Heroes and villains

From MSNBC:

The Associated Press

NEW ORLEANS -- Seven policemen charged in a deadly bridge shooting in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina turned themselves in Tuesday at the city jail, where more than 200 emotional supporters met them in a show of solidarity.

Each of the indicted men faces at least one charge of murder or attempted murder in the Sept. 4, 2005, shootings on the Danziger Bridge less than a week after the hurricane hit New Orleans. Two people died, and four people were wounded.

Defense attorneys say the seven officers are innocent of the charges.

As the men arrived at the jail, supporters lined the street, stepping forward to embrace the seven men and shake their hands. One sign in the crowd read “Support the Danziger 7.” Another read “Thanks for protecting our city.”

One protester shouted “Police killings must stop” and “Racism must go” but was shouted down by the crowd yelling: “Heroes, Heroes.”

“These men stayed here to protect our city and protect us, and this is the thanks that is given to them,” said Ryan Maher, 34, of New Orleans, who described himself as a civilian with friends in the police department.

“It’s a serious injustice,” said Sgt. Henry Kuhn of the Harahan Police Department, one of several uniformed officers from the suburbs who joined the crowd.

Sgts. Kenneth Bowen and Robert Gisevius, officer Anthony Villavaso and former officer Robert Faulcon were charged with first-degree murder. Officers Robert Barrios and Mike Hunter were charged with attempted first-degree murder, and Ignatius Hills was charged with attempted second-degree murder.

A judge said there would be no bail for the four accused of first-degree murder. Bail will be $100,000 per count for the other three officers.

Hunter posted bail Tuesday; a spokesman for the Fraternal Order of Police said the others couldn’t in part because banks were closed for the national day of mourning for President Gerald Ford.

The officers are scheduled to be arraigned Friday.

Defense lawyers said they were assured that the men would be kept separate from the general population of the jail.

Hills’ brother Darren Hills was among those outside the jail Tuesday morning.

“It took everybody by surprise. Totally blindsided by the decision,” he said of the charges.

A first-degree murder conviction carries a possible death sentence. A spokesman for District Attorney Eddie Jordan said Monday that prosecutors haven’t decided whether to seek the death penalty in the case.

The facts of what happened on the bridge, which crosses the Industrial Canal between the Gentilly neighborhood and eastern New Orleans, remain murky.

Police say the officers were responding to a report of other officers down, and that they thought one of the men, Ronald Madison, was reaching for a gun. Madison, a 40-year-old mentally retarded man, and James Brissette, 19, were killed on the bridge. The coroner said Madison was shot seven times, with five wounds in the back.

AIN'T IT FUNNY SOMETIMES how when the cops bust some gang-banger in the 'hood for blasting away just 'cause, they have just apprehended the biggest, scummiest, lowlife vermin that ever scurried out of the shadows of the trash pile . . . but when it's one of their own -- or seven of their own -- indicted for blasting away at unarmed black folk on a bridge, suddenly the alleged perps are "heroes"?

I'll not be the man to defend the nobility of scummy, lowlife gang-bangers in the 'hood. But, somehow, I've never considered shooting a 40-year-old, unarmed retarded man in the back particularly heroic.

And, indeed, it is all but certain that somebody -- or bodies -- in that group of seven New Orleans cops fatally shot that unarmed retarded man, as well as fatally shot a 19-year-old and wounded several other innocent, unarmed people on the Danziger Bridge in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. If they are found innocent of first- and second-degree murder and attempted-murder charges, it will be because jurors find the whole mess was a massive, yet understandable, screw-up in the post-Katrina chaos of New Orleans on Sept. 4, 2005.

That would make for a gaggle of tragic screw-ups, not a cadre of gallant heroes. Best case.

Worst case: That crowd of New Orleans-area cops demonstrating for their accused brethren -- in the face of the kind of evidence that gets "vermin" thrown into central lockup with nary a second thought about their scumbag status . . . or guilt -- have decided that it's different when you're a police officer. Murder is something only civilians can commit.

SCREW IRAQ. Bring the troops home and send them to Louisiana, where it's obvious that some "nation-building" is needed here in the United States -- the nation in which we actually have to live.