NEW ORLEANS — The city of New Orleans has started 2023 ominously with a wave of violent shootings and killings that have been reported since January 1, and Mayor LaToya Cantrell said that the district attorney’s office is one place that needs to do better.
“When I look at the actions of the DA and the office, I think we can do better and I’m willing to work with our DA to do better,” said the mayor in what she said is the first of what will be weekly media updates.
Cantrell specifically talked about cases that she said have either been dismissed or not acted upon promptly by Jason Williams' office.
“No doubt that has had an impact on what happens on the street. Making that connection is key and essential.”
Cantrell also suggested that the NOPD needs to be notified by the DA's office and the rest of the criminal justice system when people suspected of violent crimes are going back onto the streets.
"The New Orleans Police Department needs to be notified in a timely manner when individuals are returning to our streets," she said. "That helps us in our deployment strategies because we know where those individuals will return in terms of those neighborhoods and communities."
Cantrell says that will help police put pressure, through constitutional policing, on those people so they know the police are keeping an eye on them.
Tuesday alone three victims were found presumably shot to death in a home in Gentilly and later that evening four people were shot in the Hoffman Triangle area. Wednesday morning there were three more incidents – a shooting on the I-10 Service Road, another on Frenchmen Street, and a non-shooting homicide near Carrollton Avenue.
“To see how we started the year, we don’t want to progress this at all,” she said.
In her briefing with the media, Cantrell said the violent crime in the city affects everyone. The city now has a new interim police chief and nearly 10 officers were promoted on Tuesday.
Crime has occurred so frequently, that no sooner had the NOPD promoted Hans Ganthier to deputy chief, he was speaking to the media about three bodies found in a Gentilly home near the Fairgrounds less than an hour later.
New Orleans finished 2022 at or near the top in the number of killings per capita in the United States, according to multiple reporting agencies.