NEW ORLEANS, Nov. 18 (UPI) -- A New Orleans police officer testified she suspected a police connection to the shooting death of an unarmed man four days after Hurricane Katrina hit.
But Officer Keyalah Bell, who joined the force in 2003, said she didn't push the Henry Glover shooting issue with supervisors for fear of becoming a "bull's-eye" for retaliation from fellow officers.
Glover, 31, was shot in the chest at an open-area New Orleans shopping center Sept. 2, 2005, during the flood-related chaos that followed failures of the city's levees and flood walls. Glover's charred remains were later discovered inside a burned-out Chevrolet on the banks of the Mississippi River, near the police station where Bell worked.
Former New Orleans Officer David Warren is accused in a federal criminal trial of shooting Glover at the strip mall. Lt. Dwayne Scheuermann and Officer Greg McRae are accused of beating two men who asked police for medical help for Glover -- and later burning Glover's body in the car. Former Lt. Robert Italiano and Lt. Travis McCabe are accused of writing a false report to make it appear Glover's shooting was justified -- and purposely not connecting the shooting with the body-burning.
Federal prosecutors allege Glover was not armed and posed no threat when he was shot. Defense attorneys maintain Warren thought Glover was a looter reaching for a weapon.
When Bell was asked by a defense lawyer why she failed to report her linking of the shooting and the body-burning to a supervisor, she said that besides fear of retaliation, her assessment was based on "feelings, not facts," The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune reported.
UPI
