Louisiana Voice

Judge John Reeves is for sale but don’t worry, he’s cheap.

Reeves is a judge in the 7^th JDC which encompasses the parishes of Concordia and Catahoula and for a paltry $100, he’ll supposedly sign any document you stick in his face without bothering to actually read it.

Well, at least that’s what he did in one case when he signed a court order that (1) had not even been filed and (2) had not been assigned to his division, a document which gave the generous donor control of the bulk of his late mother’s estate.

That little transaction ended up costing Reeves a 20-DAY SUSPENSION and $3,100 to foot the cost of the Louisiana Judicial Commission’s investigation.

Wait. What? A 20-day suspension when some poor slob unfortunate enough to try to sale an ounce of weed to an undercover cop could end up behind bars for life? That’s justice? No, that’s the very definition of injustice, tilting the playing field, letting them that’s got the gold make the rules.

Bottom line: Judge John Reeves is for sale—but he’s been marked down by K-Mart. He’s a Blue-Light Special, a bargain-basement judge. But damnit, a bribe by any other name is still a bribe (I think Shakespeare wrote that in Romeo and Juliet).

In any case, judging from the decision handed down by the Louisiana Supreme Court, punishment is meted out by the degree of crime. In other words, the severity of the punishment is solely dependent upon the severity of the crime—if you are someone of social standing and not unfortunate enough to be some unemployed father trying to pilfer food for the family ‘cause that’s another story, fella.

But there’s more to this little saga than has been widely reported. Reeves claims he read the document brought to him by said bagman while a witness, who works for another judge in the 7^th JDC, says, Uh-uh, he most certainly did not. He thumbed right to the final page and affixed his signature to the order without reading its contents, the witness attested in a sworn affidavit.

Reeves also claimed he told the donor he would contribute the C-note to his church, but never seemed to get around to doing so. So, now we have him using the church as a crutch to justify a payoff. Justice for sale. Nice.

“I have an unbelievable record, and this is not like me,” he told commission members at his hearing, insisting that his pocketing the money was out of character for him.

Yeah, well there’s this:

• Reeves in 2024 allegedly authorized court commissions for two court staff members as sheriff’s deputies so they could carry concealed weapons in the courthouse only to have the badges rescinded when a defense lawyer sought to recuse Reeves, alleging an appearance of bias toward law enforcement.
• In 2021 when he ordered a deputy to pick up a child caught in a heated custody dispute and deliver the boy to his terminally ill grandfather who attended high school and played football with Reeves. He ordered four hours of visitation on his own motion, only telling attorneys after the fact (hey, easier to ask forgiveness than permission, right?). Reeves recused himself from that case when the boy’s mother complained.
• Reeves was also charged with issuing an illegal verbal order over the phone in, again in 2024, for a law enforcement search of a home.
• Finally, he’s accused of signing arrest and search warrants for a “longtime personal friend” and his property before stepping off the case.

He declined comment through an assistant, according to the Baton Rouge Advocate, because, he said, judicial canons prohibited it.

So now he invokes judicial canons. Good to know he still has something of a passing familiarity with those canons. Too bad he hasn’t been exactly a paragon of virtue when it comes to their application.

But sadly, misfits in the judiciary are all too common and most of us are blithely unaware of the damage they’re doing to our system of justice.

Fuggetabout blowhard Diaper Don Trump’s UFC cage match on the White House South Lawn on June 14. That’s just an ego-driven promotion to celebrate President Inepstein’s 80^th birthday and at best, its only child’s play.

If you want real, honest-to-God bare-knuckled, down-and-dirty, take-no-prisoners fights, one need only take a quick run over to St. Tammany Parish for the grudge match between Sheriff Randy Smith and critic Bobby Couvillon.

Now there is an event worth watching.

And best of all, you get a steak dinner for the price of admission.

Smith, who has been unable to find the killer of NANETTE KRENTEL for nine years now, was somehow able to spot nemesis Couvillon from across across the floor at Keith Young’s Steakhouse in Madisonville last Friday and sprang into action as only a cage match fan like el Trump-o could appreciate.

Couvillon was seated at the bar with his wife as they celebrated his 59^th birthday when Smith ran up and grabbed him from behind, placing him in a CHOKEHOLD and pulling him backward off the barstool (they said it was a chokehold; it could’ve been a half-nelson for all we know).

