eddie-compass

Snopes says this claim is false:

New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin created a phantom force of 700 "virtual policemen."

Actually, that's only partially false:
1. Snopes only discusses a satire from azconservative.org entitled "Nagin Defends Use of 'Phantom Police'", which I linked to on October 1, and which has a creation date of 9/30 at that site.
2. However, there was a real news story from Tony Snow of Fox Radio on 9/27 (at about 9:48AM EST) discussing phantom police. From this (cache):

...Fox News' Tony Snow has said that of the 1700 police working for New Orleans, maybe only 1000 really exist.
Rogers asked someone in the know, who agreed with Snow's statements.
"It's pretty much always been known, but never openly acknowledged, that NOPD's actual numbers were far below the "official" figure of 1500 - 1700," said the source.
"To get that number over 1500, and thus qualify for federal funding, Compass and his predecessors counted reservists and certain retirees as active duty officers. The REAL number is, and has been for some time, a lot closer to 1000."
Some time ago, the Feds were considering taking over the NOPD. Allegedly, that's when the "cooking of the books" on numbers of cops started in earnest, because one of the feds' complaints was the low number of officers, Rogers is told...

This Tony Snow claim was written up in a few minor newspapers; one such link is in "FBI investigating NOPD corruption, phantom cops; $5k bonus" which I posted on 9/29, and which has more information on Elodia Blanco. A direct link is here. And a similar Pravda report is here. I wouldn't suggest trusting that source but instead referring to Snow's report.
Unfortunately, while a link to his report is provided here, now that link goes to simply a short "outro" music-only segment. [UPDATE: the link works, and it's been cached.]
So, we have these two items:
1. There's a satirical article, and a Snopes debunking of that article.
2. A real news story that hasn't been confirmed and needs looking in to.
11/15/05 UPDATE: Shortly after posting this, I sent an email to snopes, and I got the following reply:

Thanks for the heads up!
- Barbara

I thought it might be an autoreply, but now I'm not so sure. They haven't updated their page, and I also attempted to join their forums shortly after sending the email. An administrator needs to approve the request to join their forums, and since it's been over a day I get the feeling my request has been denied.
Back on 9/19 I noted that Snopes had changed a page without providing any indication that they'd made changes. Based on that and on this current case, in the future I won't be putting a great deal of confidence in their reports.
11/16/05 UPDATE: I also sent emails to the Tony Snow show and to azconservative.com. Neither have replied. And, the audio link above does work, you just need to give it time. Here's some of what he says on that clip:

The FBI has been trying to get a complete list of the names of police who didn't show up... of the 500 names that have already been investigate by the fbi, apparently 84% of those names belong to people who... drumroll please... don't exist... They are phantom employees... The city plice were ripping off the people of New Orleans... They had fake cops... the money was going to pals of eddie compass and/or pals of the political establishment... 84%...

UPDATE: azconservative has linked here.

The former head of the NOPD has a new gig: security consultant for New Orleans Fine Hotels.

You might remember this from June. The NOPD - apparently directed by Eddie Compass - hired a deputy of Louis Farrakhan, Dennis Muhammad, to give their cops "sensitivity training":

[...the hiring came] after a rise in "anti-police" sentiment in the city.
In an item picked up by the Drudge Report, Police Chief Eddie Compass explained that "members of the Nation of Islam have some type of relationship" with the community and might be able to help ease tensions.
The Muhammed appointment immediately sparked controversy, with New Orleans Police Association spokesman David Benelli telling the Bayou Buzz that his phone had "been ringing off the hook" with complaints from the rank and file.

See also "Ray Nagin meets with Louis Farrakhan, discusses conspiracy theories". NewsMax says Nagin hasn't come to the phone to discuss that with them.

Unnamed New Orleans Police officers tell NOLA that after NOPD superintendent Compass resigned, he returned to the cruise ship where he and others are staying, and:

"He was going around telling officers, including myself, it wasn't his doing, that he would've never quit," said a high-ranking officer who asked not to be named. "He had tears in his eyes. He didn't want to go."
Another officer said Compass told him, "You work at the pleasure of the mayor. This was not my decision."
...Officers said Compass told them that he and Nagin had an angry confrontation Tuesday morning, hours before Compass announced his retirement, which he said would begin after a transition period of up to 45 days.
...At the news conference, the two men were amicable, with Nagin calling Compass' retirement, after 26 years on the force, good for his family and bad for the city.
Nagin wished Compass well, calling him a hero and saying that he hoped Compass would at least send him a Christmas card during the holidays.
Compass seemed to fight back tears. Handlers shuffled Nagin off in one direction, Compass in another.
Even before Katrina, both Nagin and Compass had come under pressure, dealing with controversies over alleged underreporting of crime statistics in the 1st District, the enforcement of the residency rule for officers, and Compass' hiring of members of the Nation of Islam to do sensitivity training for the Police Department. The city also had seen a substantial rise in the murder rate in 2005.

Nagin has named Assistant Superintendent Warren Riley to be the acting superintendent.

From "Missing in Action":

Louisiana ranks third in the nation in the number of indicted officials per capita. Just the past generation has seen a governor, an attorney general, a federal judge, a state Senate president and a swarm of local officials convicted of assorted crimes.
Police Superintendent Eddie Compass didn't say why he suddenly resigned. But it comes after his department announced that about 250 New Orleans police officers - 15% of the force - could face punishment for leaving their posts without permission during Katrina.
Before Katrina, New Orleans was a crime-ridden city with a murder rate 10 times the national average. Only one in four murders result in a conviction, largely because retaliation against potential witnesses is common. Yet New Orleans had only three cops per 1,000 residents, a ratio less than half that of Washington, D.C.
Some of the officers who did not desert their posts actually stayed and joined the looters. In an MSNBC report aired shortly after Katrina hit, Martin Savidge, reporting from a Wal-Mart being looted, interviewed police officers claiming to be arresting suspects even as those cops loaded shopping carts with merchandise...
Mike Brown may deserve criticism for his performance. But given the corruption and malfeasance in the Pelican State, and the lack of preparedness and chaotic response of local officials, his observation that "Louisiana was dysfunctional" may not be far off the mark.

Note that one of the reasons those cops left there posts might be because they never existed in the first place.