On the morning of September 4, 2005, six days after

Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Katrina was a powerful, devastating and historic tropical cyclone that caused 1,392 fatalities and damages estimated at $125 billion in late August 2005, particularly in the city of New Orleans and its surrounding area. ...

struck

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

, members of the

New Orleans Police Department The New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) has primary responsibility for law enforcement in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The department's jurisdiction covers all of Orleans Parish, Louisiana, Orleans Parish, while the city itself is div ...

(NOPD), ostensibly responding to a call from an officer under fire, shot and killed two civilians at the Danziger Bridge: 17-year-old James Brissette and 40-year-old Ronald Madison. Four other civilians were wounded. All of the victims were

African-American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa. ...

. None were armed or had committed any crime. Madison, a mentally disabled man, was shot in the back. The shootings caused public anger and further eroded the community's trust in the NOPD and the federal response to Hurricane Katrina overall. The NOPD attempted to cover up the killings, falsely reporting that seven police officers responded to a police dispatch reporting an officer down, and that at least four suspects were firing weapons at the officers upon their arrival. On August 5, 2011, a federal jury in New Orleans convicted five NOPD officers of myriad charges related to the cover-up and deprivation of

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' political freedom, freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and ...

. An attorney for the

U.S. Justice Department The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a United States federal executive departments, federal executive department of the U.S. government that oversees the domestic enforcement of Law of the Unite ...

described the case as "the most significant

police misconduct Police misconduct is inappropriate conduct and illegal actions taken by police officers in connection with their official duties. Types of misconduct include among others: sexual offences, false confession, coerced false confession, intimidation, ...

prosecution n the U.S.since the

Rodney King Rodney Glen King (April 2, 1965June 17, 2012) was a Black American victim of police brutality. On March 3, 1991, he was severely beaten by Police officer, officers of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) during his arrest after a high spe ...

beating case". However, the convictions were vacated on September 17, 2013, by U.S. District Judge Kurt Engelhardt due to

prosecutorial misconduct In jurisprudence, prosecutorial misconduct or prosecutorial overreach is "an illegal act or failing to act, on the part of a prosecutor, especially an attempt to sway the jury to wrongly convict a defendant or to impose a harsher than appropria ...

, and a new trial was ordered. The Justice Department appealed the decision to vacate the convictions, but a federal appeals court agreed that a new trial was warranted. On April 20, 2016, the five former officers pleaded guilty to various charges related to the shooting, and in return received reduced sentences ranging from three to twelve years in prison. Three of the officers are white and two are African-American.

Shooting on the bridge

On September 4, 2005, almost a week after

struck

, several

(NOPD) officers arrived at the Danziger Bridge. The officers involved included Sgt. Kenneth Bowen, Sgt. Robert Gisevius, Officer Anthony Villavaso and Officer Robert Faulcon. The officers arrived in a

Budget A budget is a calculation plan, usually but not always financial plan, financial, for a defined accounting period, period, often one year or a month. A budget may include anticipated sales volumes and revenues, resource quantities including tim ...

rental truck; none of them were in uniform; and they were armed with rifles including

AK-47 The AK-47, officially known as the Avtomat Kalashnikova (; also known as the Kalashnikov or just AK), is an assault rifle that is chambered for the 7.62×39mm cartridge. Developed in the Soviet Union by Russian small-arms designer Mikhail Kala ...

s, at least one of which was unauthorized, and an

M4 carbine The M4 carbine (officially Carbine, Caliber 5.56 mm, M4) is a 5.56×45mm NATO assault rifle developed in the United States during the 1980s. It is a shortened version of the M16A2 assault rifle. The M4 is extensively used by the US mi ...

. A witness, Kasimir Gaston, described the officers as lining up "like at a firing range". The officers opened fire without warning on the Bartholomew family and friend, who had been walking to a grocery store and were then sheltering behind a concrete barrier. As a result of this initial shooting, 17-year-old James Brissette — a family friend — was killed. Four other civilians were wounded. Susan Bartholomew's arm was partially shot off and later had to be amputated. Her husband, Leonard, was shot in the back, head and foot. The Bartholomews' teenage daughter Lesha was shot four times. Jose Holmes Jr., a friend of Brissette's, was shot in the abdomen, the hand and the jaw. Two brothers who fled the scene, Ronald and Lance Madison, were pursued down the bridge by officers Gisevius and Faulcon in an unmarked Louisiana State Police vehicle. Faulcon fired his shotgun from the back of the car at Ronald, a developmentally disabled man who later died from his injuries. The

autopsy An autopsy (also referred to as post-mortem examination, obduction, necropsy, or autopsia cadaverum) is a surgical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a corpse by dissection to determine the cause, mode, and manner of deat ...

found that Ronald sustained seven gunshot wounds, five of them in his back. Bowen was later convicted of stomping Madison on the back before he died, though this conviction was overturned for lack of physical evidence. Lance was then taken into custody and charged with eight counts of attempting to kill police officers. He was held in custody for three weeks before being released without

indictment An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offense is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use that concept often use that of an ind ...

