Two weeks later, Jordan raised the public’s ire further when he dropped charges against another murder suspect, one accused of slaughtering five teenagers last year in the city’s worst mass killing since 1995. Once again, his office explained, that a key eyewitness was uncooperative and couldn’t be located. But the next day, police produced the witness at a press conference and said that Jordan had dismissed the case without notifying them. “The victims are being treated unfairly,” says Nakita Shavers, sister of the slain musician. “We’re disrespected [by Jordan’s] just carelessly dismissing cases.”
Complaints are piling up against Jordan. Many residents believe his office has been ineffective in combating a surging tide of violence in the city. Two weeks ago, city council member Shelley Midura called for Jordan’s resignation. “The criminal justice system in New Orleans is badly broken across the board,” she says. But “even in this big, broken structure, his office’s mistakes stand out.” Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti is conducting a review of the office’s performance. State lawmaker Cedric Richmond says if things don’t improve, he might move to impeach Jordan. And New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, who hasn’t gone as far as calling for Jordan’s departure, issued a statement criticizing a “disturbing pattern in which the D.A. dismisses charges without securing assistance from the [New Orleans Police Department] or any other entity in the criminal justice system.” At a time when New Orleans is still struggling to rebuild, the bloodletting only adds to the city’s feeling of despair and paralysis.
Jordan, 54, has had his share of triumphs. Back in 2000, when he was a U.S. attorney, he earned respect for convicting Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards on fraud and racketeering charges. Yet soon after being elected D.A. in 2002, Jordan, who is black, sparked controversy when he fired scores of civilian employees, almost all of whom were white. A federal jury found Jordan had improperly considered race in the firings and ordered his office to pay millions to the plaintiffs; the case is under appeal. (Race, which is always a volatile topic in New Orleans, has also become an issue in the current controversy, since he’s the city’s first African-American D.A. and city councilwoman Midura is white.)
Jordan’s recent record has helped fuel public disapproval. While 161 people were murdered in New Orleans in 2006, his office secured only three homicide convictions. So far this year, it has dismissed charges in nine murder cases. “What’s clear is you have a system breakdown,” says Peter Scharf, a criminologist at Texas State University who is working with the FBI to improve police intelligence strategies for the city. “It’s a disaster.” While Scharf doesn’t blame the dysfunction solely on Jordan, he says the dismal murder-conviction rate could have a dangerous effect: violent criminals believe they can literally get away with murder.
So far, Jordan has refused to step down. He declined to comment for this story, but a spokesman, Dalton Savwoir, says that although 161 people were killed in 2006, police arrested suspects in only 37 cases. And of the nine murder cases dismissed so far this year, he adds, charges have been reinstated in one and Jordan plans to bring back two more. Even some of Jordan’s detractors acknowledge that other factors have contributed to the broken justice system in New Orleans. The city’s criminal court did not reopen until last June, almost a year after Katrina. And the crime lab, a critical resource for homicide investigators, reopened only this spring. In addition, the police department remains understaffed, with only 23 investigators working in the homicide division (by comparison, the Boston Police Department has about 30 homicide detectives, who last year had to contend with half as many murders as New Orleans).
Jordan’s defenders also point to potentially positive changes in his office. Two weeks ago, he invited the National District Attorneys Association to review operations. He also disbanded the homicide prosecution unit. Now, murders will be prosecuted by the D.A.’s new elite violent-offenders unit, which relies on grant money to pay prosecutors $80,000 annual salaries, much higher than the office’s standard pay. The unit’s prosecutors average 12 to 15 years’ experience compared to two to five years’ experience in the former homicide unit. The elite group has won convictions in 27 violent crime cases since its inception in March, says Chief Bobby Freeman. He vows to do a better job of monitoring witnesses than the disbanded homicide unit did in the past. “Our unit has shown we keep track of people,” he says, “and our commitment to keeping track of people may have been behind the shift.” To be sure, New Orleans’s battle against endemic poverty and the violent crime that often accompanies it isn’t new. The city has at times been the murder capital of the country, reaching an “astronomical” 424 murders in 1994, when the population was nearly 500,000, says Scharf. After a peaceful interlude in the immediate aftermath of Katrina, the violence quickly returned. Last year, New Orleans had the highest per capita murder rate in the country, with 73 slayings per 100,000 residents, according to criminologists. By comparison, New York City had only seven slayings per 100,000. Scharf cites numerous possible reasons for the post-Katrina uptick, including changes in drug-dealing patterns, weakened family and neighborhood support—and, of course, the battered criminal-justice system.
For many New Orleans residents, the carnage has become intolerable. The week after coffee-shop owner Stella Baty Landis lost her friend Shavers—the brass-band musician—another acquaintance, Helen Hill, 36, was gunned down. A well-liked artist, Hill was killed in her home by an intruder, who also pumped several bullets into her husband as he sought to shield their 2-year-old son (both survived). In response, Landis cofounded Silence Is Violence. The advocacy group runs antiviolence forums in schools, tracks murder cases as they wind their way through the justice system, organizes weekly neighborhood walks and supervises a summer music clinic for youth. In January, Landis and friends organized a demonstration that drew 5,000 residents to city hall to demand action.
The recent furor surrounding the dismissed murder cases has galvanized Landis once again. On July 11, her group delivered a letter to Nagin. “The citizens of New Orleans have had enough,” it read. “We continue to lose neighbors, children, parents and loved ones every day to the crisis in our streets … You have given us silence and apparent indifference.” Two days later, the group issued a statement calling for Jordan to be replaced by “a more competent prosecutor and manager as soon as possible.” Like many, Landis is near her breaking point. “Anyone who tells you they don’t think of leaving New Orleans is lying,” she says. “I really want to stay … But I’m 35 years old. We have to be honest with ourselves about the life we’re leading.” As the violence rages on, her city’s future seems more precarious than ever.
