Investigation Slowed, Coroner Says
|
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
Wednesday, November 2, 2005
NEW ORLEANS, Nov. 1 -- Bodies recovered from a nursing home and hospital after Hurricane Katrina were so decomposed they may not yield any evidence for prosecuting crimes, according to the coroner overseeing the autopsies.
Louisiana's attorney general charged the owners of a flooded-out nursing home in Chalmette with negligent homicide in mid-September after 34 bodies were discovered. He has also subpoenaed 73 people in an investigation into rumors that patients were euthanized at New Orleans' flooded-out Memorial Medical Center, where 40 people were found dead.
But Orleans Parish Coroner Frank Minyard, who is overseeing autopsies for the state, said this week that the bodies from the two institutions were so decomposed he listed the cause of death merely as "Katrina-related."
"There is no physical evidence from the autopsy that these people were murdered or euthanized," Minyard said. "If they did not have a knife sticking in them or a bullet in the body, it's hard to pinpoint an exact cause."
He was still waiting for toxicology reports but said unless those show abnormal levels of morphine or another drug, those tests will not help.
