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249 Epilogue Policing Katrina As the dire predictions about Hurricane Katrina controlled public discussion in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast throughout the month of August, the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) did not make any definite emergency plans until thirty-six hours before landfall. At a meeting on Saturday , August 27, the NOPD command staff was instructed to tell officers that first and foremost they were to ensure the safety of their families. Second , the command staff was told to prepare for storm duty at police headquarters by 4:00 p.m. on Sunday afternoon. Although meteorologists and hurricane experts predicted that New Orleans would get hit hard, NOPD brass felt that police headquarters was safe.1 On Sunday, Mayor Ray Nagin issued a mandatory evacuation for the entire city. Although he had been warned weeks before that Katrina would be vicious, Nagin waited until just hours before anticipated landfall to evacuate a city in which between 80,000 and 100,000 people, mostly African American, did not own vehicles. After the evacuation order, officers went throughout the city telling citizens to leave. They stayed out in the streets until the winds reached fifty to fifty-five miles per hour. In giving the order, Nagin gave all police personnel the authority “necessary to cope with the local disaster emergency.”2 Once the storm hit New Orleans at approximately 2:00 a.m. Monday morning, lawlessness and disorder settled into the city. First, the electricity went out throughout the city; second, flood waters swamped police headquarters ; and third, the department’s radio system stopped working after a piece of glass punctured the radiator atop the Entergy Tower. Thus, just one hour into the storm, the NOPD had no reliable way to communicate with 250 Black Rage in New Orleans its personnel. When the floodwaters breached the levees later that day, the NOPD received more than six hundred 911 calls within twenty-three minutes . But they were “helpless to assist.” As the levees continued to breach throughout the city, the NOPD began to resemble a rag-tag group of independent police officers who were without effective radio communication, vehicles, boats, ambulances, ammunition, and weapons. With more than 20 percent of the city in water, the NOPD was sinking into chaos as evacuees filled the Louisiana Superdome. Once the Seventeenth Street levee failed Tuesday morning, more than 80 percent of the city was covered in water and the NOPD had no effective way to respond. As New Orleanians found themselves stranded in attics, on rooftops, on porches, at the Superdome, and at the supply-less Convention Center, the NOPD was structurally not equipped to handle a catastrophe of this magnitude without the help of other law enforcement agencies. Officers soon found themselves trying to keep order in a city without order. They battled looters, carjackers, shooters, thieves, and armed gangs, without the possibility of backup and with limited weaponry and ammunition. Nonetheless , they rescued people from water-logged homes, recovered dead and bloated bodies, fought against looters, and continued to conduct dangerous patrols in a city without water, electricity, or telephones. Further, they set up makeshift living quarters, “supply depots, infirmaries in hotels, schools and nursing homes. They siphoned scarce gas from inoperable pumps using little more than hoses and a generator. They rigged car batteries for electricity , hot wired golf carts, and improvised boat repairs.” The most remarkable feat of the NOPD, however, was keeping peace at the Ernest Morial Convention Center, where approximately 20,000 people had gathered without food or water. Despite the tales of murder, rapes, and just general mayhem, only six people died at the Convention Center, and none of the deaths were related to violence.3 Paul Toye, a fifty-three-year-old narcotics officer, had an experience typical of NOPD personnel. After securing his family’s safety, Toye and his son began rescuing people on their boat. “I’ll keep driving my boat until there’s nobody left. I’ll keep working as long as we’re needed.” Many officers such as Toye had begun working around the clock and many did not have a change of clothes, a place to sleep, or a place to relieve themselves. Officer John Pfeiffer told one reporter, “I borrowed my jeans from a friend and my own house is under water.” Pfeiffer wasn’t alone in losing his house. More than 80 percent of all NOPD officers lost their homes in the storm.4 [3.141.199.243...

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