New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu Announces New Police Superintendent To Head Disgraced Police Force

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu today announced the selection of a new superintendent to head the city’s troubled police force.

Ronal Serpas will leave his post as chief of the Nashville police to take the reins from Warren Riley, a veteran New Orleans Police Department figure who has led the force since shortly after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005.

A string of controversies—some of them stretching back to the Katrina time period—buffeted the department during Riley’s tenure, drawing the scrutiny of both the national media and the federal government.

The U.S. Department of Justice has confirmed there are at least eight ongoing civil rights investigations focused on the police force. Federal investigators are examining a series of incidents in which police officers shot civilians in the aftermath of the hurricane, and have already garnered guilty pleas from four ex-cops in connection to shootings on the Danziger Bridge that left two dead and four wounded.

Collaborating with other media organizations including the New Orleans Times-Picayune and PBS Frontline, ProPublica helped to expose several of the cases now under investigation, including the shootings of Keenon McCann, Henry Glover and Matthew McDonald.

Yesterday, Landrieu invited the Justice Department to deepen its scrutiny of the police force, asking U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder for an “independent investigation” that will improve the police department’s disciplinary systems and “introduce best practices for public safety.”

The invitation from Landrieu appears to set the stage for the Justice Department to seek thorough reforms of the police force using the 1994 Violent Crime Control Act. The law provides Justice Department attorneys with an array of legal tools—including long-term monitoring by federal judges—aimed at revamping police departments deemed to have a “pattern or practice” of violating people’s civil rights.

Since 1997, Justice Department lawyers have used the act to restructure 21 law enforcement agencies, according to a 2009 study by criminologist Sam Walker and attorney Morgan MacDonald published in the George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal.

In those cases, Walker and MacDonald wrote, Justice Department attorneys sought to institute systems to flag problem cops, improve officer training and rewrite rules for using force.

Third And Fourth Cops Indicted In New Orleans Police Coverup Case

Federal prosecutors yesterday indicted New Orleans police officer Michael Hunter for his role in the Danziger Bridge incident, during which officers shot six citizens, killing two, days after Hurricane Katrina.
The indictment, on charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice and providing false information about a felony, makes Hunter the third New Orleans Police Department figure to be charged. In recent weeks, two ex-cops have pleaded guilty to similar offenses.
Hunter is the first officer who was actually on the bridge on Sept. 4, 2005, and fired shots to face charges. The other two, who have already entered guilty pleas, were involved only in the police department’s investigation of the shooting incident.
It remains to be seen if the Justice Department will ever charge officers for the killings of Ronald Madison and James Brissette, or for wounding four other people, rather than for their roles in the cover-up that followed. Given the volume of bullets flying that day, the number of victims and the missing evidence—ex-cop Jeffrey Lehrmann admitted to watching another officer kick shell casings off the bridge—figuring out exactly who shot whom may pose an epic challenge for federal investigators.
In concert with our friends at PBS “Frontline” and the New Orleans Times-Picayune, ProPublica has been scrutinizing the Danziger bridge incident, as well as the shootings of Matthew McDonald, Danny Brumfield, Henry Glover and Keenon McCann, all of which transpired in the week after Katrina made landfall. Our reporting found the NOPD conducted a series of deeply flawed investigations into these violent encounters between cops and civilians, failing to interview witnesses, collect key evidence or thoroughly question the officers involved. 

Federal investigators charged another New Orleans police officer in connection to the Danziger Bridge shootings, in which two civilians were killed and four were wounded in the days after Hurricane Katrina. The Danziger Bridge shootings are among a string of violent post-Katrina police encounters we’ve investigated in collaboration with PBS “Frontline” and the New Orleans Times-Picayune.
Officer Robert Barrios, who was charged with conspiring to obstruct justice, became the fourth police officer charged in the case, and the fifth person overall. Three former officers have already pleaded guilty to charges related to the shooting. Barrios reportedly resigned from the force shortly after being charged.
Marion David Ryder, a civilian who impersonated a police officer the day of the shooting, also was indicted this month on charges of lying to federal agents and unlawful possession of a handgun.
The charge against Barrios came in a bill of information, which is only allowed in cases where the defendant has waived the requirement that a grand jury issue charges. That usually indicates the defendant is cooperating with the case.
The Times-Picayune reports that Barrios was in the back of a vehicle with four other officers when they responded to a report that officers were shot while on Interstate 10, which is parallel with the Danziger Bridge.

In Memoriam: Lena Calhoun Horne (1917-2010)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Entertainer Lena Horne, a show-stopping beauty who battled racism in a frustrating effort to become Hollywood's first black leading lady and later won acclaim as a singer, has died at age 92.

Horne died on Sunday night at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan, a hospital spokeswoman said. She declined to give the cause of death.

Horne went to Hollywood in the late 1930s and while she never became a major movie star, she is credited with breaking the ground for black actresses to get bigger roles in Hollywood.

