Ray Nagin under indictment

Good day all. Do you remember the mayor of New Orleans at the time of Hurricane Katrina? Many people would prefer to forget Ray “Chocolate City” Nagin. His incompetence killed hundreds of people during the storm.

Well, in the category of “There is some justice after all,” Nagin is going on trial on assorted corruption charges. Here are some of the details from Fox News:

Ray Nagin rose to American political fame in swift, albeit uncensored, fashion — as the New Orleans mayor who publicly trashed and pleaded with President George W. Bush to save his city in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

And what about the calls from Bush to you and Governor “Brain dead” Blanco? You know, pleading to be allowed to send in resources ahead of the storm and help with the evacuations? Recall that a president can’t just send in federal resources in to a state on his own. He has to receive a formal request. Nagin and Blanco wouldn’t even think of it since it might make Bush look good. In other words, Nagin fiddled, Blanco danced and New Orleans drowned.

Today, more than three years out of office, Nagin returns to New Orleans, only this time to face federal corruption charges related to the aftermath of the deadly and destructive storm that put him in the spotlight.

So, no charges in regards to all the people that weren’t saved by the Ray Nagin Memorial Yellow Submarine Fleet? This was the term used to describe the hundred or so school buses that were left to be drowned by the storm surge instead of being used to evacuate people to safety.

Now what are the actual charges?

Jury selection is underway this week in the case accusing the former Democratic mayor of using his office for personal gain, by accepting payoffs, free trips and gratuities from contractors while the city was struggling to recover from Katrina’s devastation — caused when levees broke and water flooded much of the city.

The 21-count indictment, which includes bribery and wire-fraud charges, is the outgrowth of a City Hall corruption investigation that already has resulted in guilty pleas by two former city officials and two businessmen and a prison sentence for a former city vendor.

So, no homicide charges, no gross negligence charges or anything else related to the hundreds left to die on his watch. To continue:

The indictment states Nagin accepted more than $160,000 in bribes and truckloads of free granite for his family business in exchange for promoting the interests of businessman Frank Fradella — who secured millions of dollars in city contract work after the hurricane. The hurricane and its aftermath killed roughly 1,800 people and cost an estimated $108 billion.

And what happened with Frankie?

Fradella pleaded guilty in June to bribery conspiracy and securities-fraud charges and has been cooperating with federal authorities.

So he copped a plea and is ratting out Nagin. Nice. So what else did this racist incompetent crook do?

Nagin also is charged with accepting at least $60,000 in payoffs from another businessman, Rodney Williams, for his help in securing city contracts.

And what happened with Mr. Williams? (As if you couldn’t guess?)

Williams pleaded guilty in December 2012 to a conspiracy charge.

Now that is a wrist slap if I ever saw one! These guys must have provided all sorts of goodies to the prosecutors. Frankly, in my opinion, Nagin should have been charged with 1800 counts of negligent homicide. Still, like with OJ Simpson, you take what you can get. Of course, Nagin’s shyster lawyer is certain of an acquittal in the case.

Still, Philadelphia lawyer and former Assistant U.S. Attorney Fred Tecce questioned the strength of the case, despite the list of witnesses and their convictions.

“My gut reaction is the prosecutors’ case isn’t as strong as they think it is,” he told FoxNews.com on Wednesday. “We’ll wait and see how the evidence unfolds.”

I have a sneaking suspicion that his “Gut reaction” is indigestion after eating in the French Quarter in New Orleans.

Tecce based his opinion in part on the Nagin defense team’s willingness to go to trial and argued the evidence will have to be more than “dirty witnesses.”

Nagins defense team or Nagin himself? It isn’t the defense’s job to decide if a case is going to be pled out or fought in court, it’s the defendants decision. Sometimes, a defendant is guilty as sin, (See OJ Simpson again), and manages to con a jury into acquitting him. This may be the case with Nagin. He may be guilty and figures that a nice long drawn out case might keep him out of Club Fed a while longer. He might also think that his lawyers might be able to pull an OJ and get him acquitted. His lawyer seems to think he has a shot.

He also pointed to New Orleans’ long history of political corruption.

“In any other city, this guy would probably get convicted,” Tecce said. “But people there will be like, ‘Free vacation, so what.’ They don’t call it the Big Easy for nothing.”

There have been a few changes in New Orleans and Louisiana over the last few years that might be relevant. These would include a Republican governor who has been coming down hard on corruption, a legislature that has gone Republican and the fact that Nagins constituency either left New Orleans after their section 8 homes were destroyed and not rebuilt, or they just plain drowned.

Now I have no idea if Nagin is guilty or not. That’s the job of the prosecutors to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. If he is found guilty, I hope they throw the book at him. Non of this concurrent sentence nonsense, make him server each sentence consecutively. That way all the people who died due to his utter incompetence will get some semblance of justice.

Thatisall

~The Angry Webmaster~

(2 votes, average: 4.50 out of 5)

Loading...