. No weapons were recovered at the scene, and both police and civilian witnesses testified that the victims had been unarmed.

Initial investigation and cover-up

The NOPD shooters stated that while approaching the bridge, they had been fired on by civilians and were forced to return fire. Homicide detective Arthur "Archie" Kaufman was made the lead investigator on the case. He was later found guilty of conspiring with the defendants to conceal evidence in order to make the shootings appear justified, including fabricating information for his official reports on the case. NOPD Lieutenant Michael Lohman also encouraged the officers to "provide false stories about what had precipitated the shooting" and plant a firearm near the scene.Ex-cop pleads guilty in Katrina bridge shooting

CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...

, 24 February 2010

Continued investigation

The officers involved in the shooting were taken into custody on January 2, 2007, and were indicted for murder and

attempted murder Attempted murder is a crime of attempt in various jurisdictions. Canada Section 239 of the ''Criminal Code'' makes attempted murder punishable by a maximum of life imprisonment. If a gun is used, the minimum sentence is four, five or seve ...

. Gisevius, Bowen, and Villavaso were charged with the

first-degree murder Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse committed with the necessary intention as defined by the law in a specific jurisdiction. ("The killing of another person without justification or excuse ...

of Brissette. Faulcon was charged with the first-degree murder of Madison. Those officers, as well as NOPD officers Michael Hunter, Ignatius Hills and Robert Barrios, were indicted on charges of attempted murder relating to the other four victims. On August 13, 2008, the indictments were dismissed by District Judge Raymond Bigelow due to

. Bigelow found that the prosecutors had wrongly instructed the

grand jury A grand jury is a jury empowered by law to conduct legal proceedings, investigate potential criminal conduct, and determine whether criminal charges should be brought. A grand jury may subpoena physical evidence or a person to testify. A grand ju ...

, improperly used grand jury testimony against three of the defendants, and divulged grand jury testimony to a witness in the case. Two weeks later, the

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

and the Civil Rights Division of the

U.S. Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the U.S. government that oversees the domestic enforcement of federal laws and the administration of justice. It is equi ...

began investigating the shootings. U.S. Attorney Jim Letten of the Eastern District of Louisiana vowed his office would take "as much time and resources as necessary" to resolve the case. In 2010, the investigation resulted in a series of guilty pleas from participants in the

cover-up A cover-up is an attempt, whether successful or not, to conceal evidence of wrongdoing, error, incompetence, or other embarrassing information. Research has distinguished personal cover-ups (covering up one's own misdeeds) from relational co ...

. On February 24, 2010, Lohman entered a plea of guilty to

obstruction of justice In United States jurisdictions, obstruction of justice refers to a number of offenses that involve unduly influencing, impeding, or otherwise interfering with the justice system, especially the legal and procedural tasks of prosecutors, investiga ...

in federal court. On March 11, Jeffrey Lehrmann, another former NOPD officer, pleaded guilty to misprision of a felony for failing to report the cover-up. On April 7, Michael Hunter, one of the seven officers originally charged with attempted murder in 2007, pleaded guilty to misprision of a felony and obstruction of justice. Hunter later became a key witness in the case against Bowen, Gisevius, Faulcon, and Villavaso. On April 16, Barrios was charged with one count of conspiring to obstruct justice, becoming the fourth NOPD officer to be federally charged in the case. He promptly resigned from the force and cooperated with the investigation. A fifth man, Marion David Ryder, a civilian who witnessed the incident and falsely presented himself as an armed law enforcement officer, was also charged in the case. He was accused of lying to the FBI about the event when he claimed that one of the victims had a weapon. Ryder also faced a gun charge since he was a convicted felon. On April 28, Barrios and Ryder both pleaded guilty. On May 21, Hills was charged by a bill of information with one count of conspiring to obstruct justice and one count of misprision of a felony, becoming the fifth NOPD officer to be federally charged. He had resigned from the force the previous day. A former police officer stated at Hills' trial that he had used a

racial slur The following is a list of ethnic slurs, ethnophaulisms, or ethnic epithets that are, or have been, used as insinuations or allegations about members of a given ethnic, national, or racial group or to refer to them in a derogatory, pejor ...

