Blanco promises help after weekend slaughter

05:27 PM CDT on Monday, June 19, 2006

WWLTV.com

Governor Kathleen Blanco will begin dispatching National Guard and Louisiana State Troopers to New Orleans Tuesday after Mayor Ray Nagin and the New Orleans City Council asked for help following the shooting deaths of five teens this weekend.

WWL-TV

Mayor Nagin, Councilman-At-Large Oliver Thomas and other city leaders have called for hundreds of National Guardsmen to help patrol the city.

 “The situation is urgent and we will accelerate our plans to deploy law enforcement to the city tomorrow,” said Blanco. ““I will not tolerate criminal behavior. We must protect our citizens.  Having more law enforcement patrolling the streets is a direct deterrent to the criminal element.”

Though Blanco made the decision hours after the council implored her to do so, Police Chief Warren Riley said the request was made by his department as early as March and had nothing to do with a bloody weekend in the city.

Riley said he noticed trouble brewing after a large part of the city returned around Mardi Gras and he said that, coupled with the normal spike in crime during the hot summer months, prompted his call for help.

Blanco’s announcement came on the heels of an emotional city council meeting during which Nagin and each of the council members made strong statements against the criminals responsible for the recent spate of crime.

(AP Photo/Bill Haber)

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin hugs Monalisa Hunter at the conclusion of a news conference at the City Council Chambers in New Orleans Monday June 19, 2006. Nagin asked the governor Monday to send National Guard troops to patrol his city after a violent weekend in which five teenagers were shot to death and a man was fatally stabbed in argument over beer. Hunter lost two sons Arsenio Hunter, 16, and Marquis Hunter, 19, in a shooting over the weekend. Joining Hunter and Nagin is Barbara Lacen Keller, Arsenio Hunter's godmother.

"If we don't have wind knocking us down, we have shooters knocking us down, and that's unacceptable," said City Council President Oliver Thomas, who challenged the community to march on the lawbreakers.

“We can march on the mayor, we can march on the business community, so why can’t we march on the thugs,” he said.

The meeting included the mothers of several of the young men who died in the weekend slaughter. One mother begged for witnesses to come forward, saying she hadn’t slept and was preparing to bury two family members.

“No matter what they did,” said Monalisa Hunter. “They didn’t deserve to die.”

With 53 murders since the beginning of the year, people have feared the return to days when weekends with killings of two, three or four people were routine.

Nagin said the city would likely begin implementing a "youth curfew" from around 11 or 12 at night until dawn. He didn't specify what the age limit would be.

Four of the seven council members are newly-elected but each promised to pick up the fight to make the city safer. Many blamed the lack of quality schools and good programs for young people. They also lamented the lack of summer programs for children, especially in the wake of Katrina.

Thomas called for year round schools and said there was no reason for school facilities to be shuttered during the summer months when children need places to go.

Councilwoman Cynthia Hedge-Morrell echoed those thoughts.

“We as a city have failed when our youth cannot ride through this city without being ambushed,” she said. “We have abandoned our children in this school system for 30 years and now we’re reaping the problems of that abandonment.”

Morrell also took aim at the big businesses in town that are making millions off the rebuilding efforts.

“Step up and put money into this community because this community is making you rich,” she said.