FanDuel immediately began taking bets on the outcome, giving 3-2 odds Couvillon would recover and prevail over Smith who was apparently pretty well into his cups.

A little background is appropriate.

You see, Smith and Couvillon aren’t exactly the best of friends. Couvillion has been one of the high sheriff’s most vocal critics (if you consider a computer keyboard as “vocal”) and Smith had had just about enough.

Here is part of Smith’s official post-smackdown—and post-arrest—STATEMENT:

“[An] unfortunate aspect of public service is the effect such public scrutiny and criticism can have on one’s family. This too, is accepted and endured by the family…to an extent.

For the past ten years I have ignored hundreds of personal attacks directed at me by an individual who hides behind a computer screen. His actions were direct and intentional. As Sheriff, I have ignored the attacks, threats and lies directed at me. As a husband and father, the continued and worsening public harassment of my wife, the false statements against her and the body shaming of her are not only despicable, but unacceptable. Seeing the frustration and pain caused to your wife and family is something much harder to ignore.

Well, body-shaming of one’s wife ain’t exactly kosher by just about anyone’s definition of fair play.

But perhaps Smith should’ve waited a bit before making his play. After all, he had a pretty impressive bar tab, especially since this all went down about 4:30 on a Friday afternoon when he probably should’ve been out a-sheriffing. Check it out.

$346 is one helluva bar tab. Wonder if he’s a generous tipper?

All of which begs three more questions for the sheriff of St. Tammany Parish:

• Was he driving?
• If so, was he in his patrol vehicle?
• Who paid for the hootch, i.e., did it go on his office expense tab?

Asking for a friend.

By Jamie Surura, special correspondent

The St. Tammany Parish Council voted Thursday night to reappoint Pearl River attorney Charles Branton to the parish Library Board of Control (LBOC).  Branton has served as Chair of the LBOC during the past year, his first on the body.

A second candidate for the vacant position, Col. Jason M. Trew of Covington, was also nominated for the position. 

During the lengthy public comment period, two distinct factions offered observations, accolades and, often, sharp criticisms of Branton.  The group commonly referred to as the Library Accountability Project were in full force praising Branton’s leadership of the LBOC.  The Project was founded by ministers and church followers who tried to defeat the library millage renewal two years ago.  When that failed, they mounted a campaign of replacing LBOC members. 

To be clear, what they wanted was to pull books from the shelves and sequester those books containing sexual content.  Speakers such as Devin McGee, Madisonville, said Branton was able to “rein in a circus of antics.”  He called regular attendees of the LBOC local political activists.  He likened the comments made by the public at regular LBOC meetings when Branton often dismissed them, gaveling down dissent as “temper tantrums.”

Speaker after speaker supporting Branton came from the Republican Parish Executive Committee, and religious right-wing citizens such as the Slidell Ministers Alliance.  

Under Branton’s guidance hundreds of books have been placed on rolling carts behind the desks at local libraries because of perceived sexual content.  Sometimes that content involved art works.  Sometimes it was within a story and mentioned on one or two pages of the book in question.  The anti-library insisted these were part of a eft wing conspiracy to indoctrinate young children into the LGBTQIA “lifestyle.”

One right-wing Christian commenter during the Council meeting Thursday night, Fran Smith, of Slidell, claimed the LBOC is protecting the children of St. Tammany.  She said she had a “brother that read books that were obscene and had pornography in them.  My brother was a pedophile.”  She claimed to be a victim of her brother.

Long time library supporter Kevin Marino, Mandeville, said that the community looks to the Parish Council to continue to hold “the public institutions to a high standard of integrity, fairness and transparency that all St. Tammany citizens deserve.”  Marino noted that the Council had been inundated with emails and calls asking for the Council to make a needed change.

“Mr. Branton has run the library board very one sided,” he said.  “He’s unequally enforced the meeting rules.”  Marino gave examples of Branton allowing some attendees at the LBOC meetings to speak longer than the allotted time while cutting off others quickly.  “He’s offered up policy changes that have needed to be pulled…likely because they have legally questionable sounding and don’t work well.”

Former Covington Mayor Keith Villere spoke in favor of the nomination of Col. Jason Trew.  Villere spoke of Trew’s character and said that Col. Trew’s interest in serving on the LBOC was based on a “desire to make St. Tammany a better place.”

