Prosecutors have dropped a criminal case against an investigator for the Orleans Parish Public Defenders Office, months after a dramatic court hearing in which she was led away in handcuffs and accused of kidnapping the alleged victims in a child rape case in order to get an interview.

Emily Beasley, 22, was facing a simple kidnapping charge and a contempt of court conviction on July 15. But by Dec. 16, District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro’s office refused charges after all.

“Cooler heads prevailed, ” said Chief Public Defender Derwyn Bunton. “She was doing her job. Emily continues to work for us and she has been fully reinstated.”

Judge Frank Marullo had earlier dismissed the contempt of court charge against Beasley for speaking with the two girls at the center of the rape case outside their home.

Troy Harris, 40, is due to stand trial on aggravated rape, kidnapping and indecent behavior with a juvenile under age 13 on Feb. 24 at Criminal District Court. He remains jailed without bond.

Harris is accused of raping a 12-year-old girl two years ago while her younger sister watched.

Beasley visited the two girls on July 9 after their mother told the defenders office not to speak to her or her children, the mother testified in July.

Beasley spent at least one hour talking to the girls on the steps of a church across the street from their apartment building, prosecutors said.

What prosecutors and Marullo called a violation of Louisiana law protecting victims of crime, the public defenders program called fair representation of indigent defendants that the New Orleans system hadn’t seen since Hurricane Katrina dismantled the office and a new wave of defense lawyers arrived.

If convicted of the rape charge, Harris will receive mandatory life in prison.

Two months after the July hearing, public defender Kendall Green, who was found in contempt of court in the matter but by September the case was reversed by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeal, withdrew his office from representing Harris.

Marullo appointed Arthur “Buddy” Lemann III to defend Harris.

“Passions run high when children are involved, ” Bunton said, explaining the initial kidnapping arrest for Beasley. “The right call was made.”

Charlie Sheen
Charlie Sheen was arrested on Christmas Day after cops in Aspen, Colorado received a phone call from his wife Brooke Mueller claiming that he had allegedly hit her.

When police officers arrived on the scene, they gave both Charlie and Brooke blood alcohol tests. Charlie did fine with just a .04 but Brooke registered a .13.

Let’s make a note that Mueller called the cops at 8:34AM. Who is drunk that early in the morning?

TMZ reports that Brooke even told a female cop right before the bail hearing that she was drunk when she made the phone call.

Charlie was booked for two felonies and one misdemeanor relating to domestic violence but he is claiming that he was just trying to defend himself and his wife happened to be the aggressor.

Charlie is due back in court on February 8.

Three people, including a brother and sister, were fatally shot and another woman critically wounded late Thursday night in a home invasion in the St. Roch neighborhood.

Inside a bedroom, the suspects killed two women with an assault rifle and wounded a third woman. They used a handgun to execute a young man in the rear yard, authorities said. They spared only a toddler.
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The attack took place shortly before midnight inside a shotgun double in the 2700 block of Urquhart Street, a tough, residential neighborhood with houses cheek by jowl.

New Orleans police officers, responding to a report of a burglary, found the door ajar. Inside they discovered the female victims.

Kewanda Harris, 30, was killed by an assault rifle in one of the bedrooms. Her partner, Karen Matthews, who is in her 20s, had been fatally shot as well, according to John Gagliano, the spokesman for the Orleans Parish coroner who released the identities. Relatives and a neighbor confirmed their relationship.

Another woman, 26, was found alive but severely wounded. She was taken to LSU Interim Public Hospital in critical condition.

Desmond Harris, Kewanda’s 23-year-old brother, had been shot in the head and fell face-down in the rear yard, authorities said.

Police believe that the motive in the slayings revolves around drugs, which were often sold from the house.

“It appears that the shooting involved the sale and distribution of narcotics from that home,” said Marlon Defillo, assistant police superintendent. “We are trying to determine whether it was a drug rip-off or something else.”

Defillo said Friday evening that detectives had worked through the night and were pursing some “very good leads.”

By midmorning Friday, the house had been cordoned off, its front door affixed with a sticker from the coroner’s office. Two homicide detectives huddled in the cold as crime scene technicians snapped photographs in the rear yard of the coffee-colored home, which had sheets covering the windows.

Next-door neighbor Wallace Welsh, 45, said people frequently sold drugs in and around the home, and that drug sales are an ongoing issue in the neighborhood. Welsh, who confirmed their identities and relationships, said he heard little at the time of the incident and learned of the shooting when police arrived. He said he is haunted by what he saw.

Karen Harris, 44, a cousin of both Desmond and Kewanda Harris, said in an interview that her relatives grew up in the Magnolia public housing complex and recently settled into the Urquhart apartment.

She added that Desmond was the outgoing sibling, a “hard-working and fun-loving man,” employed at the Cat’s Meow nightclub on Bourbon Street. A manager there declined to comment Friday.

She also said Kewanda Harris was quiet, respectful and very much in love with her girlfriend.

Karen Harris had no answers for the motive in the killing of her cousins.

“I’m trying to find out myself,” she said.

Brendan McCarthy can be reached at bmccarthy@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3301.