Katrina suit vs. Army Corps dismissed

[babsbunny]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080131/ap_on_re_us/katrina_levee_suit

By CAIN BURDEAU and MICHAEL KUNZELMAN, Associated Press Writers
27 minutes ago



NEW ORLEANS - A federal judge threw out a key class-action lawsuit Wednesday against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over levee breaches after Hurricane Katrina, saying that the agency failed to protect the city but that his hands were tied by the law.


U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval ruled that the Corps should be held immune over failures in drainage canals that caused much of the flooding of New Orleans in August 2005.

The ruling relies on the Flood Control Act of 1928, which made the federal government immune when flood control projects like levees break.

The suit led to about 489,000 claims by businesses, government entities and residents, totaling trillions of dollars in damages against the agency.

The fate of many of those claims was pinned to that lawsuit and a similar one filed over flooding from a navigation channel in St. Bernard Parish. It was unclear how many claims could still move forward.