Villere elaborated on Col. Trew’s military service and his dedication to his church and family.  Trew is a retired Colonel and has a PhD.  Villere ended his comments by saying he’s known Jason Trew for a long time and knows him to be a consensus builder and someone who he fully supports for the LBOC.  “I urge you to vote of Jason Trew.  And I just want you to know, I’ve known Charles Branton for a long time, too.”

Following more than an hour of public comments, the Parish Council, as expected, voted 9-4 to place Charles Branton back on the LBOC.  This time for a term of five years.

By Paul Spillman, guest columnist

The Senate has begun hearings on the Protect College Sports Act, their version of legislation designed to address the wild, wild west show that is college athletics. The bill is co-sponsored by Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA). Even though hearings have just begun there is already tremendous pressure on lawmakers to pass the bill as it is seen as the last best chance to reform college sports given the complete collapse of the SCORE Act in the House.

The Protect College Sports Act differs from the SCORE Act in several meaningful ways. Where the SCORE Act would have granted the NCAA broad antitrust exemptions to make and enforce rules, the Protect College Sports Act grants only a limited antitrust exemption to enforce rules covered by this legislation only.

The legislation still permits students, athletes, and institutions to sue the NCAA for injunctive relief which critics claim will do nothing to limit the current morass of litigation. But it also permits universities, conferences, and associations to recoup attorney fees and legal expenses from student athletes who lose in court, which will limit litigation as the prospect of owing tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal costs will have a chilling effect on student athletes’ willingness to sue. With this provision only the most egregious of violations will be challenged.

The Senate bill defines a period of college eligibility as beginning upon high school graduation or the athlete’s 19^th birthday, but list several exceptions and allows for the NCAA to determine others. The bill also allows for one transfer without penalty, but imposes a loss of one year of eligibility for any additional transfer. Should the legislation become law both these provisions could be challenged in court.

There is language mandating equal conditions and facilities for men’s and women’s sports. There is also protections for women’s sports and Olympic sports conditional on pooling media rights. More on that in a bit.

Notably the bill does not cap name, image, and likeness compensation nor make any reference to how coaches are paid or prevent entities such as the Tiger Athletic Foundation from playing its proper role. But it does adopt the “Lane Kiffin” rule preventing member institutions from hiring a coach while the season is on-going and penalizing any coach who accepts such an offer.

Interestingly the NCAA just released it’s schedule for the 2026 football season. The championship game is scheduled for January 25, 2027. Under the Protect College Sports Act no school would be able to hire a football coach until after that date. But in 2026 the transfer portal opened on January 2 and closed on January 15, and spring semester classes began at LSU on January 12.

If this rule had been in effect in 2026 LSU would have found themselves beginning a new season (transfer portal open and closed, students enrolled) without a head coach. Even if there had been an illegal, backroom agreement had Ole Miss miraculously made the championship game or even won it all Kiffin might have changed his mind. Leaving LSU where? This provision, if included, is also likely to be challenged in court.

But all that is Title I. What has everyone stirred up is Title II, Sports Broadcasting. This section of the legislation amends the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 for application to the college game and permits the “voluntary” pooling of media rights if 75% of the membership votes for it. If that should happen language in the legislation requires establishing a fund smaller and less profitable schools could tap to provide required benefits such as medical coverage and to help fund women’s and Olympic sports. The NCAA divides Division I into the Bowl subdivision (FBS) and the Championship subdivision (FCS).

As an example of how the NCAA seemingly desires to be woefully outdated both subdivisions have had a championship playoff since 1998 but continue to use outdated labels. Currently there are 138 schools in the FBS. The sixteen SEC schools, the eighteen Big Ten schools, and Notre Dame can form a voting block of 25.4% of teams in the Bowl subdivision and prevent the “voluntary” pooling of media rights. But adding two more teams to the Bowl subdivision would keep those schools from forming a voting block equal to or greater than 25% of membership and thus permit the pooling of media rights.

Over the last five years eight schools have moved up from the Championship subdivision to the Bowl subdivision. With the pooling of media rights creating a fund less profitable schools can tap the incentive to add two more schools to the FBS will be tremendous. Proponents argue pooling media rights will increase the total dollars, which may be true, but not for the SEC, the Big Ten, and Notre Dame who will all see some of their media dollars doled out to less profitable schools. The SEC and Big Ten have released a joint statement adamantly opposing the Protect College Sports Act.

