One of Michel Foucault's central insights might be summarized, roughly, as: there are already enough policemen in the world, you don't need another one inside your head.
Think about that.
But, practically-speaking, who
disciplines and punishes the police? Especially the
New Orleans police.
Mominem notes the most interesting facet to the story about the Inspector General's request for
guns and ammo:[Leonard Odom, a retired federal agent and Inspector General Robert Cerasoli's first assistant for criminal investigations] said he expects his investigators to work side by side with the city's yet-to-be-named police monitor, which will have authority to look into "civilian and internally generated complaints" against the New Orleans Police Department.
In that capacity, Odom said, the monitor and armed investigators from his office likely will show up at all crime scenes where a police officer has fired a gun.
...
Odom said he is confident that the Police Department will ultimately deputize his investigators and clear the way for the acquisition of the equipment.
Here are some recent blog entries and news stories about the NOPD. Read a few:
"St. Tammany Parish deputies arrested a New Orleans police sergeant Thursday and accused him of raping three of his stepchildren..."."All of these shootings happened under an inoperable/useless crime camera.""In fact, there was not a single representative from the NOPD present.""Orleans Parish Prison is a torture chamber.""Because for the second time last night, I was harassed by police in my neighborhood, on the way to the store, for a DWI (Driving While Integrated)."St Claude NOPD community sign.“It’s next to impossible to get someone to call you back.” (More
here.)
"All it takes is one look at the crime stats for New Orleans to make one fear for both the present and the future of our fair city.""Both Nagin and Riley have refused to respond to repeated requests to resolve the problem of crime under-reporting."
"Harry Connick recently wrote a letter to the Picayune calling for Police Chief Warren Riley's ouster. It was precipitated by the latest major NOPD screwup: $18K and other evidence has gone missing. Since then Riley has questioned the veracity of a crime survey listing New Orleans as the Crime Capital and quipped about the crime rate: 'Is it the water in the Mississippi?'"Orleans Parish Coroner Frank Minyard said [Adolph] Grimes was struck by 14 bullets, with two hitting him in the front torso. The other 12 wounds were in his lower back and legs, Minyard said Friday.""Wendy's killers match the same description." (More
here.)
The release of the IG's crime camera report has been delayed for a reason. If Mayor Nagin (unlike
Councilmember Midura) is
uninspired by the report on take home cars, he's going to go
nuts when the IG's crime camera report is publicly released. (Btw, is that what
dambala's working on?) And I don't think the NOPD will be too thrilled by the active monitoring and investigation from the IG's office.
===
And here's a little story that I'll add to the above links. It sounds fantastical, so if you want to prefer that this happened fifty years ago instead of five days ago, please be my guest.
A fortuneteller was leaving Jackson Square after a hard day's work when he got jumped by three robbers. A fight ensued and two of the guys stole the fortuneteller's money ($700) and ran off. But the fortuneteller hit the third dude in the jaw-- crack!-- and he went down. The police came and cuffed the robbery suspect. Just then, an heir to an infamous
tomato fortune named Mr. Marcello happened to be strolling along nearby. He knew the fortuneteller and went over to see what was wrong. After the fortuneteller explained to Mr. [first name redacted] Marcello what happened, Marcello grabbed the suspect by his broken jaw and got in real close to his face. The robber shrieked in pain, and Mr. Marcello said to him "When you get out of jail these guys" and he motioned to the police standing nearby "are going to find you in seven different places in the swamp".
The robber looked over at the policemen and gurgled "This man just threatened to kill me!"
One of the policemen corrected the suspect. "He didn't threaten to kill you.
He promised to dismember you."
While they were taking the suspect away, the fortuneteller was concerned that he would be blamed if Mr. Marcello fulfilled his "promise". Mr. Marcello told the fortuneteller not to worry. "Nine out of ten of these [policemen] are on my payroll, anyway".
Let's pretend that's just a colorful story, shall we?
Labels: Carlos Marcello, crime, philosophy, Riley
17 Comments:
Marcello ran sh!t down dere for some time...
I think he was the trigger-in a manner of speaking-that pressed the button in Dallas, as we have touched on somewhat in the recent past.
But, I'd recommend to you the guy who wrote "Gangs of New York". His sequel to that was "The French Quarter" which was a history of The New Orleans Underworld. It was written before Marcello's time, but it'd give you some great insight into the NOPD.
Historically, there's never been a more inept outfit in terms of crimefighting. They were so bad that, at one time, they pressured the at that time version of the City Council to not force them to wear their uniforms while on duty, lest they be subject to ridicule.
In other words, don't hate on the NOPD for their current woes...They've NEVER been worth a shit...
That's answers one of my questions. Wow.
Heynow, they're only 10% dirty! At least that's what Big Chief Riley admitted to the Daily Wipo (aka nola.com).
Thanks for the recommendation, Go! Sounds interesting. I'll check it out.
That book was written in 1930's, it was about N.O. in the nineteenth and very early twentieth centuries. Talking about corrupt, inept police departments as if they're relevant now isn't much different than Errol LaBorde and Warren Riley talking about past crime as an excuse for crime today. It's an interesting subject, but let's not give them any excuses.
