New Orleans
Five teenage boys were shot to death, execution style, as they sat in an SUV on a New Orleans street last week. The deaths capped a surge in violence that prompted Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco to dispatch 100 National Guard troops to patrol the city’s most troubled neighborhoods. The 53 killings so far this year put the city on pace with its 2004 murder rate, which was the second worst in the nation. City leaders said the mayhem threatens to set back New Orleans’ fitful recovery from the devastation wrought last year by Hurricane Katrina. “If we don’t make people feel safe in their homes,” said City Councilman Arnold Fielkow, “nothing will happen.”
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