Records are examined in an effort to finish list of the dead

Wednesday, August 30, 2006
By Michelle Krupa

A year after Hurricane Katrina claimed the lives of 1,464 people in southeast Louisiana, state officials have released the names of about half of the victims and say that without continued federal support, it could be months before they publish a comprehensive account of those who died in the epic storm.

The names still being withheld are mostly tucked away in a stack of more than 500 death records from parish and out-of-state coroners being culled single-handedly by state medical examiner Dr. Louis Cataldie, who said FEMA has rejected his requests to hire additional staff to help him determine whether the deaths should be counted among Katrina's official toll.

A lack of federal money also has triggered the shutdown of a coordinated effort to locate 135 people still listed as missing, Cataldie said. The project, financed through FEMA, has resulted in the resolution of more than 13,000 reports of missing people.

FEMA and the state Department of Health and Hospitals announced this month that the Find Family National Call Center, which also counsels relatives waiting to learn whether their loved ones are among the corpses awaiting identification, would close Aug. 14. Though health department has kept a reduced staff on hand since then, the money soon will run out, Cataldie said.

"I wasn't excited about it," he said. "I lobbied to keep it open through the anniversary date because of 'anniversary trauma.' But the feds made up their mind and said the mission was complete."

Cataldie said the circumstances are the direct result of waning federal resources available for primary relief efforts, which continue to drag on for some families, even as most residents are busy rebuilding their lives.

Unidentified bodies

Fifty-two nameless corpses were still being held last week by Orleans Parish Coroner Frank Minyard, and a trove of DNA samples provided by relatives searching for loved ones also were transferred in recent weeks from the investigations center to State Police, said Kristen Meyer, a spokeswoman for the health department. A telephone hotline for the center will be suspended Thursday, she said.

A FEMA spokesman did not respond to several requests for comment about the agency's role in the developments.

"We turned over the remaining missing persons cases to local law enforcement authorities," Meyer said, noting that 107 of the cases were sent to New Orleans. "These cases are still open."

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