Police and National Guard troops on Saturday closed down the two centers — the Superdome arena and the city’s convention center — but them penned them in outside in sweltering heat to keep them from trying to walk out of the city.
I thought these areas were meant to be refuges, not prisons.
Several residents of the impromptu shantytown recounted two horrific incidents where those charged with keeping people safe had killed them instead.
In one, a young man was run down and then shot by a New Orleans police officer, in another a man seeking help was gunned down by a National Guard soldier, witnesses said.
Wade Batiste, 48, recounted another tale of horror.
“Last night at 8 p.m. they shot a kid of just 16. He was just crossing the street. They ran him over, the New Orleans police did, and then they got out of the car and shot him in the head,” Batiste said.
“We found a young girl raped and killed in the bathroom,” one National Guard soldier told Reuters. “Then the crowd got the man and they beat him to death.”