Prison Justice
Courtroom clerk staffers in New Orleans dig by landfill to seek out wrongly tossed courtroom information
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry speaks with reporters outdoors the U.S. Supreme Courtroom constructing in Washington, D.C., on March 18, 2024. (Picture by Francis Chung/Politico through the Related Press)
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry has ordered the Louisiana State Police to research why felony courtroom information have been tossed right into a landfill, forcing felony clerk of courtroom staffers to wade by the particles final week to recuperate them.
“This can be a disgusting abuse of energy and a slap within the face to crime victims,” Landry mentioned on X, previously often known as Twitter.
NOLA.com has protection.
Movies shared on-line present staff standing in particles whereas recovering mangled paperwork, the Related Press studies. Darren Lombard, clerk of the felony district courtroom, mentioned he labored with workers members to dig by the rubbish, however not all of the paperwork have been recovered.
“The final day we have been on the market, it stormed a bit, so we recovered nearly every part we might,” he instructed WWL-TV.
Lombard mentioned the Louisiana secretary of state’s workplace has a course of in place for lacking or destroyed paperwork that shall be used if a wanted doc can’t be discovered. The tossed paperwork have been from the Nineteen Fifties to the Seventies.
The tossed Orleans Parish paperwork included case appeals, docket books and proof logs in instances of homicide, rape and armed theft, based on NOLA.com. Felony information should be completely retained within the parish.
The paperwork have been being positioned inside trailers at a Division of Public Works upkeep yard as a result of the felony courtroom clerk’s workplace doesn’t have enough storage, mentioned Joe Menace, the New Orleans chief administrative officer, in an interview with NOLA.com. The paperwork have been discarded when public works staffers have been cleansing out the trailers from the Federal Emergency Administration Company.
The town has reached a lease to purchase settlement for a brand new web site to retailer all courtroom paperwork, Menace mentioned.
GETTING HANDS DIRTY:
These are movies of Orleans Parish Prison Clerk Darren Lombard’s workers
…digging by a landfill…
For courtroom information that metropolis staff wrongly dumped final week.@FOX8NOLA pic.twitter.com/WTvZI86U4c
— Chris Joseph (@ChrisJosephNews) August 5, 2025
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