On Monday settlements were announced by the New Orleans Mayor for familes of those who suffered deadly police shootings in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

He also apologized to the victims’ families on behalf of the city and announced that the lawsuits had been settled for a total of $13.3 million.

Mayor Mitch Landrieu said at an afternoon news conference:

“I am hoping that in some sense the strength of these families will help the city find peace in our future,”

17 plaintiffs settled to end all civil litigation over the cases, it took 11 years to reach this.

Black America Web reported:

Sherrel Johnson, the mother of 17-year-old James Brissette, who died in the Sept. 4, 2005, shootings on the Danziger Bridge, was among the victims’ relatives on hand for Landrieu’s announcement. She said she “wholeheartedly” accepts his apology.

“Since that time, it has been an awful long and rough road. But me and my family got through it,” she said. Later, she added, “Now this is closure for me, and I can go forward … because I know the old New Orleans does not exist anymore.”

A total of 20 current or former New Orleans police officers were charged in a series of Justice Department civil rights investigations following the August 2005 storm. All but one of the cases centered on alleged police misconduct during the chaos that gripped the flooded city.

Eleven officers pleaded guilty to charges related to deadly shootings on a bridge less than a week after Katrina’s landfall. Officers shot and killed two unarmed people and wounded four others on the Danziger Bridge before engaging in a cover-up that included a planted gun, fabricated witnesses and falsified reports.

Read more here: http://blackamericaweb.com/2016/12/20/new-orleans-pays-out-13-3-million-to-families-of-katrina-police-shooting-victims/

Image src: https://www.propublica.org/nola/story/nopd-order-to-shoot-looters-hurricane-katrina/