New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has asked the State governor to send National Guard troops to patrol his city after a violent weekend in which five teenagers were shot dead.
City leaders convened a special meeting to voice outrage after the killings on Saturday in an area near the central business district.
"If we don't have wind knocking us down, we have shooters knocking us down, and that's unacceptable," said City Council President Oliver Thomas.
The shootings brought this year's murder toll to 52, raising fears that violence was back on the rise in a city that had been plagued by violent crime even before Hurricane Katrina drove residents away last year.
Saturday's incident was one of the bloodiest in the city's turbulent history.
The five teenagers, who ranged in age from 16 to 19, are believed to have been killed at the same time. Three were found in a sport utility vehicle rammed against a utility pole and two were on the street nearby. Police said they probably all arrived in the SUV.
No motive had been confirmed, but "just the sheer carnage of it, the location of it and the time that it occurred" make drugs or revenge likely candidates according to police Capt. John Bryson.
Mayor Nagin has asked the governor to send up to 300 National Guard troops and 60 state police officers to patrol the city. The City Council said it also would consider increasing overtime for police to put more officers on the street.
AP