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An Orleans Parish judge Friday gave a former Alabama legislator 60 years in prison for ripping off six families in a modular-housing scam two years after Hurricane Katrina and the levee failures devastated the region.

After testifying before the U.S. Civilian Board of Contract Appeals, St. Tammany Parish President Kevin Davis is optimistic that the panel will charge FEMA with paying at least part of the cost to clear hurricane debris from the Coin du Lestin canals near Slidell.

Strange as it may seem, the right lessons for the future of climate science come not from the success in predicting thunderstorms, floods and hurricanes, but from the failure to predict earthquakes.

More than 100 deaths occurred in New Orleans-area hospitals and nursing homes after Hurricane Katrina when emergency backup power systems failed. It raises a potentially far-reaching legal question: How prepared do hospitals have to be for the worst possible circumstances?

The destruction of New Orleans by Katrina in 2005 showed the importance of keeping levees in tip-top condition. In practice, though, that is hard. Levees fail for many reasons, and there are so many of them - 100,000 miles-worth in the US alone. So, keeping an eye on all of them is an almost impossible task.

The crisis of contaminated drywall may have first come to light in Florida, but records show that at least 60 million pounds of Chinese drywall came into the Port of New Orleans beginning in January 2006, enough to build 6,500 average-sized homes.

The Army Corps of Engineers has recommended changes in the proposed designs of three levee segments along Lake Pontchartrain in eastern New Orleans.

New Orleans police shot 10 civilians, at least four of whom died, after Hurricane Katrina made landfall. But a fresh examination of the post-storm period — a joint effort by ProPublica, The New Orleans Times-Picayune, and PBS “Frontline” — raises additional questions about the actions of police.

Experts have said that Louisiana has about a 10-year window to make meaningful efforts to reverse decades of coastal erosion. That calls for fast action.

Lawyers for one of several trailer manufacturers accused of supplying the federal government with toxic hurricane shelters said Wednesday they were negotiating a settlement for thousands of claims.

The record level of money spent since Hurricane Katrina means that more than 1 million residents are better protected from hurricane-driven flooding today. But a roomful of somber decision-makers gathered in New Orleans today to remind each other that there are still miles to go.

Louisiana officials asked the secretary of the federal Department of Commerce to mediate the state's dispute with the Army Corps of Engineers over the agency's failure to use most of the sediment it dredges from the lower Mississippi River each year to rebuild wetlands.

In a powerful, almost angry decision, U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval ruled that the corps' mistakes, delays and long history of "monumental negligence" made it liable for much of Hurricane Katrina's devastation.

Four years on, and finally some good news for the victims of hurricane Katrina. A judge has ruled that the US federal government was to blame for much of the flooding caused by the 2005 storm, paving the way for billions in payouts.

Although the money spent since Hurricane Katrina means that residents are better protected from hurricane-driven flooding today than ever before, a roomful of decision-makers gathered in New Orleans today to remind each other that there are still miles to go before Louisiana can sleep easy.

It's been clear to us for some time and after the recent court ruling that the Army Corps was at fault for the flooding after Katrina, maybe now it will be clear to outside observers who, for whatever reason, believed our flooding to be inevitable.

The blistering ruling validates the rage felt by so many survivors — and it could help spread a message to millions of Americans who still think the tragedy of Katrina was the government's response to the disaster rather than the government's creation of the disaster.

The finding that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is liable for much of the flooding during Hurricane Katrina could have a far-reaching effect on flood-control policies and on the government's long-standing refusal to take responsibility for its errors.

The day after a judge ruled that flooding in two areas of New Orleans was caused by negligence, city residents were trying to decipher the implications of the decision.

Louisiana officials called on the Obama administration Thursday to compensate residents after a federal judge's ruling that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was responsible for some of the worst flooding in and around New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.