Louisiana Voice

If it’s an adverse court judgment, it must be Iberia Parish.

Right.

And if it’s Iberia Parish, it must be the office of Sheriff Louis Ackal.

Right again.

Ackal, who has already been hit with enough judgments to paper the entire Iberia Parish Courthouse, has just been tagged again.

Ackal’s office alone is responsible for judgments averaging more than $25,000 per month for every month of his 10 years in office. The total has now zoomed past $3 million, surpassing much larger parishes like Orleans, Jefferson, Caddo, and East Baton Rouge.

The latest judgment, signed by 16th Judicial District Court Judge Lori Landry on September 21, awarded $122,500 to Brian Riley who was bounced around his jail cell like a ping pong ball in a whirlwind and doused with an entire can of pepper spray—all while handcuffed and conveniently out of sight of jailhouse surveillance cameras.

The judgment stems from an incident on Feb. 24, 2015, when Riley was being fingerprinted by a female deputy, Lt. Rachita Rhine, who accused him of touching her in an inappropriate manner and proceeded to scream expletives at Riley. That attracted the attention of Deputy Camisha Jackson. whose response was described in the judgment as “very deliberate.” She retrieved a can of pepper spray and proceeded to a holding cell where Riley had been secured, alone and handcuffed. Jackson promptly emptied the entire can of pepper spray in Riley’s face.

No sooner than that task was completed then Lt. Rhine’s assistant warden husband, Capt. Jackie Rhine who did his impersonation of Muhammad Ali on Riley’s face in what the judgment described as an “unsolicited and senseless beating. Capt. Rhine, in administering the beating of Riley, ignored the advice of bystanders to let other officers handle the prisoner. As officers were removing Riley from the holding cell, Rhine took the opportunity to strike the prisoner in the face in what the judgment called a “sucker punch.”

Rhine said the last punch was in response to a comment from Riley, though he was unable to say at trial what the comment was. Moreover, a witness to the entire sequence of events, Sgt. Joshua Chipman, denied ever hearing Riley make a comment.

“It is noteworthy,” Judge Landry said, “that the last incident occurred outside the holding cell but in an area that was not covered by cameras and none of the abuse inside the cell was captured on tape because the view was obscured” by deputies (again, conveniently) positioned “so as to shield the activity occurring in the cell.

Initial allegations by Jackson and Capt. Rhine of a combative prisoner “were never supported by the internal investigation or their later admissions,” the judge said, adding that video of the fingerprinting of Riley “could not support the allegation of an improper or intentional touching…”

Since Ackal took office in 2008, more than 30 lawsuits have been filed against his office in federal state courts. At least five inmates have died in the custody of the Iberia Parish Sheriff’s Office under his watch.

Ackal’s predecessor, Sit Hebert, a retired state trooper, was instrumental in disbanding the New Iberia Police Department, only recently reinstated after crime got completely out of control under Ackal, a retired state trooper.

One announced candidate for the 2019 election, Tommy Romero, is a retired state trooper whose daughter is an assistant district attorney for the 16th JDC. It is also rumored that another current state trooper, Murphy Meyers, who is expected to retire, may qualify to run.

Perhaps the time has come for voters in Iberia Parish to consider a candidate other than a retired state trooper for sheriff.

It’s not like troopers retire on a pauper’s pension, so it can’t—or shouldn’t be—that they actually need the additional salary, which for sheriffs in Louisiana averages more than $150,000 in annual salary and something approaching $200,000 after other perks are factored in.