four
were convicted of federal firearms charges that carried mandatory minimum
sentences ranging from 35 to 60 years in prison. Faulcon was convicted in both
deadly shootings.
"The court imposes them purely as a matter of
statutory mandate," Engelhardt said.
Retired Sgt. Arthur Kaufman, who was assigned to
investigate the shootings, received six years in prison – a sentence below the
federal guidelines. Kaufman wasn't charged in the shootings but was convicted
of helping orchestrate the cover-up.
During a scathing lecture that lasted roughly two hours,
Engelhardt questioned the credibility of officers who cut deals and testified
against the defendants during last year's trial.
"Citing witnesses for perjury at this trial would be
like handing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500," Engelhardt said.
Justice Department attorney Bobbi Bernstein defended
prosecutors' tactics, saying the officers who cooperated with the probe gave
them the breakthrough they needed to reveal the cover-up.
"Those deals are the reason that the whole world now
knows what happened on the Danziger Bridge," she said.
Steve London, one of Kaufman's attorneys, said his client
was pleased that the judge gave him a sentence below the guidelines, which had
called for a sentence ranging from a little over eight years to a little over
10.
"This judge recognized that the government put liars
on the stand to testify and convict other people," London said.
Lindsay Larson, one of Faulcon's attorneys, said the
judge "laid out the blueprint" for how defense attorneys will
challenge the firearms convictions and sentences.
"We have only just begun to fight," he said.
Wednesday's sentencing isn't the final chapter in the
case. The convicted officers are expected to appeal, and Gerard Dugue, a retired
sergeant, is scheduled to be retried in May on charges stemming from his
alleged role in the cover-up.
Perez expressed hope that a consent decree will provide a
"comprehensive blueprint for sustainable reform" that will reduce
crime and restore the public's trust in the police department.
"Reform, reconciliation and rebirth cannot occur in
New Orleans unless those who are held accountable are indeed prosecuted
criminally, yet we must also respect and understand that criminal prosecutions
are not enough to bring about sustainable reform," Perez said.
Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas said he and New
Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu "stand lockstep" with the Justice
Department in the effort to overhaul the police department and develop "a
consent decree that will have the force of law to make sure we never go down
this dark horrid path ever again."
Landrieu said the convictions and sentence "provide
significant closure to a dark chapter in our city's history."
"We now have an opportunity to turn the page and to
heal," he said in a statement. "The citizens of New Orleans deserve a
police department that protects, serves, and partners with the community to
keep New Orleans safe. It is my commitment to the people of New Orleans to
rebuild and reform the NOPD."
Had enough? Write to the Speaker of the House, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515 and demand federal
hearings into the police problem in America.
Demand mandatory body cameras for cops, one strike rule on abuse, and a
permanent DOJ office on Police
Misconduct.