[StBernard] Family demands answer in 2 deaths

[Westley Annis]

Family demands answer in 2 deaths 

Pair died despite evacuation promises 

By SANDY DAVIS

Advocate staff writer 

CHALMETTE -- Dorothy Hingle lit a candle sometime after 9 a.m. Monday, Aug.
29, in her small brick home on Rosetta Street. She crawled into bed with her
quadriplegic son, Russell Embry, put her arms around him and prayed. Then
she waited.
That's what her daughters have pieced together as her final actions while
Hurricane Katrina cut its deadly path through St. Bernard Parish.

A wall of water came crashing over Chalmette within an hour, swallowing
mother and son in a small bed in the rear bedroom of the home.

Hingle and Embry died.

Their relatives say the two had waited since Saturday for Acadian Ambulance
and Med Air to come and pick them up.

But Acadian never showed up.

Embry, 54, a quadriplegic since 1974, was on a special-needs list compiled
by the parish's Department of Human Resources. The list was for those who
needed to be evacuated by ambulance in the event of a hurricane.

Hingle was listed as Embry's caretaker and, over the years, was always
evacuated with her son.

"It was like clockwork," said Sally Viada, one of Hingle's three daughters.
"My mother and brother had been picked up and evacuated by ambulance before
every hurricane for at least the last 10 years."

During Hurricane Ivan in 2004, Acadian picked up Hingle and Embry, who was 6
feet, 4 inches tall and weighed about 250 pounds, and evacuated them to
Barksdale Air Force Base.

"It never occurred to me that anything could go wrong," Viada said, crying
quietly during a recent interview.

And it is Acadian that holds the exclusive rights to provide the wide array
of ambulance services needed by residents in St. Bernard Parish. Parish
officials signed a contract with the company in February 2004, said Larry
Ingargiola, director of the parish's Office of Homeland Security and
Emergency Preparedness.

"Acadian has had exclusive rights to operate in St. Bernard Parish for more
than a year," Ingargiola said. "It's the only ambulance service operating in
the parish. It's the only one the contract allows."

When meteorologists determined on Saturday, Aug. 27, that Hurricane Katrina
would likely make landfall somewhere in southeast Louisiana or Mississippi,
parish officials ordered a mandatory evacuation and the special-needs list
was given to Acadian.

"Acadian assured us they were picking everyone up on the list," Ingargiola
said.

But somehow Hingle and Embry were not picked up.

And since the storm, Ingargiola has discovered that others on the list were
left behind.

"We're doing an investigation," he said. "We're going to find out what
happened."

Acadian officials refused to comment on the allegations surrounding Hingle's
and Embry's deaths.

Steven Kuiper, Acadian's vice president of operations, said Monday the
company was not conducting a special investigation into the deaths. Instead,
he said, the company was conducting a post-storm "status review," which is
"standard operating procedure."

"We're evaluating the disposition status of all the transports in the
tri-parish area in the days before the storm," Kuiper said, adding that the
tri-parish area included St. Bernard Parish. "That's part of our normal
self-critiquing after a major storm."

Kuiper also refused to provide records that would show how many times Hingle
called Acadian between Saturday and Monday before the storm.

"That's part of our investigation," he said. "I don't have all of those
facts. It's part of our total evaluation."

He also said that evacuating residents on the special-needs list is not
"specific to the contract" his company has with St. Bernard Parish.

But parish officials disagree, though they note that the contract was lost
in the storm along with much of the parish's paperwork.

"If they agreed to the exclusive contract and they're the only service
allowed in the parish, who else would be responsible for moving people on
the special-needs list?" asked Lynn Dean, a parish councilman. "That doesn't
make any sense."

To the family, there is only one question.

"Acadian talked to my mother several times over that weekend, and each time
they told her they were coming to pick her up," said Betty LeBlanc, one of
Hingle's daughters. "What I can't understand is when they knew they weren't
going to come, why didn't they just call and tell her that? Instead, Acadian
played God, and that's unforgivable."

Left behind

Dorothy Hingle was at the center of her family. She was the person her
daughters went to for advice or to be picked up when life dealt them a blow.
Despite her 83 years, Hingle was known for her strength and faith and
dispensed wisdom to her girls on a regular basis, they said.