Jefferson Parish has its own history of corruption and mob influence, yet, notice the difference:
Reward raised for West Bank murder; JP sheriff acknowledges spike in violence link
Young drug-dealing kids with low moral IQs and guns have helped make New Orleans the most crime-ridden city in the nation, according to a local criminologist responding to a report that New Orleans has the nation's highest crime rate.
...
NOPD Superintendent Warren Riley disputed the findings.
"It's inaccurate information," he said at a Monday press conference. "There's nothing factual about it. There's nothing scientific about it." link
Nagin described the city's violent crime as concentrated and unlikely to affect visitors who frequent tourist destinations.
"You don't have anything to worry about," Nagin said. "I'm looking at this audience and you all don't look like young African-American males who are involved in drug activity."
...
"Come back. Come back and see us," Nagin told the group. "It's safe in the downtown areas and the areas that are uniquely New Orleans." link
Of course, I meant talking about corrupt departments from the distant past has little relevance for today. I was under the impression that was pretty par for the course across nineteenth century America.
It kind of scares the hell out of me that Cerasoli is arming "20-30" men for his office. What does Cerasoli need that many deputized investigators for? It seems like a whole lot of men. How many investigators does the State AG have? I'm not sure I trust him with this kind of thing--after all, besides complaining about the fact that he can't get computers, his only other action since taking office has been to release a report on take-home cars. Problems with City of NO take home cars have been covered before by the news stations, so I'm not totally impressed.
I agree that 20-30 armed IG investigators seems excessive, unless there is need for a massive coordinated investigation into the NOPD, or something like that-- arresting a lot of people with firearms, at once. (I don't anticipate such a scenario, but it's the only thing that comes to my mind where such an armed force would be necessary. And in that case, of course, you'd want the FBI involved.)
Let's not forget that Cerasoli has also completed a report on crime cameras, the release of which is being delayed, I believe, because of potential criminal investigations into the contracts... etc.
I don't agree with those people who are unimpressed with Cerasoli's take home car investigation, saying "we already knew that".
If he merely cleaned up every issue and point of waste that "everyone knows about", that would be HUGE! Doing only that would be an incredible accomplishment.
However, it looks like he has bigger fish to fry, beyond areas of "obvious" waste and abuse.
just WOW.
If we're going to talk about take home cars, I'll remind everybody that Stacy Head made a very good point. Yes, we've known how much the city spent on take home cars for decades, but in the past that was justified by low pay for even high ranking city officials. That excuse is no longer valid. No matter what you think of Stacy Head that's a valid point. Not only are the "everyone knows about it" and "it's nothing new" excuses bullshit in general, they really don't apply to the take home car issue.
Armed investigators is par for the course for other IG offices, nationwide.
Bayoustjohndavid, my point was not that it was something that was contemporary and fresh, but that from its inceptions, the NOPD has been rotten to the core.
There was never an "Epoch of Degeneration" like the book talks about in terms of civility and societal breakdown like New Orleans experienced. It was never worth a damn to begin with.
Which was my entire ever-lovin' point, sir...
Hmmm...no first name given. I wonder if said heir was heading to his office in Cafe Envie?
Yes, Go, I understood your point, sir. However, as "Gangs of New York" and other books indicate, corruption, brutality and incompetence pretty much characterized nineteenth century police departments around the country. That might be difficult for a resident of Baton Rouge, a city with a police department with such a sterling reputation for integrity that it doesn't need to call in outside agencies to investigate allegations of brutality made by police from two other states, to understand, but it really was the case.
I only make an issue of it because too many New Orleanians use past corruption as an excuse to label present day reformers either naive or racist and too many non-New Orleanians use it as an excuse to condemn New Orleans today.
bayoustjohndavid,
I'm not even that lucky...
I'm a lifelong resident of the thriving metropolis known as Denham Springs, nestled in that veritable cultural mecca otherwise referred to as Livingston Parish...
Just to add to your list of NOPD failures.
The Cheif still has not responded to my (and Councilman Fielkow) emailing him about the Algiers Point residents who went hunting for black people.
As far as I know, nobody has been helpful at all when it comes to the case of "Mary" and her sexual assault.
no...I'm working on something else. But I can tell you that Cerasoli is arming himself because he knows what this administration is capable of and the stuff I'm working on will reflect that.
And yes, the crime camera report is going to be a whopper...I am pretty sure people are going to jail...which people, I don't know.
I think you have to look at Cerasoli as New Orleans' Elliot Ness....he can't trust anyone right now....ESPECIALLY the NOPD. The story I'm working on will reflect that.
Great post...I read Crime and Punishment...the punishment of the mind instead of the body does seem to be our evolved notion of penal strategy. I think Carlin must have written this bit after reading Foucault:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXrcM0fL1zc
nike air max 90
nike air max 95
nike shoes
nike air
nike air shoes
nike air max tn
nike air rift
nike shox r4
sports shoes
nike air rifts
nike air rift trainer
nike air max 360
nike shox nz
puma cat
air max trainers
mens nike air max
nike air
puma mens shoes
puma shoes
puma speed
nike shoes air max
nike shoes shox
air shoes
Lucyliu IS Lucyliu
nike shoe cart
puma future
levis jeans
nike rift shoes
cheap nike air rifts
bape shoes
cheap puma
nike rift
jeans shop
diesel jeans
