NEW ORLEANS – A federal grand jury charged two former and three current New Orleans police officers in the death of Henry Glover whose charred remains were found in Algiers inside a burned out car days after Hurricane Katrina, according to U.S. Attorney Jim Letten.
A federal grand jury returned an 11-count indictment against David Warren, Travis McCabe, Dwayne Scheuermann, Greg McRae and Robert Italiano, said Letten outside the federal courthouse.
The charges are in connection “with the shooting of Henry Glover, a civilian, on September 2nd in Algiers by a police officer, the burning of his body in a vehicle and other civil rights and other obstruction of justice offences,” said Letten.
Former officer Warren was charged with shooting and killing Glover and is already in custody, said Letten.
Scheuermann and McRae were charged with assaulting civilians who were trying to come to the aid of Glover, according to Letten. They were also charged for burning up Glover’s body and the destruction of a vehicle that Glover's body was inside and obstructing a federal investigation.
Warren faces life in prison, if convicted, said Letten, and Sheuermann and McRae faces up to 60 years, if convicted on all charges.
According to William Tanner who owned the car that Glover’s body was found inside, he picked up Glover and his brother Edward King after Glover had been shot by a Chucky E. Cheese in Algiers.
“I seen him on the street bleeding to death, and I thought I might could save his life,” Tanner said in an earlier interview.
Tanner said he took Glover to Paul Habans Elementary just a few blocks away, where the New Orleans police were using the school as a staging area to get medical help for Glover. But he said that nine or 10 officers pointed guns at them, and handcuffed all three of them, leaving Glover still bleeding in the back seat of Tanner’s car.
Tanner said they accused them of committed crimes and were beaten by police.
Later, a private investigator, Michael Orsini and his partner found Tanner's charred car with human remains inside.
“The skull looked like it had a bullet hole penetration, but I'm no expert on that,” Orsini said.
Orsini and his partner, both former law officers, said it looked like some kind of accelerant was used to set the car on fire. He said he thought it was a homicide.
“The remains were skeletal remains with a little flesh that was just burned right down to the bone,” he said. “That sort of surprised us there, because something – it had to be a man-made fire I believe in some way.”
“Somebody was trying to cover up that person's death in some way,” he said.
The investigators found Tanner's burned-out car on the batture of the river in Algiers with the remains of a body inside. The remains were later identified as Henry Glover's.