As the storm approached on Saturday, each of the three daughters -- LeBlanc,
Viada and Hazel Cooley -- talked to Hingle to make sure Acadian was on its
way.

Viada worked at Sears in the parish's small town of Violet.

"I worked late Friday night and early Saturday," Viada said. "So it wasn't
until Saturday afternoon that I found out about Katrina."

Viada called her mother immediately.

"My mother told me to go on and leave," Viada said. "She told me that she
had just spoken to Acadian and they were coming to get her within the hour.
That was the last time I ever spoke to her."

And Viada left.

"The ambulance could only take my brother and a caretaker," she said. "I
learned that a long time ago. They had always come before, so there was no
reason for me to question it this time."

LeBlanc also spoke to her mother on Saturday. LeBlanc planned to evacuate in
her new car, following her son out of the parish. But her mother told her
not to go in two cars.

"I'm 61 years old, but when I told my mother I was going to follow my son's
family out of Chalmette, she said, 'Oh no, you can't do that. What if you
get separated from him? It will be a nightmare. You have to ride with him,'
" LeBlanc said.

LeBlanc left her 3-week-old car behind and did as her mother told her to do.

That was the last time LeBlanc talked to her mother.

Herb Stansbury, who has lived next door to Hingle for about 30 years on
Rosetta Street, was surprised when he saw her at his door Sunday afternoon
with a cake.

"I couldn't believe she was standing with some cake," Stansbury said. "I was
surprised she was still there. She and her son had always been picked up by
ambulance this close to the storm's arrival. I said, 'What are you doing
here?' She said, 'The ambulance is coming soon. Don't worry.' "

When Stansbury's wife, a nurse, finally got home just before 3, they
evacuated.

"We saw Ms. Hingle standing outside. I had a bad feeling, but she said the
same thing, 'I just talked to Acadian and they're on their way. Don't worry
about us. We'll be fine.' "

As he pulled down the road and headed out of Chalmette, Stansbury couldn't
shake his concern.

"I worried about it for a month," he said.

Hazel Cooley, who lives in Mississippi and is the only one of Hingle's
daughters who lives outside St. Bernard, called her mother several times
over the weekend.

"I talked to her two times on Sunday, and each time she told me that she had
just talked to Acadian and they would be there in an hour," Cooley said.
"She was always in a hurry to get off of the phone because she was afraid
that Acadian was calling her to let her know they were nearby."

But by that time, Hingle admitted she was concerned and had called a parish
councilman and 911 to see if she could find out what was taking Acadian so
long, Cooley said.

"After she called 911, a deputy came out to see her and reassured her that
the ambulance would come soon," Cooley said.

Councilman Dean remembers getting a call from Hingle.

"I told her to call the director of human resources," Dean said. "I gave her
the phone number and told her that she should have the director call
Acadian. They always responded when the director called them."

Mitch McDaniel, who works in the parish's Department of Human Resources,
remembers getting calls Saturday from residents complaining that Acadian
hadn't picked them up.

"I called Acadian, and they assured me they were going to pick everyone up,"
McDaniel said. "They just couldn't give us a time frame."

McDaniel said he was concerned, but did believe that everyone would be
picked up.

"As the hours were passing, their answer was the same," he said.

When Cooley, who was at her Mississippi home hundreds of miles away, hadn't
heard from her mother by Monday morning, she called her.

"It was a little after 9 a.m.," Cooley said. "I was surprised when she
answered the phone. She said, 'If they're coming to get us, they're coming
now.' And then, in a different voice, she said, 'Honey, don't worry about
us. God is with us.' I told her I loved her and she told me she loved me,
and we hung up."

That was the last time Cooley talked to her mother.

The list

Parish officials began holding meetings on Friday, Aug 26, in preparation
for the storm. By Saturday, they called for a mandatory evacuation.

"That's when we started calling everyone on the special-needs master list,"
McDaniel said. "There were five or six of us making the calls, including an
employee of Acadian."

People on the list were asked if they wanted to be picked up or had made
other arrangements, McDaniel said. Once the calls were completed, he said,
the revised list was handed over to Acadian.

"We were prepared," McDaniel said. "Acadian had plenty of time to pick
everyone up."

McDaniel said he can't find a copy of the list.

