…And we thought that Attorney General Jeff Landry was a horn-tooting self-promoter, who loved to tout his prosecutorial “accomplishments” while conveniently ignoring more blatant wrongdoing.
Turns out Landry should be watching State Inspector General Stephen B. Street and taking notes on how to fool all the people all the time—or at least make a pretty decent effort at doing so.
Street has just released his 29-page 2017 ANNUAL REPORT and network television must already be poring over it as the possible basis for a weekly series on crime fighting. Or maybe a sitcom. Either way, with all the tax breaks for movie and television production being given away by the state, the show is certain to be profitable while making Street a star in the process.
Eleven photographs are included in the annual report and Street’s smiling face is included in every single one. Here’s what one observer said of the photos: “…only one other staff member, an investigator, gets in one. Boy he must have done something really special to merit being the single staff member to be picked to be in a picture with the boss in the annual report. I am sure this did wonders for office morale.
“Street couldn’t even see the way clear to have a group picture of the whole staff in what only can be considered his annual report? I guess he couldn’t get the, as described very limited, 14 staff members in the same room to have one taken (probably has a shortage of meeting space also).”
Street, who undoubtedly wears a large red “S” on his chest, chronicles how his office beat back efforts by legislators in 2012 and 2016 to shut his office down for ineffectiveness—although his office, like most other agencies, has endured appropriations cutbacks.
Of those efforts to shut him down, Street, somewhat smugly philosophizes: “The 2016 OIG funding fight in Louisiana was simply the latest reminder of what comes with the territory in the Inspector General business. If you do the job aggressively – and we have — folks will come after you. It’s absolutely guaranteed. It was also a great reminder that the public is overwhelmingly supportive of Inspectors General, and we should never forget this.”
So, let’s review just how he has done his job “aggressively” to see who it prompted to “come after” him.
Street’s office, in response to a November 2016 public records request from LouisianaVoice, provided a list of FUNDS RECOVERED totaling more than $5.3 million since July 1, 2013, for which he claimed credit. No one on that list who might “come after” street—just low-hanging fruit. Easy pickings don’t often “go after” anyone.
Of course, the recovery of funds is quite different from orders of restitution, which was what each of these cases was. An order of restitution means little if there are no funds to be recovered.
“We have no information regarding amounts collected by those office and we receive none of the funds,” said OIG General Counsel Joseph Lotwick in a letter to LouisianaVoice.
In the case of Deborah Loper, for example, most of the million dollars ordered repaid had long since disappeared into slot machines at area casinos so any real chance of restitution is, for all intents and purposes, non-existent. Still, Street listed that as a recovery of funds.
The LouisianaVoice request was made pursuant to Street’s claim for an accounting of public funds recovery stemming from OIG investigations.
Moreover, what Street’s office did not say, the difficulty of actually collecting notwithstanding, is that the OIG’s role in many of the above investigations was secondary to the U.S. Attorney’s role and restitution payments, if any, are made through either U.S. Probation or, in the case of the state’s being the lead prosecutor, to Louisiana Probation and Parole.
Nor did Street happen to mention the investigations by his office that either blew up in his face or simply did not occur. Even though most, if not all, actually occurred prior to 2017, they’re still worth mentioning:
- The Murphy Painter fiasco, orchestrated by Bobby Jindal and Steve Waguespack, which resulted in the federal criminal trial of Painter who was cleared of all charges and the state had to pony up his legal fees of $474,000;
- The illegal raid on the home and offices of Corey DelaHoussaye under the mistaken assumption (Street’s an attorney: attorneys should never “assume”) that DelaHoussaye was contracted to the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness (GOHSEP) when in fact, he was contracted to the Livingston Parish Council where he had no jurisdiction (embarrassing). DelaHoussaye was subsequently exonerated of all charges.
- Likewise, it was Street’s office that investigated and found no wrongdoing in the case of two assistant district attorneys in CADDO PARISHwho applied for a grant to obtain eight automatic M-16 rifles from the Department of Defense’s Law Enforcement Support Office (LESO). The two claimed on their application that they, as part of a Special Investigations Section (SIS), “routinely participate in high-risk surveillance and arrests (sic) activities with the Shreveport Police and Caddo Sheriff.” Persons interviewed from both agencies, however, refuted the claim that SIS employees took part in such operations.