in later describing how he tried to "pop a round off" at 14-year-old Leonard Bartholomew. Hills and Bartholomew are both African-American. On July 13, 2010, a federal grand jury indicted Bowen, Gisevius, Faulcon, and Villavaso in connection with the shooting and subsequent cover-up. Additionally, Kaufman and Gerard Dugue, the original investigators in the case, were charged with falsifying reports and false prosecution in the conspiracy to cover up the shooting. While the federal government lacked jurisdiction to file murder charges in the case, they were able to file charges under federal civil rights statutes intended to enforce Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment. Under Title 18 U.S.C. Section 242, "Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law", anyone who acts, under color of law, to unlawfully deprive a citizen of their right to life, may be sentenced to death.

Sentencing

On September 22, 2010, Lehrmann was sentenced to three years in prison. In 2011, prosecutors asked a judge to reduce his sentence due to his cooperation, but the request was rejected on the grounds that he had already been sufficiently rewarded for his cooperation. Lehrmann was released from prison on April 22, 2014. On December 1, 2010, Hunter was sentenced to eight years in prison and three years of supervised release. He was also fined $2500. On September 24, 2011, Ryder was sentenced to eight months in prison, followed by eight months of home detention. He was released from prison on June 1, 2012. On October 5, 2011, Hills was sentenced to 6.5 years in prison. He was released on July 11, 2017. On November 2, 2011, Lohman was sentenced to four years in prison and three years of supervised release. Prosecutors asked for a two-year sentence due to his cooperation, but the request was rejected. He was also fined $2500, and ordered to perform 300 hours of community service and meet with NOPD recruit classes to warn other officers who could be tempted to break the law. Lohman was released from prison on June 26, 2015. On December 1, 2011, Barrios was sentenced to five years in prison. He was released from prison on May 17, 2016. Guilty verdicts were handed down for Bowen, Gisevius, Faulcon, Villavaso and Kaufman on August 5, 2011. On April 4, 2012, District Judge Kurt D. Engelhardt sentenced Faulcon to 65 years' imprisonment, Bowen and Gisevius to 40 years, Villavaso to 38 years, and Kaufman to six years. Engelhardt was critical of how the prosecution had been pursued, stating that he was "astonished and deeply troubled" by the number of

plea bargain A plea bargain, also known as a plea agreement or plea deal, is a legal arrangement in criminal law where the defendant agrees to plead guilty or no contest to a charge in exchange for concessions from the prosecutor. These concessions can include a ...

s offered to other participants who served as witnesses. Federal prosecutors responded that the plea bargains had been necessary for a difficult case that had been "

cold Cold is the presence of low temperature, especially in the atmosphere. In common usage, cold is often a subjectivity, subjective perception. A lower bound to temperature is absolute zero, defined as 0.00K on the Kelvin scale, an absolute t ...

" when they assumed responsibility. Although federal prosecutors recommended sentence reductions for both Hunter and Hills due to their cooperation, their requests were rejected. In both cases, the presiding judge pointed out that the two were already receiving a great deal of leniency, as both had maliciously fired shots and missed. In Hills's case, the judge also said that he and Villavaso had essentially committed the same crime, but only Villavaso was facing decades in prison. Hunter was released from prison on September 17, 2018, and Hills was released from prison on July 11, 2017. Gerard Dugue, who is alleged to have conspired in the cover-up with Kaufman, had his original hearing ruled a

mistrial In law, a trial is a coming together of parties to a dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court. The tribunal, ...

in January 2012. His retrial was postponed to allow for

appellate court An appellate court, commonly called a court of appeal(s), appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear a case upon appeal from a trial court or other lower tribunal. Appel ...

petitions from both the prosecution and

defense Defense or defence may refer to: Tactical, martial, and political acts or groups * Defense (military), forces primarily intended for warfare * Civil defense, the organizing of civilians to deal with emergencies or enemy attacks * Defense industr ...

, and was set for March 11, 2013, then delayed and set for May 13. It was later delayed indefinitely.

Retrial ordered

On May 18, 2012, a month after they were convicted, the five officers

appeal In law, an appeal is the process in which Legal case, cases are reviewed by a higher authority, where parties request a formal change to an official decision. Appeals function both as a process for error correction as well as a process of cla ...

ed their convictions, arguing that federal prosecutors had engaged in a public relations campaign against their clients by anonymously posting comments on NOLA.com, the website of New Orleans newspaper ''

The Times-Picayune ''The Times-Picayune , The New Orleans Advocate'' (commonly called ''The Times-Picayune'' or the ''T-P'') is an American newspaper published in New Orleans, Louisiana. Ancestral publications of other names date back to January 25, 1837. The cu ...