"Our computers were commandeered after the storm by parish employees," he
said. "I haven't found mine yet, and I don't have a copy of the list."

He doesn't remember whether Hingle's name was on the list, but he did say
there were about 30 people who needed to be evacuated.

McDaniel said that some years earlier, the parish advertised for people who
needed assistance in an evacuation to sign up at his office.

LeBlanc provided a copy of a parish application for "Evacuation
Transportation for Disabled or Homebound People due to Hurricanes or other
Catastrophic Events in St. Bernard Parish."

The application, accompanied by a letter from a doctor, says Embry was
bedridden, couldn't sit up and had to be evacuated by ambulance. It lists
Hingle as his "caretaker."

The application has a letter from a doctor attached that states Embry is an
"invalid" and, in the event of a disaster or hurricane, "will need to be
evacuated by ambulance to the nearest medical facility."

"I filed that application myself with the parish," LeBlanc said. "I filed
one every year, and each time there was a hurricane, mother and Russell had
been evacuated by ambulance."

The parish held emergency preparedness meetings as officials tried to get
ready for Katrina's arrival, Ingargiola said.

"There was a representative from Acadian at each meeting who reassured us
that everyone on the special-needs list would be picked up," he said.

Ingargiola said he now knows that didn't happen.

"Now I know they didn't pick everyone up," he said.

A futile search

After Cooley called her mother Monday morning, she called her sister,
LeBlanc, to let her know their mother was still in Chalmette.

"I was shocked," LeBlanc said. "By that time, communications were going down
all over from the storm. I tried to call the parish and I couldn't get
through. I called a sheriff's office in Mississippi, and they couldn't get
through."

For hours, LeBlanc tried to find a way to help her mother.

"I couldn't get in touch with anybody," she added.

LeBlanc said she didn't know about the storm surge.

Residents and parish officials who stayed during the storm said the surge
struck about 10 a.m. They estimate it took about 15 to 30 minutes for it to
cover the parish with about 10 feet of water.

Still, Hingle's daughters refused to believe she was dead. For the next 24
days, they frantically searched hospitals, nursing homes and the Internet to
find their mother.

Cooley said Hingle's and Embry's description was on 40 Web sites.

"It was a full-time job," she said. "I got up every morning, and that's what
we all did all day and into the night. We looked for them."

LeBlanc, who lost her home and car in the storm, made phone calls.

"I even walked through a nursing home and hospital looking for them,"
LeBlanc said. "I kept thinking that maybe something happened and mother
couldn't talk."

Cooley and LeBlanc even provided DNA samples, hoping that in the event their
mother couldn't talk, someone would match their DNA to hers.

"When we could finally get through to the parish, we asked that someone go
look in the house to see if they were there," Cooley said.

Each time, the daughters were told no one was at the Rosetta Street house.

But on Sept. 23, LeBlanc talked to a woman in the parish and explained the
situation to her. The woman sent her husband to the house, and he found the
bodies of Hingle and Embry.

He told the family that Hingle was lying next to her son with her arm around
him.

"I am so hurt, so angry that they laid there for that long in that
contaminated water," LeBlanc said. "It's cruel. It's heartbreaking. It's
wrong."

Because of Hurricane Rita, the bodies were not removed from the house until
Sept. 26. The bodies were sent to St. Gabriel, where all those who died in
the storm are taken to a special morgue for autopsies and identification.

"This is insult to injury, having to wait for them to release the bodies,"
LeBlanc said. "After everything that happened, we have no closure to this."

A few weeks ago, the sisters went to their mother's house.

"We found her purse by the door because she was ready to leave," Cooley
said. "We also found a candle tipped over with wax that flowed out when the
flood water washed over it. That's how come we know she was praying. She
always lit a candle."

A neighbor found a plastic bag containing phone numbers, a three-days'
supply of Hingle's and Embry's medicines, and $40.

Now marked on the side of the house on Rosetta Street is a large orange "X"
put there by the St. Bernard Parish Fire Department. On the bottom of the
"X" is the number "2," denoting two bodies found in the house.

"The only thing that I keep thinking about is what my mother always told
us," LeBlanc said. "She always said, 'Betty, the Lord won't take anyone one
second too early or one second too late.' " 

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