A New Orleans police officer who fired his gun at civilians on the Danziger Bridge a week after Hurricane Katrina pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday, offering a chilling account of what transpired on the bridge that early September day in 2005.
Michael Hunter, 33, became the first officer who actually participated in the shooting to enter a guilty plea. Two investigators have already confessed to playing roles in a wide-ranging cover-up of the police shooting, which injured four unarmed civilians and left two men dead.
Hunter, who resigned last week after he was charged in federal court, contends that fellow officers shot at people they should have seen were unarmed. The account of events Hunter signed Thursday afternoon, called a factual basis, provides the most specific details to date about officers' actions on the bridge, which spans the Industrial Canal at Chef Menteur Highway.
Hunter, 33, said a New Orleans police sergeant fired an assault rifle at wounded civilians at close range after other officers stopped shooting and after it was clear that the police were not taking fire. He also says he saw another officer in a car fire a shotgun at a fleeing man's back, although the man did nothing suggesting he was a threat to police. That man, 40-year-old Ronald Madison, who was severely mentally disabled, died of his wounds.
As part of his plea, Hunter also acknowledged taking part in a conspiracy with colleagues to conceal the circumstances of what he considered an unjustified shooting. At one point, in a meeting with other officers, a supervisor said "something to the effect of, we don't want this to look like a massacre," the court document says.
"I don't think you can listen to that account without being sickened by the raw brutality of the shooting and the craven lawlessness of the cover-up," said U.S. District Judge Sarah Vance after the factual basis was read aloud in the still courtroom by prosecutor Bobbi Bernstein, deputy chief of the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.
Beyond saying that I'm shocked and sickened by the story of members of the New Orleans Police Department allegedly gone wild on a shooting spree and then even more members of the department allegedly participating in a massive cover-up of the carnage, I don't know what to say.
Incoming mayor Mitch Landrieu has his work cut out for him when he takes office in May. I believe that he has the potential to be a good mayor, but cutting the murder rate and cleaning up the NOPD is a daunting challenge. I wonder why he even wanted the job. Is the NOPD fixable?
Present mayor Ray Nagin seems to have left office before his term is up, except for attempting to close the deal on contracts that Landrieu will be stuck with during his term.
Pray for the city of New Orleans.
