I guess Mardi Gras just wouldn't be Mardi Gras without a shooting in New Orleans to cast a pall over it
Aw man.
Just as Mardi Gras 2009 was about to fade into history, just as I was about to call it day and head home and eat some King Cake and drink some Abita and put Professor Longhair on repeat in my iPod, I checked the news feed on my Blackberry and ran across this...
Six people were injured this afternoon after a shooting spree broke out along the St. Charles Avenue parade route near Second Street, according to NOPD spokesman Janssen Valencia. One of the victims was a man who was shot in the abdomen and is in serious condition.
All other victims are in stable condition. They include a 1-year-old boy with a graze wound to the back; a 17-year-old girl shot in the thigh; a 50-year-old woman shot in the elbow, and and 30-year-old man with a graze wound to the thigh.
All appeared to be innocent bystanders in the area for the day's Carnival parades, said Deputy Chief Kirk Bouyelas.
The violence broke out about 1:40 p.m. on the lake side of St. Charles somewhere between the neutral ground and sidewalk. Truck parades continued to roll down the street as several dozen police officers this afternoon worked the active crime scene just steps away.
Two suspects were arrested shortly after the shooting, when police officers on parade duty heard the pops and chased them on foot. They were apprehended at Carondelet and Second streets, where officers found them carrying three guns, Bouyelas said.
In the Garden District no less. On St. Charles Street! But hey...at least the parade continued to roll, eh?
Reading that kind of reminds me about how in some parts of Israel they say that a bus or a restaurant being bombed just causes a minor blip in commerce, that within hours everything is cleaned up and it's back to business as usual. They're so used to the violence that they've sort of become immune to it.
This just serves to remind me why I often recommend people go to Lafayette or Houma for Mardi Gras instead of New Orleans.
5 comments:
When I was 8, I saw a man get run over by a float on St. Charles Avenue on Mardi Gras Day. During one of those inevitable parade lulls, he had climbed up to reach for a silk rose when the float jerked back into motion. He slipped underneath and was flattened. About 15 minutes later, the body was gone, and everyone went right back to guzzling beer and stomping on people's fingers for doubloons. I was so confused by that; it just seemed so utterly wrong and disrespectful. Cut to exactly 20 years later: I go back to St. Charles Avenue for Mardi Gras for the first time since the aforementioned accidental death, this time with my husband and three-year-old son. All is well for the first few hours, then there's a shooting the next block over. The truck parade continued to roll; people literally gasped in horror, shrugged their shoulders, and then slipped right back into Mardi Gras mode. Unbelievable. We left. We won't be back.
The shooting was on the lakeside (Central City side) of the avenue, just a couple of blocks from the Magnolia project.
It was a beautiful day today - I am exhausted.
I moved from nola to St. Louis last year. When people here tell me how "dangerous" their city is, I just laugh and say, "I'm from New Orleans.". Sad.
I was pretty close to where this mess occurred. The cops were all over it and had the shooters rounded up almost immediately.
Damned shame. It was one of the best Mardi Gras days that I have ever had. We were out early on bikes, rode down to the Marigny, hung out with the peeps at the R Bar and then went for a long, completely unsupervised and probably illegal, parade with St Ann's. It was pretty hard to beat. If you can't have fun with that bunch, you can't have fun.
Ah...we were in that exact spot not more than 30 minutes before the shooting. We packed it up and left after Rex.
Thank God.
I love this city and I love Mardi Gras, but this kind of crap sickens me to death.
I was there with my 3 kids. We would have been in the exact line of fire.
People have no shame and no regard for life.
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