Police charged in shootings back at work; NAACP calls for probe

NEW ORLEANS- Six of the seven police officers indicted in a deadly bridge shooting following Hurricane Katrina returned to work Monday, unarmed and in low-profile jobs, a development that an NAACP leader said erodes public confidence in the department.
“The assurance that the officers will be assigned to desk duties does not allay that crisis in confidence,” Danatus King, president of the New Orleans branch of the NAACP, said at an afternoon news conference.
King said the NAACP has decided to ask the U.S. Attorney and the civil rights division of the Justice Department to investigate the shootings; and he said the decision to let the officers return to police jobs smacks of favoritism.
King said he worries that the officers will have access to police records and other information that might reveal the identities of witnesses that might testify against them.
“None of them have access to the public or to sensitive records,” said Assistant Police Superintendent Marlon Defillo, who is in charge of the police Public Integrity Bureau.
Two of the officers have been assigned to work in the police department’s horse stables, two are entering data on computers, and two are working in communications, Defillo said.
The officers are not allowed to wear uniforms, make arrests or carry weapons, Defillo said. They do not have arrest powers and are closely monitored, he said. They also continue to wear ankle bracelets that monitor their whereabouts, he said.
That the officers were freed on bail _ highly unusual in first-degree murder cases and that hundreds of people turned out to cheer them when they turned themselves in also undermines public confidence, King said. He said police had failed to properly investigate the incident until media pressure forced them to.
Homicide is the only crime not investigated by the police integrity department, Defillo said. It is investigated by homicide and the findings are turned over to the district attorney, he said.
U.S. Attorney Jim Letten confirmed receiving the letter from the NAACP Monday afternoon. His office, the Justice Department and the FBI have been monitoring the investigation, Letten said. He described that as routine.
Sgts. Kenneth Bowen and Robert Gisevius Jr., officer Anthony Villavaso II and former officer Robert Faulcon Jr., face first-degree murder charges and attempted murder charges in the Sept. 4, 2005, shootings on the Danziger Bridge that killed two men and wounded four other people.
Officers Robert Barrios and Mike Hunter Jr. were charged with attempted first-degree murder, and Officer Ignatius Hills was charged with attempted second-degree murder.
In the chaos that followed Katrina, Ronald Madison, a 40-year-old mentally retarded man, and James Brissette, 19, were shot and killed by police on the bridge.
Police said the officers were responding to a report of other officers being attacked when they came under fire. Police also claimed Madison was reaching for a gun.
Madison’s brother, Lance, denies he or his brother was armed. He said they were running from a group of teens who had opened fire on the bridge when seven men jumped out of a rental truck and also shot at them without warning.
Judge Raymond Bigelow has given Orleans Parish District Attorney Eddie Jordan until Feb. 1 to decide if he will ask for the death penalty for the four facing first-degree murder.
The officers were suspended without pay when they were indicted in December.