GRETNA, La. (AP) - A jury has been seated for a civil trial over claims that Jefferson Parish’s evacuation of drainage pump operators ahead of Hurricane Katrina’s landfall led to the flooding of thousands of homes and businesses.
The Times-Picayune reports (https://bit.ly/Kk6Uw1) that the final members of the jury were picked Wednesday. Jury selection began on Monday.
Twelve jurors and six alternates are scheduled to hear the trial’s opening statements by attorneys on Thursday.
Plaintiffs’ lawyers sued Jefferson Parish and former parish president Aaron Broussard over a decision to carry out the parish’s “Doomsday Plan” and evacuate more than 200 pump operators a day before Katrina’s 2005 landfall.
Broussard is serving a prison sentence in North Carolina for an unrelated corruption conviction. He is not expected to testify in person at the trial.
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