''. Principally, the defendants cited comments made by Sal Perricone, the former top trial attorney for the Eastern District (though Perricone was not involved in the prosecution of the Danziger Bridge case). Perricone's activities had been exposed in March 2012 in an unrelated case, and he had resigned soon afterward. On September 17, 2013, following a year-long probe into the defendants' claims, Judge Engelhardt vacated the convictions of Bowen, Faulcon, Gisevius, Villavaso and Kaufman, and ordered a new trial. In his decision, Engelhardt cited what he called "highly unusual, extensive and truly bizarre actions" by prosecutors; specifically, leaks to certain media outlets and comments that were posted by members of the U.S. Attorney's Office in online forums. The probe revealed that Perricone had made numerous posts attacking the NOPD as early as 2008, and had also made posts urging witnesses to join Lohman in pleading guilty. It also revealed that Perricone and Justice Department official Karla Dobinski had made posts regarding trial testimony while the trial was underway. Dobinski was the head of a Justice Department "taint team" that was to help ensure testimony Bowen gave to the state grand jury wasn't used improperly. The Justice Department appealed Engelhardt's decision to the

United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (in case citations, 5th Cir.) is one of the 13 United States courts of appeals. It has appellate jurisdiction over the U.S. district courts in the following federal judicial districts: ...

, however, a panel of judges upheld the ruling in a 2-1 decision. While awaiting his retrial, Kaufman successfully sought release on bond since he did not fire a gun in the shootings.

Guilty pleas

On April 20, 2016, five former officers pleaded guilty to charges of deprivation of rights under color of law, obstruction of justice, and conspiracy to obstruct justice. In return, they were sentenced to significantly reduced sentences of three to twelve years in prison, with credit for time served. Gisevius' attorney, Eric Hessler, later said a number of potential witnesses in the planned retrial were too afraid to testify. In addition to the online commenting scandal, several witnesses had been threatened by prosecutors and investigators. According to Hessler, this left no option but to accept a plea bargain. Those who pleaded guilty included the four former officers who took part in the shootings and the former officer who covered up the incident after it happened. On November 4, 2016, Dugue pleaded guilty in federal court to "a misdemeanor charge of accessory after the fact to deprivation of rights under the color of law". He was sentenced to one year of

probation Probation in criminal law is a period of supervision over an offence (law), offender, ordered by the court often in lieu of incarceration. In some jurisdictions, the term ''probation'' applies only to community sentences (alternatives to incar ...

, making him the only NOPD officer who pleaded guilty in the case, but was not sent to prison. Dugue's sentencing marked the end of the criminal cases against the police officers involved in the shootings and cover-up.

Civil lawsuits and settlement

Four civil lawsuits involving eight plaintiffs and seventeen defendants had been filed in federal court but were put on hold until the criminal cases were resolved. Defendants in the civil lawsuits included the City of New Orleans, the NOPD, a former police chief and assistant chief, and

Mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...

Ray Nagin. The four lawsuits were consolidated before U.S. District Judge Jane Triche Milazzo. On December 19, 2016, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu announced a settlement agreement between the city and the families of the Danziger Bridge shootings, plus two other cases involving "lethal confrontations between officers and civilians in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The settlement includes payments for the families of victims killed or injured in the shooting of unarmed civilians on the Danziger Bridge; for the beating death of Raymond Robair, 48, who was killed before the storm; and for the fatal shooting of Henry Glover, who was killed by a police officer standing guard outside an

Algiers Algiers is the capital city of Algeria as well as the capital of the Algiers Province; it extends over many Communes of Algeria, communes without having its own separate governing body. With 2,988,145 residents in 2008Census 14 April 2008: Offi ...

shopping center." As part of his news conference announcing the settlement, Mayor Landrieu also issued a verbal apology to the families of the victims, which is considered rare for any city leader to do in cases of proven

police brutality Police brutality is the excessive and unwarranted use of force by law enforcement against an individual or Public order policing, a group. It is an extreme form of police misconduct and is a civil rights violation. Police brutality includes, b ...

. The settlement was also revealed to have totaled $13.3 million.

Timeline of events

References

External links

Grand Jury Indictment at the Times Picayune

NPR.org story about guilty pleas
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