LA Times: Louisiana/Families Lose Loved Ones Again- in a Bureaucratic Mire

[lindisfarne]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-bodies2oct02,0,985746,full.story?coll=la-home-headlines
<snip>
A month after Katrina upended the lives of hundreds of thousands, families of the dead have been traumatized again by the ordeal of trying to pry their loved ones' bodies from a bureaucratic quagmire. They say they have spent weeks being rebuffed or ignored by state and federal officials at a massive temporary morgue that houses hundreds of decomposed corpses.
<snip>
I wish I could speed up the process," Cataldie said. "But speeding up the process could contaminate the process, and I just can't do that. And I'm sorry we have to do that in some situations to make sure the entire process is as pure as it can be. I have to be able to stand up before somebody and say I am absolutely sure."

Bob Johannssen, a spokesman for the state Department of Health and Hospitals, said part of the problem might be that families haven't been told to call the National Find Family Call Center (1-866-326-9393). He said the center would relay information between families and the morgue.

Several families said their frantic calls to FEMA and state officials were taken by people who were either indifferent or unable to provide any information. And even those whose loved ones' remains have been officially identified and cleared for release said it still took weeks to get the bodies.