NEW ORLEANS — The city of New Orleans says it has the bust of John McDonogh back after it was toppled by protesters, thrown in the Mississippi River and retrieved by a group of unknown men last weekend.
Beau Tidwell, a spokesman for the city, said Friday the statue had been returned, and was being kept in a secure but unspecified location.
It is unclear if the city will try to put the bust back on its defaced pedestal in Duncan Plaza.
On June 13, demonstrators used rope and other tools to bring down the statue of McDonough. Video from the removal shows people cheering when it fell.
The New Orleans Police Department said the statue was then dragged into the street and loaded into a truck. The truck, which police said was driven by Caleb Wassell and Michaela Davis, took the statue to the riverfront where protesters dumped it into the river.
Wassell and Davis were arrested and later released under their own recognizance.
Sunday, a separate group of men were seen on a Facebook Live video retrieving the statue from the shallows of the river and driving it away in another truck.
Those men have not been identified.
McDonogh was a slave owner who put forward a system where slaves could buy their own freedom over a period of 15 years. He was memorialized as a statue in Duncan Plaza because he left his fortune to the cities of Baltimore and New Orleans, to build public schools, when he died.
The statue's toppling and subsequent relocations are some of the latest events in a national debate about the future of statues and other landmarks that honor racists and confederate leaders.
In New Orleans, there is a push by the city council and activists to rename streets such as Jefferson Davis Parkway.
More Stories:
► Get breaking news from your neighborhood delivered directly to you by downloading the new FREE WWL-TV News app now in the IOS App Store or Google Play.
