Over the weekend, longtime WXRT-FM deejay Terri Hemmert, who has been a Chicago fixture for 50 years, witnessed a deadly mass shooting while dining in a popular New Orleans restaurant.
"Aunt Terri," as many of her listeners know her as, was in the Crescent City, as she is every year, for the annual New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.
A waiter working at the eatery, Hilbert Walker III, was killed in the shooting. The New Orleans Police say he was the intended target.
Hemmert was celebrating her birthday at the restaurant. The disc jockey's party, in her words, was "interrupted by a hail of bullets." One of her friends was wounded--everyone else in her party is obviously suffering emotionally.
In her Facebook statement Hemmert referenced the need for more gun control, a cause she has previously supported. Hey, I've never been shot at, so I'm not going to venture down a path to criticize gun control here.
Interestingly, media coverage of last weekend's horrific shooting has left out that New Orleans in 2010 had roughly 1,500 police officers, NPR reported in March that the Big Easy now has less than 1,000 cops.
Orleans Parish, where New Orleans is situated, has a catch-and-release prosecutor, Jason Williams, whose campaign was funded by leftist billionaire George Soros.
Of Williams, Christopher Tromoglie wrote last year in the Washington Examiner:
Since he became district attorney, less than one out of every five felony cases have ended with a felony conviction (17%). Approximately 67% result in dismissal without legal consequences for the alleged criminal offender. And about 20% of the felony cases dismissed were crimes of violence.
Additionally, the Advocate elaborated on Williams’s devastating decisions since he was elected. According to the Metropolitan Crime Commission’s latest report, in 2021, Williams rejected 46% of violent felony arrests for such criminal acts as murder, rape, kidnapping, carjacking, and robbery, among others. That represents an 84% increase over his predecessor.
Keep in mind, prior to Williams' election, New Orleans already had a high crime rate. Criminals are emboldened now, and not just in the Crescent City. They know if they are caught, they may not be punished--or these lawbreakers might only receive a slap on the wrist.
I hope that Hemmert's friend makes a full recovery--and that the emotional scars that the witnesses have received are healed.
Okay, you can say I'm wrong about Williams and the other Soros-funded prosecutors.
But shouldn't New Orleans at the very least hire more police officers?
New Orleans has been playing with fire for decades in regard to crime.
Tourism to the Big Easy is what the automobile industry was to Detroit in the 1960s. When tourists stop coming to New Orleans, the city will die.
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