Louisiana Voice

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(Editor’s note: Rip Picard is not the writer’s real name, for obvious reasons. His column below gives a rare peek into the way Louisiana’s prison system operates.)

Allen’s Finest…

By Rip Picard

January 2003 I was transported to Allen Correctional Center in Kinder, Louisiana. I’d been sentenced not two years before on a robbery charge which stemmed primarily from youthful rebelliousness and a naivete which soon was made clear after being arrested. At that age, I was under the impression that the badder I was, the cooler I was. I was ultimately sentenced – as a first offender – to fifteen years with the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections. Of those fifteen years, I would end up serving just over 12 years in accordance with Louisiana sentencing and good time laws.

Anytime – as most often is the case – you start a lengthy sentence in any of the various “satellite” camps (local facilities which house DOC offenders) in Louisiana, you find yourself satiating your boredom by digesting the grapevine of what’s available at State operated facilities. Educational opportunities range from Literacy classes to vocational school and even college. Various State facilities even boast other trades such as sign language certification and seminary. Beyond education, there are offender nonprofit organizations such as the Junior Chamber of Commerce, Toastmasters of America, VETS, and several facility-bred nonprofits which offenders can pursue the opportunity to learn how to plan and carry out community service activities to further sharpen their citizenship skills for their return to society. Should you find yourself with a little extra time here and there, State facilities have recreation yards, weight piles, gymnasium, sports leagues, arts and crafts, and countless self-help classes – many of which can afford you more good time off your release date for completion of same. All in all, there is a glaring opportunity for any offender to truly refine and redefine themselves into a productive individual with a true sense of self-worth. Couple that with the handful of organizations and government initiatives aimed at achieving employment for recently released offenders, and there is the real opportunity for the criminal justice initiatives of rehabilitation, education, and reentry to become a reality.

All in all, I was housed at Allen Correctional Center from January 2003 until January 2010, at which time I transferred to Rayburn Correctional Center in Angie, Louisiana. While at Allen, I completed a vocational trade, was a peer trainer/tutor in several classes/self-help programs, as well as an elected board member of a nonprofit organization. Such endeavors, however, come with the added cost of having to figuratively fight for the ability to participate. Starting with the mandate – at least at the time – that you serve a minimum of 90 days in the field line prior to obtaining a job change. This could be seen as a reasonable election to see what type of workers individuals are, but what’s left in the grey area is that many offenders are given disciplinary reports by security guards who simply make up a reason to issue an infraction – and sometimes this is done with the specific intent to keep the offender from obtaining a job change. My field job when arriving at Allen consisted of digging to the tap root of pine trees and chopping them down and cutting them into sections with an axe which was welded to a quarter inch thick hollow steel pipe which weighed anywhere from 20-25 pounds each. Likewise, for those working the shovels, pitchforks, hoes, etc., all were welded to the same type of piping for the appropriate length for the tool. They didn’t want to pay for replacement wooden handles.

For those who received infractions for no reason at all, they were brought before a kangaroo court disciplinary board where the offender disciplinary counsel already knew what the disciplinary board planned to do and told the offender either plead guilty and receive sentence “A” or fight it and maybe they’ll send you to the cell block. Considering the disciplinary procedures are a manifestation of the Louisiana legislature to provide a semblance of Due Process within the prison system, the actual procedures adhered to would make any actually just barrister roll eternally in their grave. There were only two members of the disciplinary board, a chairman and member. During my time there, Assistant Warden Mark Estes, Major Lasonya Thomas, and Captain Selton Manuel were the dominant presence on the disciplinary board. In short, Estes was gifted an Assistant Warden position at about the age of 25 from the “Good Old Boy Club” in Allen Parish, Thomas was a time bomb who would break security radios on the side of offenders’ heads because she felt like it (and was even kicked out of a GEO prison in Texas because of these antics) without any legal repercussions whatsoever, and Manuel was always seeking an angle to send someone to the cell block whether they deserved it. None of the three ever had anything to do with anything which could be perceived as rehabilitation. In fact, I was once told that they expected offenders to remember their place by acting up and being offenders, they didn’t care about all “that other stuff”.

Allen Correction Center, for the entire time I was there, was a compost pile of staff which was poorly – if at all – trained and an administration that was the poster child for the way Louisiana government really works. Once, there was an offender who was brutally beaten by a captain and several members of the field line staff. While he was handcuffed. Little did they know the individual’s family member worked for the FBI. Next thing you know the captain and those field line staff were escorted off the compound by the FBI. Needless to say, many (if not all) of those staff members went on to work in other prisons. Another time an offender was stabbed to death and kicked by another offender who acquired the steak knife from the lunch box of a female staff member with whom he was in a relationship. The offender only received an eight-year sentence for murdering that man. So, was his life less valuable than someone who isn’t in prison? If “Karen” or “Kevin” were stabbed to death and kicked while dying, that would come with at least a life sentence. Manslaughter at the low end.

