Scandal-Ridden New Orleans Police at Crossroads

(July 16) -- In New Orleans, a town known for its jambalaya, jazz and hospitality, it hasn't been difficult over the years to find folks willing to serve up some harsh words about their often-maligned and scandal-plagued police department.

That may change -- even with the latest federal indictments for the shootings after Hurricane Katrina.

The Big Easy has a new mayor, Mitch Landrieu. The Justice Department -- at his request -- has stepped in to examine signs of systemic police misconduct. And a new police chief, Ronal Serpas, has been installed.

The department is at a crossroads. And the nation is watching a department in need of an extreme makeover.

Just this week, Americans got a glimpse of the department's travails: The Justice Department announced the indictment of four New Orleans police officers and two supervisors in the post-Katrina shootings of six unarmed people on Danziger Bridge, two of whom died. The charges come on top of decades of scandal: cops busted for drug trafficking, bribes, rape and murder.

"They have a reputation that was deserved: deplorable, of being massively corrupt, of having very little regard for the Constitution, widespread racial profiling and cover-ups of their own infractions," said Marjorie R. Esman, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, which has often been at odds with the department.

But she is willing to give the new regime a chance.

"I don't think it's fair at this junction to judge the new police force based on the actions of the old one," she said. "We want to give the chief a fresh start, but we expect everyone who committed misdeeds to be held accountable for their misdeeds."

The road to redemption for the department may be lined with fresh, albeit cautious, optimism, but there are sure to be bumps.

Besides the indictments this week, five other cops have pleaded guilty to covering up the 2005 bridge shootings. Three officers arraigned Wednesday pleaded not guilty, and one attorney is claiming the charges aren't what they seem.

Whatever the outcome, more indictments could be forthcoming -- not only in that case, but in others.

"I can really only emphasize that our investigation is open and ongoing" into the Danziger Bridge shootings, Justice Department spokeswoman Xochitl Hinojosa told AOL News.

She did note that there are about eight federal investigations targeting suspected police misconduct there.

And over the years, the department has been hit with a wave of disturbing and embarrassing arrests of crooked cops.

Among them:

• In the 1990s, in an FBI probe called "Operation Shattered Shield," about 12 New Orleans cops went to prison for participating in a cocaine trafficking ring.
• in 1994, a 13-year police veteran went off to prison for shooting an unarmed man in a bar.
• In 1995, two officers were arrested on charges of raping a 14-year-old girl.
• Just last month, a police captain was busted on federal corruption charges related to a private business scheme.

Is the department as bad as some insist?

Depends on who's talking.

Leonard N. Moore, a University of Texas history professor, has little good to say about the department. He authored the recently released book: "Black Rage in New Orleans: Police Brutality and African American Activism from World War II to Hurricane Katrina."

"It's the worst police department in the history of America," he asserts. "I went back to the 1940s looking at the relations between the New Orleans Police Department and the black people. ... It's a systemic issue. Nothing parallels it."

A former Florida police chief, Andrew Scott III, knows the department's reputation.

"I can't quantitatively say it's the worst department in the United States," said Scott, president of AJS Consulting, which provides consulting for police departments and law firms on police practices. "I can say that in my 30-year-plus career and since I've retired, the New Orleans Police Department has always had a bad reputation for a variety of reasons: public corruption, improper training, improper leadership and a culture that did not hold its officers accountable."

Department Has Defenders

Frank DeSalvo, who also represents an officer charged in the Danziger Bridge case, doesn't see it that way.

He said the department used to be one of the best in the nation in the '70s and '80s, and somewhere along the line politicians meddled too much, which resulted in "police chiefs who really had no business being police chief."

"For the most part, the men and women of the police department are good people who work very hard to do a good job," said DeSalvo, attorney for the New Orleans Police Association. "But because of the lack of leadership, I think sometimes they lose direction."

Jeff Hochman, a detective sergeant with the FBI task force, retired from the department at the end of 2007. He is even more enthusiastic when trumpeting the virtues of the department, calling it "the finest police department in the world."

"Only due to the strength and courage of the men and women that I had the honor and privilege to work with was the city of New Orleans saved from the USA's worst natural disaster," he said.

He said the department "is no more corrupt than ... any other large institution. ... The corruption flag is always thrown by people in the public and media when they don't understand the full circumstances."

Unquestionably, big police departments have had their share of problems. In fact, on Tuesday, the day the six New Orleans cops were indicted, three police officers in Philadelphia were charged with conspiring with drug dealers to rip off a heroin supplier. In Chicago, about a half dozen cops were recently indicted in a towing scam, and the New York Police Department has had its share of problems.

But Moore insists that in New Orleans, the department used excessive force on blacks for decades. Then came the drug wars in the 1980s, and even the black officers started "committing some of the most brutal and violent acts against black people," he said.

"They could get away with it because they couldn't be called racist," he noted.

He said New Orleans officers were paid very little. Many had second jobs providing security at bars and other establishments.

"They had more loyalty to their details than the police department," Moore said.

Change for a While

Things changed in the 1990s when a D.C. police official, Richard Pennington, became New Orleans' chief from 1994 to 2002. Homicides and other crimes dropped sharply. Hundreds of bad cops were purged. But Pennington ran for mayor in 2002 and lost. He became Atlanta police chief. Things reverted to the old way, and not for the good, Moore said.

Now, the new administration must try to rework the department's image, and change internally. That task is likely to bump up against the Danziger Bridge case and perhaps charges from the other ongoing probes.

The bridge confrontation took place days after Katrina hit. Some cops simply abandoned the city, and leadership seemed to be lacking at such a critical time.

Then on Sept. 4, 2005, a police call came of shots being fired at officers. A group of officers rushed in a rental truck to the bridge. And, according to authorities, some officers opened fire, striking six unarmed people. One of them, Ronald Madison, 40, a mentally disabled man, was fatally shot in the back as he tried to flee.

The department quickly called the shootings justified, claiming the officers were returning fire. The black community was particularly skeptical. Eventually, official New Orleans was, too. Seven officers were indicted on state charges. But the prosecutor's office bungled the case, and the charges were dropped.

Then came the FBI and the Justice Department, which opened the case wide.

Silas H. Lee, a sociology professor at Xavier University in New Orleans, is cautiously optimistic that things will get better.

"Any time you have a new administration, you have an automatic transfer of positive perceptions," he said. The new chief
"seems to have the support of the community right now. But people are taking a wait-and-see attitude."

DeSalvo shares some optimism, though he sees the Justice Department review as nothing more than politics.

"They don't need federal intervention," the police association lawyer said. " They don't need the ACLU telling them what to do. They don't need an independent police monitor. They just need leadership. I still have hopes this man will do a good job."