Congress is under some pressure to pass this legislation. With the collapse of the SCORE Act in the House and no other legislation in the works this bill is seen as the last chance to rein in college sports since the NCAA refuses to take any steps on its own to do so, except to wait for Congress to write it a “get out of jail free” card. But no legislation is going to adequately address all issues to everyone’s satisfaction. That’s the flaw of Congress compromising on law. Worse though is that Congress becomes the rule making body for college sports. One would be hard pressed to name a more cumbersome, slow, fractious, and clueless rule-making body than Congress.

In this writer’s humble opinion the best solution is for schools that want to live in the 21^st century to break away from the relic that is the NCAA and form a new organization willing and capable of addressing the modern world. Initially this would have its greatest impact on the post-season, with only a limited number of schools involved. But a new organization headlined by the SEC, the Big Ten, and Notre Dame is where the money would be and most other schools would soon follow allowing a new organization to eventually stage post season championships similar to what the NCAA has today. Otherwise The Law of Unintended Consequences will have a field day with college athletics.

Last July, LIVINGSTON PARISH LIBRARY BOARD OF CONTROL President Jonathan Davis, installed on the board as a puppet of Citizens for a New Louisiana Chairman Michael Lunsford, declared, “A DEGREE IS A DEGREE” (he’s the dude with the beard. Turns out he doesn’t know much about conducting a public meeting. More on that later) in justifying his position that a special Master’s degree was not needed to qualify for the position of parish library director.

That was right after he’d led the charge to fire the incumbent director against whom no complaints had been lodged except by Davis’s small group of self-appointed overseers of public decency and censorship (I used lower-case letters because the title, while appropriate, is still unofficial).

Davis obviously had his own candidate in mind and let that slip by suggesting that the new director could be “especially former principals that have managed schools and know exactly how to do a job very, very similar to this.”

It turned out, of course, it was all done illegally because one member (she’s the one on the far right) left prior to the board’s voting not to renew incumbent director Michelle Parrish, leaving the board without a quorum. Attorney General Liz Murrill subsequently sued the board for conducting an illegal meeting at which official action was taken.

Well, now it seems this particularly confused and dysfunctional board is almost a year into its rumbling, bumbling, stumbling mismanagement of the business of appointing a new library director and there is still no decision on that touchy little matter.

In fact, just today, I received in my email inbox a posting of available jobs at the Livingston Parish Library. There was only one job opening. Want to guess what it was?

Yup, the good ol’ Livingston Parish Library Board of Control, those fabulous five who probably know about as much about the true needs of a public library as I know about cross-stitching is soliciting applications for a …(wait for it)…library director.

The position begins in the early fall of this year and applicants, the announcement says, “are subject to public interview processes.”

That last time they tried that—you know, that meeting that was deemed to be illegal—an acquaintance did apply and he got a response the very next day politely rejecting his application. Did I mention it was the next day? That, my friends, was one helluva fast interview process.

But get this. Among the required qualifications are:

• A Master’s degree in Library Science. (Uh oh, I guess a Master’s degree is necessary, after all.).
• Four years of progressively responsible experience in professional library work.
• Certification by the Louisiana Board of Library Examiners—to be achieved within the first year of hire.

Here is the library board’s solicitation in full:

Davis, with egg all over his face, looks rather inept, uninformed and unqualified in retrospect—much like the other four members.

Folks, if it seems I’m being a tad harsh it’s because it’s time parish councils get the hint that we don’t want them or uninvited outsiders like Michael Lunsford sticking their noses into operations they know nothing about and that is precisely what is occurring here and around the state with the hysteria over literary content of classics like To Kill a Mockingbird, The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men and 1984. I ask in all earnestness: what is happening to us?

These people constitute a minority in our communities. A couple of years back, Livingston school librarian Amanda Jones stood up to these do-gooders and paid a price she should never have had to pay.

She was brutally (and I do mean brutally in the truest sense of the word) attacked and libeled by online trolls. One of those went a little too far and she sued him, winning a judgment and a public apology.

But that’s what happens when narrow-minded people allow their imaginations and fantasies to run amok and allow themselves to believe any propaganda they are spoon-fed.

Our libraries are for the public and that right must not be revoked in the interest of any person’s puritanical idea of propriety and decency. If you allow that to creep into our standards, we will quickly find that we will no longer have standards, but a set of arbitrary rules instead, enforced by those few who appoint themselves as police, prosecutor, judge and jury. And once they taste that power, we must ask ourselves, what they will demand next—because there will be a next. And a next and another next…