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Louisiana Charges St. Rita's Nursing Home Owners With Negligent Homicide

Facility Owners Charged With Murder
Louisiana Charges St. Rita's Nursing
Home Owners With Negligent Homicide
Louisiana's attorney general filed 34 criminal charges against the husband and wife who own St. Rita's Nursing Home in St. Bernard Parish, where 34 decomposing bodies were found after Hurricane Katrina swept through the state. Salvador A. Mangano and Mable Mangano surrendered to authorities in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, today and are being charged with 34 counts of negligent homicide, Attorney General Charles C. Foti told reporters today at a news conference in Baton Rouge. Attorneys for the couple couldn't immediately be reached by Bloomberg News. ``Thirty-four people drowned in a nursing home when it should have been evacuated,'' Foti said. ``They didn't follow the standard of care of what a reasonable person would follow.''

Nursing Home Owners Face Charges
BATON ROUGE, Louisiana -- The owners of St. Rita's Nursing Home in St. Bernard Parish, where 34 people drowned as Hurricane Katrina hit, have been charged with negligent homicide, Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti Jr. said Tuesday. "They did not die of natural causes; they drowned," Foti told reporters. "Thirty-four people drowned in a nursing home where they should have been evacuated."

La. Nursing Home Owners Charged in Deaths
Baton Rouge, La. -- The husband-and-wife owners of a nursing home near New Orleans were charged Tuesday with negligent homicide in the deaths of 34 people during the flooding unleashed by Hurricane Katrina. The case represents the first major prosecution to come out of the disaster. The owners of St. Rita's Nursing Home in Chalmette "were asked if they wanted to move (the patients). They did not. They were warned repeatedly that this storm was coming," Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti said. "In effect, their inaction resulted in the deaths of these patients," Foti said.

Homicide charges filed in hurricane deaths
NEW ORLEANS -- Homicide charges were filed on Tuesday against the operators of a nursing home where 34 patients trapped by floodwaters died, as the death toll from Katrina, the third deadliest hurricane in U.S. history, hit 648. At another New Orleans facility, the owners of a medical center where 44 bodies were found said they were those of critically ill patients who died in stifling heat after power was cut off to the flooded building but before it could be evacuated.

Dozens Found Dead at New Orleans Hospital
NEW ORLEANS -- The bodies of more than 40 mostly elderly patients were found in a flooded-out hospital in the biggest known cluster of corpses to be discovered so far in hurricane-ravaged New Orleans. The exact circumstances under which they died were unclear, with at least one hospital official saying Monday that some of the patients had died before the storm, while the others succumbed to causes unrelated to Katrina. The announcement, which raises Louisiana's official death toll to nearly 280, came as President Bush got his first up-close look at the destruction.

Bush appoints new FEMA chief
President George W. Bush named David Paulison, a top official in the Homeland Security Department, to replace Michael Brown on an acting basis as head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Mr Bush moved quickly to put Mr Paulison in charge of FEMA after Mr Brown resigned the position under fire for the slow federal response to Hurricane Katrina that killed hundreds and displace 1 million people. Mr Brown said: "Today I resigned as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. "As I told the President, it is important that I leave now to avoid further distraction from the ongoing mission of FEMA."

Career Firefighter Named New FEMA Director
WASHINGTON -- President Bush has tapped a federal official with three decades of firefighting experience and a background in emergency management to be the new face of his administration's response to Hurricane Katrina and future natural disasters. Bush on Monday said he would name Miami native R. David Paulison as acting director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, replacing Mike Brown. Brown resigned Monday after days of criticism over what some said was a slow and ineffective response to Hurricane Katrina's devastation.

Katrina Educates World On Need For Owning Guns
Hundreds of New Orleans police officers had fled the city. Some took their badges and threw them out the windows of their cars as they sped away. Others participated in the looting of the city. "It was pandemonium for a couple of nights," said Charlie Hackett, a New Orleans resident. "We just felt that when they got done with the stores, they'd come to the homes."

Mayor: New Orleans will decide on reconstruction
Nagin: 'The city is bankrupt … We have no money'
BATON ROUGE -- Mayor Ray Nagin pledged Monday that he and other citizens of New Orleans rather than state and national officials would be the lead planners in rebuilding the Crescent City, even as the town copes with cash shortages and a dispersed population unsure of when or whether they will return. In a wide-ranging discussion at the state capitol with city council members and state lawmakers representing New Orleans, Nagin said the city had spent its last available cash last week on city employee payroll and was seeking bank loans, federal assistance and other means of financing to continue paying its bills and staff. "Technically today we’re out of cash," Nagin said. "The city is bankrupt … We have no money."

Governor Defends Louisiana's 'Exit Plan'
HOUSTON -- Louisiana had a "well thought-out exit plan" in the days before Hurricane Katrina, and many more lives would have been lost without it, Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco said Sunday. "There was not a single individual taking a slow step in our state," Blanco said at the Reliant Center, where more than 2,000 evacuees are living after fleeing the devastation in New Orleans. City, state and federal governments have been criticized for delays in evacuations and delivery of supplies, widespread communication difficulties, and law enforcement breakdowns in New Orleans that led to looting and violence.

Posted by Editor at September 13, 2005 08:17 PM