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La. Deaths at 423; Facility Owners Charged
By ADAM NOSSITER, Associated Press Writer 15 minutes ago
The death toll from Hurricane Katrina climbed more than 50 percent in a single day Tuesday to 423, including last week's grisly discovery of 34 dead patients and staff members at St. Rita's nursing home in the town of Chalmette in hard-hit St. Bernard Parish.
In the nursing home case, Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti charged the husband-and-wife owners of St. Rita's with 34 counts of negligent homicide for not doing more to save their elderly patients.
"The pathetic thing in this case was that they were asked if they wanted to move them and they did not," Foti said. "They were warned repeatedly that this storm was coming. In effect, their inaction resulted in the deaths of these people."
Salvador A. Mangano and his wife, Mable, were released on $50,000 bond each.
Their attorney, Jim Cobb, said his clients were innocent.
Cobb said they followed the nursing home's evacuation plan that had been filed with officials, and he blamed the St. Bernard Parish officials for not ensuring the plan was proceeding.
"They sat and waited for a mandatory evacuation order from the officials of St. Bernard Parish that never came," he said.
Cobb said the Manganos were forced to make a difficult decision as the hurricane approached: evacuate the patients, many of them elderly and on feeding tubes, or keep them comfortable at the home through the storm.
"If you pull that trigger too soon (on evacuation) those people are going to die," Cobb said.
Tammy Daigle, a nurse who worked at the home, also said the owners had been worried about trying to evacuate some residents of the home who they knew wouldn't survive the move.
Tom Rodrigue, whose mother was among the dead, was still angry and near tears.
"She deserved the chance, you know, to be rescued instead of having to drown like a rat," he told CNN.
In addition to St. Rita's, the attorney general said he is investigating the discovery of more than 40 corpses at flooded-out Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans. A hospital official said the 106-degree heat inside the hospital as the patients waited for days to be evacuated probably contributed to the deaths.
La. Deaths at 423; Facility Owners Charged
By ADAM NOSSITER, Associated Press Writer 15 minutes ago
The death toll from Hurricane Katrina climbed more than 50 percent in a single day Tuesday to 423, including last week's grisly discovery of 34 dead patients and staff members at St. Rita's nursing home in the town of Chalmette in hard-hit St. Bernard Parish.
In the nursing home case, Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti charged the husband-and-wife owners of St. Rita's with 34 counts of negligent homicide for not doing more to save their elderly patients.
"The pathetic thing in this case was that they were asked if they wanted to move them and they did not," Foti said. "They were warned repeatedly that this storm was coming. In effect, their inaction resulted in the deaths of these people."
Salvador A. Mangano and his wife, Mable, were released on $50,000 bond each.
Their attorney, Jim Cobb, said his clients were innocent.
Cobb said they followed the nursing home's evacuation plan that had been filed with officials, and he blamed the St. Bernard Parish officials for not ensuring the plan was proceeding.
"They sat and waited for a mandatory evacuation order from the officials of St. Bernard Parish that never came," he said.
Cobb said the Manganos were forced to make a difficult decision as the hurricane approached: evacuate the patients, many of them elderly and on feeding tubes, or keep them comfortable at the home through the storm.
"If you pull that trigger too soon (on evacuation) those people are going to die," Cobb said.
Tammy Daigle, a nurse who worked at the home, also said the owners had been worried about trying to evacuate some residents of the home who they knew wouldn't survive the move.
Tom Rodrigue, whose mother was among the dead, was still angry and near tears.
"She deserved the chance, you know, to be rescued instead of having to drown like a rat," he told CNN.
In addition to St. Rita's, the attorney general said he is investigating the discovery of more than 40 corpses at flooded-out Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans. A hospital official said the 106-degree heat inside the hospital as the patients waited for days to be evacuated probably contributed to the deaths.
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