Crime and the Outdoors

Noticed something the other day and I was curious what experiences others had. Growing up for I primarily spent my time outdoors in the surrounding area near Irish Bayou. If you are not familiar with it, this is a small fishing community outside of New Orleans East on the south side of the I-10 twin span and is located on Hwy 11. Along Hwy 11 between Powers Junction (near Textron) and Irish Bayou I used to come across some spooky stuff the unfortunate thing is that these things were so normal here you didn't really pay that much attention to it.

For example I remember paddling my pirogue through the middle of the Watson Williams canal (runs along Hwy 11 in the Bayou Sauvage refuge) and hitting something with my paddle while in 6-8 feet of water. When i looked down into the muddy water i could see the roof of a brand new full size SUV. (off the lot white with very shiny chrome) This was kind of scary, and to the day i still wonder what was inside....

Seeing cars burned to a crisp and left on side of the road was normal. Seeing them with bullet holes and burned was also not uncommon, while most of the holes were done by someone using it as target practice I can recall times the holes were on a car that was left the night before. I also remember growing up and hearing that they found a body in the Sauvage refuge several times over the years, thankfully I never had to deal with that. Also i can think of a bunch of times where someone tried to "sink" a vehicle in <4' of water, and I thought to myself what a bunch of idiots.

Looking back the levee, Hwy 11, and the turn arounds (exits to no where between Irish Bayou and New Orleans East) were prime dumping grounds for criminals. Just curious if anyone else experienced this where they go, or if you have any stories about this area. I imagine anyone who spends time in the outdoors around New Orleans has come across this type of thing especially if you venture off the beaten path.

What prompted this post was that I was browsing over the OT the and saw mention of something about the mob/New Orlenas and then a few days later I was watching a movie and the mobster said something about "I said to hide the body in the marsh, not hide the body were some old man goes fishing every weekend". Made me wonder if anyone else ran across the remnants of violent crime while in the outdoors.