Horne had a stage persona that was mysterious, elegant, haughty and sexy and it helped her become an enchanting nightclub performer who made "Stormy Weather" her signature song.

Known as the "Negro Cinderella" early in her career, she was as complex as she was beautiful. She had a reputation for coldness and insecurity and her career frustrations led to bitterness.

With her big bright eyes, brilliant smile and light complexion, biographer James Gavin said Hollywood considered Horne "as the Negro beautiful enough -- in a Caucasian fashion -- for white Americans to accept." Until then, black women had usually been cast as servants or prostitutes -- roles that Horne did not want.

Many of her movie appearances in the 1940s and '50s were relegated to songs that had no bearing on the plot and could easily be edited out for showings in the South, where white audiences might protest the appearance of a black actress.

Her first substantial movie role did not come until 1969 when she was a brothel madam and Richard Widmark's lover in "Death of a Gunfighter." Her only other movie role after that was as Glinda the Good Witch in "The Wiz," an all-black adaptation of "The Wizard of Oz."

"I really hated Hollywood and I was very lonely," Horne said in a Time magazine interview. "The black stars felt uncomfortable out there."

WON TWO GRAMMYS

She moved back to her native New York and became a singing star in nightclubs and theaters and on television. She won two Grammys.

Gavin, author of the 2009 book "Stormy Weather: The Life of Lena Horne," said Horne was especially sensitive to rejection.

"Every perceived or real slight, she recoiled from it in a violent way," Gavin told the Los Angeles Times. "This does not make for a happy lady. She was angry."

Horne's life was filled with contradictions. Despite being too dark for Hollywood stardom, as a girl she was taunted by peers because of her light complexion. She campaigned for civil rights in the 1950s and '60s but admitted she had ulterior motives for marrying second husband Lennie Hayton, a white bandleader, in 1947.

"It was cold-blooded and deliberate," she told Time. "I married him because he could get me into places a black man couldn't. But I really learned to love him. He was beautiful, just so damned good."

Horne and Hayton were married until his 1971 death. Horne and her first husband, Louis Jones, married in 1937 and divorced in 1944. They had a son, Teddy, who died of kidney problems, and a daughter, writer Gail Lumet Buckley.

Horne was born in New York on June 30, 1917. Her father was a gambler who left the family when she was a toddler and her mother was an actress who often left Lena to live with her grandparents while she toured with a black acting troupe.

Horne began her career as a 16-year-old dancer at the Cotton Club, the storied Harlem nightclub where the leading black entertainers of the time performed for white audiences, before going to Hollywood.

In the 1950s, her support of civil rights group landed Horne on a list of celebrities with alleged communist leanings, which further hurt her movie career.

In 1981, she received a special Tony Award for "Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music," the Broadway show in which she sang and discussed the ups and downs of her life.

Malcolm X Assassin Set Free After 44 Years In Prison

(CNN) -- Thomas Hagan, the only man who admitted his role in the 1965 assassination of iconic black leader Malcolm X, was paroled Tuesday.



Hagan was freed a day earlier than planned because his paperwork was processed more quickly than anticipated, according to the New York State Department of Correctional Services.


Hagan, 69, walked out of the minimum-security Lincoln Correctional Facility at 11 a.m. The facility is located at the intersection of West 110th Street and Malcolm X Boulevard.


Hagan had been in a full-time work-release program since March 1992 that allowed him to live at home with his family in Brooklyn five days a week while reporting to the prison just two days.


Last month, Hagan pleaded his case for freedom: To return to his family, to become a substance abuse counselor and to make his mark on what time he has left in this world.


He was dressed in prison greens as he addressed the parole board. He had been before that body 14 other times since 1984. Each time, he was rejected.


Hagan was no ordinary prisoner. He is the only man to have confessed in the killing of Malcolm X, who was gunned down while giving a speech in New York's Audubon Ballroom in 1965.


"I have deep regrets about my participation in that," he told the parole board on March 3, according to a transcript. "I don't think it should ever have happened."


Hagan had been sentenced to 20 years to life imprisonment after being found guilty at trial with two others in 1966. The other two men were released in the 1980s and have long denied involvement in the killing.


To win his release, Hagan was required to seek, obtain and maintain a job, support his children and abide by a curfew. He must continue to meet those conditions while free. He told the parole board he's worked the same job for the past seven years. He told the New York Post in 2008 he was working at a fast-food restaurant.


A parole officer checked on him while outside prison, and he had to undergo random drug tests.


CNN was unable to reach Hagan for a comment about his release. The Nation of Islam declined comment for this story.


Malcolm X is best known as the fiery leader of the Nation of Islam who denounced whites as "blue-eyed devils." But at the end of his life, Malcolm X changed his views toward whites and discarded the Nation of Islam's ideology in favor of orthodox Islam. In doing so, he feared for his own life from within the Nation.