- Street also failed to follow through on an investigation into widespread abuses by the Louisiana State Board of Dentistry. The board, with the aid of its investigator who employed questionable methods, was imposing excessively high fines against dentists for relative minor infractions and even bankrupted one dentist who blew the whistle on faulty jaw implants developed by a dentist at the LSU School of Dentistry.
- Retired State Trooper Leon “Bucky” Millet said he filed a formal complaint on February 19 with Street’s office against the four State Troopers who drove the state vehicle to San Diego last October but never received an acknowledgement from Street. “I know he received because I sent the complaint by certified return receipt mail,” Millet said. Of course, it turned out that what Street’s office could not or would not do, the Baton Rouge Advocate’s Jim Mustian, New Orleans TV investigative reporter Lee Zurik and LouisianaVoice did—and we know the outcome of that.
- Street said there was nothing to investigate when a gravity drainage district in Calcasieu Parish refused to pay contractor Billy Broussard a million dollars for work he did in dredging canals after hurricanes in 2005 and 2006. Broussard performed the work he was asked to do and the district refused to pay him, yet Street said there was nothing to investigate.
- And he’s done nothing toward investigating possible human trafficking in the baby adoption racket in Louisiana, despite the persistent efforts of Craig Mills to get both Street and Landry involved in the investigation.
Of course, in listing the successful prosecutions (again, low-hanging fruit—people who are a lock not to “go after” him), Street is careful to see to it that his office is cited in all 10 reports—even if he had to insert the recognition himself, which he does in eight of the cases. Five of the reports were actually press releases from the U.S. Attorney’s office but Street piggy-backed them in his annual report.
But perhaps the best indicator of the effectiveness of Street’s office turns up in the report on 2017 travel expenses for his office.
That report shows that the office spent only $57.13 for in-state travel to conferences and just $509.11 on instate field travel (investigations).
But the office spent $2,564.46 on out-of-state travel to conventions and conferences.
Of 376 complaints received in 2017, OIG opened 60 investigations. The 2016 numbers showed 42 investigations opened on 401 complaints.
Hilarious! Too bad it is also reality. A friend sent me the following comment about the report yesterday:
“I have never seen a more self serving document in my life. Me, Me, Me and more Me.”
Too bad Robert Burns doesn’t comment here anymore – he would really like this one. I’ll never forget the video of Street putting his head close to Burns’ video camera at an odd angle and with a big sneer saying something that ended with “…Mr. Buuuuuurns.”
If you remember in that video I had respectfully ask Mr. Street if he had jurisdiction to investigate GOHSEP’s Contractors/Administrator. As I stated “… is there one case that you can name that you investigated that led to a prosecution.”
And the purpose for me asking him to name me a case, is I wanted to get a hold of that case to use it as some sort of case law. To date I can only assume there is not one.
And another thing, it was GOHSEP’s Contractor/Administrators that were running the Indian Bayou Project “ordering and directing the work.”
Now GOHSEP is saying that all the additional work that was ordered is not eligible to date but potential eligible if FEMA will approve. But consider that these Administrators that were contracted by GOHSEP were payed for doing that same additional work.
It is just this kind of waste of taxpayer money that gives the Republicans in the Legislature a basis to parrot John Kennedy’s now infamous statement that Louisiana has a Spending problem, not a Revenue problem. The end result is that necessary funds to maintain critical services such as Education and Health Care are not generated.
Speaking of “LOW HANGING FRUIT” pointing our ineptitude in government, particularly Louisiana guvment, is so easy it is ridiculous and probably fattening. Seriously, I applaud your effort and ability to connect the dots. However, it only serves to highlight my inability to change anything. This cancer is so embedded as to be accepted by the masses.
At first I thought Landry was the most inept, reality ignoring cur of the entire Baton Rouge crew. Street gives him a run for his money.
Has the Dental Board been cleaned up? If so how did it come about?
The private investigator who was stalking dentists across the state and the board’s attorney who served as accuser, prosecutor and judge no longer have contracts with the Dental Board and the board’s offices have been moved to Baton Rouge where they should have been all along. So, to that extent, it has been “cleaned up.”
The OIG, if not the biggest, one of the biggest teats on the bull’s ass of State Government. Legislators: this Office needs to disappear.
Good article Tom. OIG is a duplication of investigative services already provided by Mr. Purpera at LLA. Which I might add, that LLA at least is not scared to do their job like Stephen Street is scared. We are all lucky Street didn’t get the nod for U.S. Attorney!