New Orleans coroner ordered to release reports on deaths

Source: AP/CNN

NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (AP) -- The coroner's reports on the deaths of nine patients trapped in a sweltering hospital in the days following Hurricane Katrina should be made public, a judge has ruled.

Chief Civil Court Judge Nadine Ramsey ruled Friday in favor of The Times-Picayune newspaper, which had sued Orleans Parish Coroner Frank Minyard for the reports. Ramsey gave Minyard until Monday to release them.

Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti conducted a criminal investigation into the deaths, leading to charges of second-degree murder against Dr. Anna Pou and nurses Lori Budo and Cheri Landry, who stayed to work at the flooded hospital during and after the August 29, 2005, storm.

Foti accused Pou and the nurses of killing patients by overdosing them with a sedative-painkiller mix during the days after Katrina, when Memorial Medical Center and other hospitals had no power and no way to evacuate.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/law/10/20/hospital.deaths.ap/index.html

Nobody was coming for them.

I remember reading the pleas from one of the hospitals on Craigslist, begging for help. Begging.

Heat. Humidity. Limited or no power to keep food or medicine cold. People in agony and no way to save them. No sleep.

The jury wouldn't convict and neither will God.

I believe as you do about the circumstances that the hospital personnel was working with. I realize that the context of the situation gives little or no comfort to the family members of those who died in that hospital, I wish them peace and comfort. But I sat here in Oregon for more than a week sobbing, screaming, and wondering if * would ever let more than the CG choppers in to help.

God bless all of their souls.

If I go to a hospital, I would like to feel assured that if a natural disaster struck while I was there, I would not be murdered by the staff.

No need to tell me how bad it was, or how they were being merciful in their killings. All I want to know is that my doctor, or my nurses, will not kill me - on purpose - ever. I would like the chance to fight for my life. No mercy needed - unless, I ask for it, of course.