These are just a few examples of what really goes on in prisons in Louisiana. There are a great many staff members, particularly those involved in programs, counseling, and reentry services who truly care and do their best to make a difference. It’s a bittersweet victory for them, however, because they often find themselves targeted by administration and staff as well because they can’t fathom the idea of offenders becoming better. As assistant warden was quoted as saying during a staff training session, “If an inmate is talking, he’s lying.” Although I can’t speak to the circumstances which pushed the bad apples to the deranged mentality they acquired, I can say that the Stanford Prison Experiment by Philip Zimbardo hit the nail on the head. I can remember – while at Allen – reading “The Lucifer Effect”, written by Zimbardo, and feeling like they must be talking about Allen Correctional.

At some point, Louisiana’s constituents need to be able to bridge the gap between what they believe about Louisiana’s government and what reality is. There are times I feel there are a great many people who know better and just don’t care because they don’t want to concern themselves with the mess which is government. And I get it, life is hard enough by itself without trying to champion a cause which may or may not be affecting an individual. But then I think about the old Greek offender I was housed with for a time, who was in Greece when it was occupied by the Nazis. He was actually going to be shipped to a concentration camp and, but to his good fortune, the UN took back Greece. I asked him one day if there were any particular prison in Louisiana wherein the guards reminded him of the Nazis, to which he replied, “Yeah, St. Tammany Parish Jail.” I’ll close with one of my favorite poems I look to when seeking a little inspiration:

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me

– Pastor Martin Niemöller

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Why the urgency to can Dr. Brian Salvatore at LSUS?

I mean after all, he’s not the only faculty member at the school who is outspoken on political matters. Associate political science professor Jeffrey Sadow has been far more vocal in defending all things Republican and attacking all things Democrat on the Hayride blog for years now, which apparently gives him free rein to pontificate – in contrast to Salvatore, who has made the school’s administration a tad uncomfortable with his criticism of toxic chemical disposal and open meetings violations.

Now, why would LSU find it intolerable for Salvatore to discuss toxic pollution of the air, land and water? I mean, aren’t we all concerned about that?

Well, when you’re a major university that receives mega-funding grants from corporate interests that are directly involved in the business of the toxic poisoning of the air, land and waterways of this state, or of malfeasance, then you become a bit sensitive to such criticism, any criticism actually.

This heavy-handed method of dealing with free speech goes all the way back to the firings of Drs. Fred Cerise and Roxanne Townsend for the sin of SPEAKING OUT against proposed policy.

Jeff Landry, when he was still attorney general, attempted to get Bob Mann FIRED from his professorship at LSU after Mann was critical of the way Landry had dispatched a “flunkie” from his office to the LSU Faculty Senate meeting to read a letter attacking covid vaccines.

Then, we have the story about the LSU School of Dentistry’s sacking of Dr. John Kent, the firing of STEPHEN HATFIELD who was erroneously implicated in the mailings of anthrax envelopes in 2001 – and Hatfield’s boss, Stephen Guillot, director of the National Center for Biomedical Research and Training and the Academy for Counter-Terrorist Education.

And most of us remember the firing of Ivor van Heerden for his CRITICISM of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over the levees that failed during Hurricane Katrina, causing extensive flooding of New Orleans. Well, van Heerden sued LSU and prevailed in a multi-million-dollar settlement.

Actually, the Hatfield and van Heerden episodes pre-date the Cerise and Townsend kerfuffles.

So, why was LSU so uber-sensitive to criticism on the part of its professors – or in Hatfield’s case, so eager to rid itself of a possible suspect in a terror attack before the first shred of evidence was present, and indeed, never was?

Because LSU receives millions upon millions of dollars in grants from the Corps of Engineers, federal law enforcement and the medical community. The last thing it wanted – far more than say, protecting the rights of its employees – was to jeopardize the continued money flow from cash cows. So much for justice and fairness being top priorities.

Having said that, let’s now take a deep dive into the LSUS administration that so desperately wants to destroy Salvatore, who has fought the proposed outdoor burning of toxic CHEMICAL WASTE at facilities in MINDEN and Colfax and in the process, accused of LSUS of possibly contributing to the problem with its own chemical wastes.