Malcolm X remains a symbol of inspiration for black men, in particular, who are moved by his transformation from a street hustler to a man the late African-American actor Ossie Davis eulogized as "our own black shining prince."


The ballroom where he was killed has now been converted into The Malcolm X & Dr. Betty Shabazz Memorial and Educational Center. Board Chairman Zead Ramadan said the center doesn't have a position on Hagan's release.


"I personally find it strange that for a couple decades any person convicted in the assassination of such an iconic figure would be allowed such leniency," Ramadan said.


There's outrage among some African-Americans, he said, that he's being released. Would he be set free if he had killed an iconic white leader?


"It's really a struggle for Muslims to contemplate this issue, because our faith and our religion is full of examples where we have to exert mercy," he added. "The Malcolm X story has not ended. His populuarity has grown in death. ... Only God knows why this was allowed to happen."


The center is preparing for a special service next month to celebrate what would have been Malcolm X's 85th birthday. Would the center welcome Hagan if he asked to attend?


"We'd cross that bridge if he called us," Ramadan said, "Think about that: How far-fetched is it that he could meet one of the daughters of Malcolm X? And what's going to happen then? Mercy, fury, anger, emotions -- who knows?"


Killed in front of his family


On February 21, 1965, Malcolm X took to the stage of the Audubon Ballroom, a site often used for civic meetings. His wife, Betty Shabazz, and four children were in the crowd.


"I heard several shots in succession," his wife later told a Manhattan grand jury. "I got on the floor, and I pushed my children under the seat and protected them with my body."


Gunshots continued to ring out, she said. Her husband's body was riddled with bullets. The native of Omaha, Nebraska, was 39.


"Minister Malcolm was slaughtered like a dog in front of his family," A. Peter Bailey, one of Malcolm X's closest aides, told The New York Times on the 40th anniversary of the killing.


The assassination came after a public feud between Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam's founder, Elijah Muhammad. Malcolm X had accused Muhammad of infidelity and left the Nation in March 1964.


"For the next 11 months, there was a pattern of harassment, vilification and even on occasion literally pursuit in the streets of Malcolm by people associated with the Nation," said Claude Andrew Clegg III, author of a biography on Elijah Muhammad called An Original Man.


"Malcolm felt that if Elijah Muhammad snapped his fingers, then he could stop the escalation of the violent tone around the split of the two men. And I think there's some truth to that."


Over the years, the killing of Malcolm X has been the subject of much debate, with conspiracy theories involving the Nation of Islam and others. The Nation of Islam has repeatedly denied any involvement in Malcolm X's assassination.


On a deadly mission


Hagan, then known by the name Talmadge X Hayer, was in his early 20s and a radical member of the Nation of Islam the day he entered the ballroom armed and ready to kill. His allegiance was to the Nation's founder, and he was outraged Malcolm X had broken from its ranks.


After the shooting, Hagan tried to flee the scene but he was shot in the leg. He was beaten by the crowd before being arrested outside.


Last month, he told the parole board he felt the urge to kill Malcolm X because of his inflammatory comments about the Nation's founder.


"It stemmed from a break off and confusion in the leadership," Hagan said. "Malcolm X broke with the Nation of Islam, separated from the Nation of Islam, and in doing so there was controversy as to some of the statements he was making about the leader."


He added, "History has revealed a lot of what Malcolm X was saying was true."


Two other men, Muhammad Abdul Aziz and Kahlil Islam, were also found guilty of murder in 1966 and received 20 years to life. Both proclaimed their innocence. Hagan, who eventually admitted his part in the murder, testified at trial and subsequent parole hearings that both men were innocent. Aziz was paroled in 1985; Islam was freed in 1987.


At last month's parole hearing, Hagan again maintained that Aziz and Islam were not the other assassins. He said it was two other men who helped plot, plan and participate in the killing.


Did they receive orders from the Nation to carry out the killing?


"I can't say that anyone in the Nation of Islam gave us the idea or instructed us to do it. We did this ourselves for the most part, yes," Hagan told the parole board.


Hagan said he received a master's degree in sociology while incarcerated and that helped him deal with his actions from 45 years ago.


"I understand a lot better the dynamics of movements and what can happen inside movements and conflicts that can come up, but I have deep regrets about my participation in that."


He added, "Unfortunately, I didn't have an in-depth understanding of what was really going on myself to let myself be involved in anything like that. ... I can't really describe my remiss and my remorse for my actions -- basically a very young man, a very uneducated man. "


He is still a Muslim but no longer a member of the Nation of Islam. He volunteers at a mosque to help young men. He told the parole board he hopes to become a qualified substance abuse counselor.


His primary mission is to help his four children, ages 21, 17, 14 and 10. He has two other grown children.


"My focus is to maintain my family and to try to make things a little better for them. It's upward mobility, and to encourage my children to complete their education because it's a must."