Blog Assignment #47 / Times Picayune-NO

Cop says facts in shooting withheld

Retired New Orleans police Lt. Robert Italiano testified Wednesday that he simply wasn't given the information that would have led him to connect the discharge of a gun by another officer shortly after Hurricane Katrina to a burnt body later found in a car on the levee near an Algiers police station.Italiano believes that the other officer missed the man he was trying to get.H e claims the directions of the gun was not fully explained to him.He also states that he did not shoot the two dead bodies that were later found near by a school.He trail is still being delt with.

Wife receives 10 years in slaying

after a St. Tammany Parish judge sentenced Kendra Talley to 10 years in prison for participating in the shooting death of her husband two weeks before Christmas 2004, the victim's brother walked over to Talley's mother and asked, "So, what do you think?" "Fair," Karie Thiac replied Wednesday. "It is better than life."They then embraced and filed out of the courtroom, choking back tears.Talley, 30 -- who has a son, Zachary, by her husband -- pleaded guilty last month to manslaughter and possession of crystal meth. She had been facing a second-degree murder charge in the Dec. 11, 2004, slaying of Thomas Talley, 30, outside their Covington Pointe subdivision home.

Death from OD was murder, jury told

 Prosecutors argued Tuesday that Walter A. Kott Jr. murdered a 22-year-old woman by injecting her with a lethal dose of  

   Abused painkiller, Kott's defense attorney tried to suggest to jurors that the woman died because of drugs she took  herself.

Kott, 54, is charged with second-degree murder in the death of Rebecca R. Roshto, who was found dead of an overdose Jan. 29, 2004, in a bathtub at a Slidell motel. He would spend the rest of his life in prison if convicted on that charge.During the trial's opening arguments Tuesday, Assistant District Attorney Jason Cuccia told jurors that Roshto died after Kott shot Dilaudid into a vein in her arm so that she could get high. She overdosed, and more than three hours passed before Kott called 911.

Who better than Brees?

Drew Brees, who brought his rebuilt shoulder to a city some thought would never rebuild after Hurricane Katrina and led the Saints to a Super Bowl title last season, was selected Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year on Tuesday.

As Sports Illustrated Group Editor Terry McDonell, who personally made the pick, put it, Brees didn't win because his admirable work is done. Rather, more is to come with Brees, he said. His artistry on the field is inseparable from his work off. All of which, McDonell said with undisguised astonishment, is genuine.

Man jailed on incest charges

A 51-year-old Destrehan man was arrested last week and remains in jail booked with aggravated incest.

According to the St. Charles Parish Sheriff's Office, the man, whom authorities did not identify, is accused of repeatedly sexually abusing a family member from the age of 8 to 15.

He was arrested last month on similar charges and was still in jail when the most recent allegations were lodged on Nov. 24.Jesus is the is all I have to say.What is wrong with people these days?