New Orleans, LA. Upper 9th Ward. 2007
This is one of my favorite all-time shots. I'd seen this dude a day or 2 before I snapped this photo as I was sitting on a curb with Matt Fischer. He was milling around St. Mary's, the deserted Catholic school in the Upper 9th Ward that had become a makeshift outpost for post-Katrina do-gooders from all over America who came here to volunteer with Common Ground Relief, a controversial grass roots organization that sprouted up in the aftermath of Katrina in '05. When I spotted this guy at St. Mary's he looked a little like Samuel L. Jackson. But on this day he looked a little more sinister. The Tony Montana t-shirt didn't help. A few minutes after I snapped this shot, a New Orleans squad car came barreling up and a pair of cops jumped out, cuffed our guy and drove off with him watching his Huffy mountain bike fade off in the distance from the backseat of the NOPD cruiser, another accused crackhead to clog up the system. Somewhere in my digital archives I've got footage of the arrest going down. If you know my man's name let me know so I don't have to refer to him as "Katrina Scarface" anymore. I suppose I could call him Sam Jackson of NOLA. Hope he's off the crack pipe.