WBRZ - Baton Rouge

NEW ORLEANS - A federal judge has postponed a sentencing hearing for a former New Orleans police lieutenant who pleaded guilty to helping cover up the deadly shootings of unarmed residents on a bridge after Hurricane Katrina.

U.S. District Judge Ivan Lemelle agreed this week to delay Michael Lohman's sentencing until Sep. 14.

Lohman was scheduled to be sentenced Wednesday, less than a week after a jury convicted five other current or former officers of civil rights violations in the fatal shootings of two people and wounding of four others on the Danziger Bridge less than a week after the 2005 storm.

Lohman, a government witness during the trial, said he helped orchestrate a cover-up that included a planted gun, fabricated witnesses and falsified reports.