Posted on 09/02/2005 6:20:49 PM PDT by HAL9000
NEW ORLEANS, Sept 2 (Reuters) - With the rotors of President George W. Bush's helicopter sounding overhead, New Orleans' poor and downtrodden recounted tales of murder, rape, death threats and near starvation since Hurricane Katrina wrecked this city.Ending days of abandonment since the hurricane struck on Monday, the U.S. National Guard handed out military rations and a bottle of water to thousands of evacuees -- the first proper meal most had eaten in days.
But as the masses lined up outside, herded by Army troops toting machine guns, inside the convention center where these people slept since Monday was the stench of death and decay.
Leroy Fouchea, 42, waited in the sweltering heat for an hour to get his ration -- his first proper food since Monday -- and immediately handed it over to a sickly friend.
He then offered to show reporters the dead bodies of a man in a wheelchair, a young man who he said he dragged inside just hours earlier, and the limp forms of two infants, one just four months old, the other six months old.
"They died right here, in America, waiting for food," Fouchea said as he walked toward Hall D, where the bodies were put to get them out of the searing heat.
He said people were let die and left without food simply because they were poor and that the evacuation effort earlier concentrated on the French Quarter of the city. "Because that's where the money is," he spat. A National Guardsman refused entry.
"It doesn't need to be seen, it's a make-shift morgue in there," he told a Reuters photographer. "We're not letting anyone in there anymore. If you want to take pictures of dead bodies, go to Iraq."
As rations were finally doled out here on the day President Bush visited the devastated city, an elderly white woman and her husband collapsed from the heat.
"I had to walk two blocks to get here and I have arthritis and three ruptured discs in my back," said Selma Valenti, 80, as her husband lay beside her, being revived by a policeman in riot gear. The two had eaten nothing since Wednesday.
Valenti and her husband, two of very few white people in the almost exclusively black refugee camp, said she and other whites were threatened with murder on Thursday.
"They hated us. Four young black men told us the buses were going to come last night and pick up the elderly so they were going to kill us," she said, sobbing. "They were plotting to murder us and then they sent the buses away because we would all be killed if the buses came -- that's what the people in charge told us this morning."
Other survivors recounted horrific cases of sexual assault and murder. Sitting with her daughter and other relatives, Trolkyn Joseph, 37, said men had wandered the cavernous convention center in recent nights raping and murdering children.
She said she found a dead 14-year old girl at 5 a.m. on Friday morning, four hours after the young girl went missing from her parents inside the convention center.
"She was raped for four hours until she was dead," Joseph said through tears. "Another child, a seven-year old boy was found raped and murdered in the kitchen freezer last night."
Several others interviewed by Reuters told similar stories of the abuse and murder of children, but they could not be independently verified. Many complained bitterly about why they received so little for so many days, and they had harsh words for Bush.
"I really don't know what to say about President Bush," said Richard Dunbar, 60, a Vietnam veteran. "He showed no lack of haste when he wanted to go to Iraq, but for his own people right here in Louisiana, we get only lip service."
One young man said he was not looking forward to another night in the convention center and wondered when conditions would improve. "It's been like a jail in there," he said. "We've got murderers, rapists, killers, thieves. We've got it all."
The man just wanted a cigarette. Do you have a bible quote for that?
I don't think it's President Bush's fault but I am very upset and disillusioned that even on Friday night, 4 days after the hurricane hit on Monday, there are people, old and young that are starving to death and NOBODY on this forum seems to be upset or care. (Well, there are some.) Is that because they are mostly poor and black? I don't know but this should never happen in America. The people who are outside the convention center deserve better. The people who have been waiting on I-10 deserve better. There are no looters and shooters there. These people need help and they needed it two or three days ago. The problem is that there is NO ONE in charge.
I was asked if I donated. YES my husband and I donated to the American Red Cross on Monday! Can we go to LA and help? We are self employed and our business is seasonal so yes, after this fall, we could go help and have planned to do just that.
I don't think you should make threats.
I heard tonite that the people at the convention center are NOT allowed to leave the city.
Ahh, I don't think so. Last time I checked, the US national guard would probably be the United States Army.
Looks like the MSM is trying to hide a horsechit Democrat Governor's failure by making it look like W was slow on the draw.
These clowns NEVER give up!
Smoking is bad for you.
Not Biblical, but true.
You don't, huh. And pray tell why not, Steve?
Don't forget the criminals who were released from the City/County/Parish jails. These jailbirds went to the only places they knew -- the ghettos -- where they first stole guns, then tried to take over the neighborhoods. Stealing cars, breaking into homes and business.
How stupid can city officials be -- to turn these criminals out amongst its citizens? Someone should go to jail for this.
"Im not sayin its Bush's fault, I dont think it is. But on fox news, they are sayin that they now got check points up between orleans and I 10, and that they arent letting people leave from Orleans to I 10. That doesnt sound like such a great idea."
don't know.
Could be they don't want refugees clogging the road.
There aren't many good access points to NO.
Threats will taken seriously by law enforcement. You will be in trouble.
The connecting parishes are claiming they had to protect their own parish's resources -- by not allow Orleans Parish citizens entry into their Parish.
A lot of wild rumors have been reported from the Gulf Coast - and on further scrutiny, some of them have been debunked.
I guess it wasn't a threat, but a promise.
Mentioning cannibalism maybe ugly, but there's no substantiation that it's a fact.
What is wrong with some of these people? I have a feeling they were animals before all this happened. What's being done to filter out the criminal elements before they ship them up here to Texas?
Nothing. The rapists, thugs and druggies will drop everything and stand in line like innocent choir boys when the busses come. Then they'll be shipped off to wreak mayhem and murder on another city just trying to do the right thing and help the innocent among them. Some thanks that will be. Be afraid. Be very afraid. they won't even touch them when caught looting in broad daylight. You think anything will happen based on heresay of traumatized people? Nope- can't touch them. Just shift them from place to place handing out benefits all along the way.
You might want to limit what you write.
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