im tRacking the Aftermath of hurricane katrina

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Read also this article: from Reuters AlertNet

Horrific Stories of Rapes, killings and Terror

People left homeless by Hurricane Katrina told horrific stories of rape, murder and trigger-happy guards in two New Orleans centers that were set up as shelters but became places of violence and terror.

Police and National Guard troops on Saturday closed down the two centers — the Superdome arena and the city’s convention center — but then penned in the storm victims outside in sweltering heat to keep them from trying to walk out of the city.

The refugees, who were waiting to be taken to sports stadiums and other huge shelters across Texas and northern Louisiana, described how the convention center and the Superdome became lawless hellholes beset by rape and murder.

Several residents of the impromptu shantytown recounted two horrific incidents where those charged with keeping people safe had killed them instead.

In one, a young man was run down and then shot by a New Orleans police officer, in another a man seeking help was gunned down by a National Guard soldier, witnesses said.

“They killed a man here last night,” Steve Banka, 28, told Reuters. “A young lady was being raped and stabbed. And the sounds of her screaming got to this man and so he ran out into the street to get help from troops, to try to flag down a passing truck of them, and he jumped up on the truck’s windscreen and they shot him dead.”

Wade Batiste, 48, recounted another tale of horror.

“Last night at 8 p.m. they shot a kid of just 16. He was just crossing the street. They ran him over, the New Orleans police did, and then they got out of the car and shot him in the head,” Batiste said.

The young man’s body lay in the street by the Convention Center’s entrance on Saturday morning, covered in a black blanket, a stream of congealed blood staining the street around him. Nearby his family sat in shock.

“There is rapes going on here. Women cannot go to the bathroom without men. They are raping them and slitting their throats. They keep telling us the buses are coming but they never leave,” she said through tears.

People here said there were now 22 bodies of adults and children stored inside the building, but troops guarding the building refused to confirm that and threatened to beat reporters seeking access to the makeshift morgue.

One National Guard soldier who asked not to be named for fear of punishment from his commanding officer said of the lack of medical attention at the center, “They (the Bush administration) care more about Iraq and Afghanistan than here.”

The Louisiana National Guard soldier said, “We are doing the best we can with the resources we have, but almost all of our guys are in Iraq.”

“We found a young girl raped and killed in the bathroom,” one National Guard soldier told Reuters. “Then the crowd got the man and they beat him to death.”


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