09/04/07 (LA):
Expert Says Levee Breaks Caused Fatal Katrina Floods
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Levee breaches caused more than 90 percent of the flooding that killed 35 elderly residents at a nursing home during Hurricane Katrina, a defense witness testified Tuesday at the negligent homicide trial for the home's owners.
Ivor Van Heerden, deputy director of the Louisiana State University Hurricane Center, said mistakes by the Army Corps of Engineers in designing and constructing the levee along the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet were to blame for 92 percent of the flooding in St. Bernard Parish. Had the levees held, he said, St. Rita's nursing home in St. Bernard Parish would have had less than a foot of water.
Van Heerden's testimony contradicts earlier testimony from prosecution witness, Brian Jarvinen, retired tropical meteorologist with the National Hurricane Center, who said levee breaches had a minor impact on flooding, contributing just a foot to the 7 feet of water that swamped the nursing home.
The two men agreed on one point: No one would have drowned in St. Bernard Parish if the levees had been properly armored and built to the height authorized by Congress.
The trial resumed after a four-day weekend break and a brief delay Tuesday morning as the court awaited a state Supreme Court decision on whether a key piece of evidence can be admitted.
Attorneys defending St. Rita's owners Salvador and Mabel Mangano sought to introduce as evidence a document from the Louisiana Nursing Home Association showing that 32 of 74 nursing homes in the New Orleans did not evacuate.
Prosecutors appealed trial judge Jerome Winsberg's decision to allow the defense to admit the list into evidence. The 1st Circuit Court of Appeal late Friday upheld Winsberg's decision, but on Tuesday afternoon the state Supreme Court ruled that it could not be introduced as evidence.
The judge decided to proceed with Van Heerden's testimony while waiting for the state Supreme Court to rule.
© X-Pro 2007
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