William Jennings Jefferson is an American former politician from Louisiana whose career ended after his corruption scandal and conviction. He served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for nine terms from 1991 to 2009 as a member of the Democratic Party. He represented Louisiana's 2nd congressional district, which includes much of the greater New Orleans area. He was elected as the state's first black congressman since the end of Reconstruction.
Clarence Ray Nagin Jr. is an American former politician and convicted felon who was the 60th Mayor of New Orleans, Louisiana, from 2002 to 2010. A Democrat, Nagin became internationally known in 2005 in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Jacquelyn Brechtel Clarkson is an American politician who served in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 1994 to 2002, and multiple tenures on the New Orleans City Council. She has been Honorary consul of Lithuania in New Orleans since December 2014. She is the mother of actress Patricia Clarkson.
Renée Gill Pratt is an American politician from New Orleans, Louisiana. She was also Director of the Center for Student Retention and Success in Southern University at New Orleans. On July 25, 2011, she was found guilty of racketeering. For this crime, she served a 4-year sentence.
The 2008 congressional elections in Louisiana to determine representation for the state of Louisiana in the United States House of Representatives occurred November 4, 2008. Louisiana has seven seats in the House, apportioned according to the 2000 United States Census. Representatives are elected for two-year terms; those elected will serve in the 111th Congress from January 4, 2009 until January 3, 2011. The election coincided with the 2008 U.S. presidential election.
Ánh Quang "Joseph" Cao is a Vietnamese–American politician who was the U.S. representative for Louisiana's 2nd congressional district from 2009 to 2011. A member of the Republican Party, he is the first Vietnamese American and first native of Vietnam to serve in Congress.
James Gill is a writer and a columnist who worked for the Times-Picayune, in New Orleans, Louisiana before joining the staff of The Advocate. He has written books about the Mardi Gras celebration.
Ivan L. R. Lemelle is a Senior United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Mary Ann Vial Lemmon is a Senior United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Stacy Aline Singleton Head is an American lawyer and former president of the New Orleans City Council.
Edward James Blakely, for most his career, was a Professor of Urban Planning at the University of California at Berkeley. In 1994, he retired as a leading scholar in the field with award winning books. He is known primarily for having been Executive Director of Recovery Management for the City of New Orleans.
Rosalind Magee Peychaud is a Democratic former state representative for Louisiana House of Representatives District 91. In 2009 Peychaud became deputy chief of staff for U.S. Representative Joseph Cao, a Republican who represented Louisiana's 2nd congressional district. She served in his New Orleans district office.
Mose Oliver Jefferson was a member of the New Orleans family that includes his younger brother, former U.S. Representative William J. Jefferson. On 21 August 2009, Mose Jefferson was convicted on four felony counts of bribery.
Angela Coleman, daughter of New Orleans Fourth Municipal District Assessor Betty Jefferson, was one of four individuals indicted in 2009 by federal grand jury for the U.S. Justice Department's Eastern District of Louisiana. The charges on violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act were also directed against Betty Jefferson, Mose Jefferson, and Mose Jefferson's companion Renée Gill Pratt.
James B. Letten is an American attorney. A career prosecutor, Letten served as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana for more than eleven years. By the time Letten resigned as U.S. Attorney in December 2012, he was the longest-serving U.S. Attorney in the country.
Brenda Jefferson Foster was a witness for the prosecution in the 2008-2009 trials of her older siblings Betty Jefferson and Mose Jefferson, Betty Jefferson's daughter Angela Coleman, and Mose Jefferson's companion former City Councilwoman Renée Gill Pratt.
Michael Kirk Talbot is an American politician from Louisiana. A Republican, Talbot has represented the 10th district in the Louisiana State Senate since 2020, and previously represented the 78th district in the Louisiana House of Representatives between 2008 and 2020.
Edward Joseph Price, III, is the former mayor of Mandeville in St. Tammany Parish, who resigned from office in 2009 amidst a federal plea agreement.
The corruption case against then Louisiana Representative William J. Jefferson in the United States started on a suspicion of bribery. The FBI raided his Congressional offices in May 2006. He was re-elected to his seat in the fall. On June 4, 2007, a federal grand jury indicted Jefferson on sixteen charges related to corruption. Jefferson was defeated by Republican Joseph Cao on December 6, 2008, and was the most senior Democratic incumbent to lose re-election that year. In 2009 he was tried in the US District Court in Virginia on corruption charges. On August 5, 2009, he was found guilty of 11 of the 16 corruption counts. Jefferson was sentenced to 13 years on November 13, 2009 - the longest sentence ever given to a representative for bribery or any charge.
On the morning of September 4, 2005, six days after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, members of the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD), ostensibly responding to a call from an officer under fire, shot and killed two civilians at the Danziger Bridge: 17-year-old James Brissette and 40-year-old Ronald Madison. Four other civilians were wounded. All the victims were African-American. None were armed or had committed any crime. Madison, a mentally disabled man, was shot in the back. The shootings caused public anger and further eroded the trust New Orleans had in the federal response to Hurricane Katrina and the NOPD.