So, what about the guy who is behind the effort to show Salvatore the door?

That would be Chancellor Robert Smith who hand-picked the ad-hoc committee which heard Salvatore’s case and who has now taken the committee’s termination recommendation up the chain to LSU system President William Tate who will almost certainly uphold the committee and Smith for fear of antagonizing dictator Gov. Landry.

Having said that, let’s take a look at Smith’s curriculum vitae.

Smith recently joined LSUS after leaving his position as Provost at Valdosta State University last July. While at Valdosta State, his claims to fame were hiring a dean of science and mathematics without receiving the consent of the faculty.

That dean, Keith Walters, was arrested as a SEXUAL PREDATOR who was accused of soliciting sex online from 13-year-old children. After Walters was arrested, Smith appointed a new dean who subsequently “violated the academic freedom of VSU biology professor LESLIE JONES who was teaching her students peer reviewed science about the biological basis of gender, ‘woke s**t’ in the words of the PARENT of a student who called the university to complain,” according to an article in The Spectator.

Professor Jones subsequently sought legal assistance from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).

Smith, at LSUS, hired a human resources director who, for the past eight years, has maintained a Facebook profile cover photo of his fraternity that included a simulated lynching. Did I mention that he’s the HR director at a public state university?

Smith, of course, didn’t see the photo as racist, but simply “poor taste,” according to the post below that was supposed to be “confidential.” Smith added that he attended church with the HR director, Robert Lindsey and that Lindsey was also “close friends with Chief of Staff Kim Ramsey.”

Well, then, that certainly clears up that little lynching photo issue.

So, it appears that controversy is no stranger to Smith – just as pandering to corporate interests at the expense of faculty members is no stranger to LSU.

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Jeff Landry’s long-term strategy is becoming more and more apparent with each passing day of the 2024 legislative session.

By ramming through grooming courses for Louisiana public school students, mandating the posting of a single version of the Ten Commandments in each school classroom, stacking the State Ethics Board, gutting necessary social programs while committing untold millions to private school funding, and other similar legislation, it’s become obvious that he wants a gaggle of lawsuits filed against his administration. I mean, he’s begging for ’em; that must be his game plan.

It doesn’t matter to him if he loses; he’s void of any real political philosophy other than to stick his finger in the air to see which way the wind is blowing.

But by setting up a series of lawsuits, he has guaranteed members of the bar, attorneys in good standing, that the state money machine will keep pumping out financial payback for all the lawyers who contributed to his campaigns. Those barristers will be retained through the attorney general’s office (which he conveniently controls through his proxy, Liz Murrill) to defend his programs. It’s simple, really: an attorney contributes $5,000 or $10,000 – or more – to his campaign and receives cases from the state that may well enrich his office by as much as $100,000, or more – of taxpayer money. It’s a dandy return on investment.

It’s the circle of life in Louisiana politics.

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The Republican party has its collective drawers in a wad over those predator Democrats and their grooming of children. If you don’t believe it, all you have to do is google “Republicans, grooming” to see for yourself. They’re beside themselves: Marjorie Green Taylor and Matt Gaetz, side-by-side (and that, friends, is the best illustration of Republicans being “beside” themselves). I mean, who better to speak against pedophilia than those two?

But I digress. News broke (perhaps “news oozed” would be more accurate) late Wednesday that PragerU had been ACCEPTED to show “edu-tainment” videos to Louisiana public school children.

Talk about grooming! Are you kidding me?

To view one of the “edu-tainment” videos offered by PragerU, go  HERE.(You’ll need to click on the speaker icon in the top left corner to hear the garbage this spokesperson spews out as if it were gospel. The name of this particular clip is “The Inconvenient Truth About the Democratic party.” The lady, in all apparent sincerity, ties today’s Democratic party to the Democratic party of the mid-19^th Century and paints the Republicans (of that same era) as the good guys who wanted only what was best for America’s slaves. That, of course, is accurate – again, for that time period. But she neglects to point out that the roles have reversed dramatically in the last 160 years – especially since the Republicans adopted the so-called “SOUTHERN STRATEGY,” which dates back to passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and the Lewis Powell MEMORANDUM to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce five years later.

But don’t stop there. On the right side of that video clip is a menu of other “edu-tainment” video clips that offer a decidedly politically-biased take on American history. That, folks, is what real grooming looks like and it’s got nothing to do with drag queens.

The headline in the Baton Rouge Advocate said it all: “Louisiana will let public schools show right-wing group’s ‘edu-tainment’ videos, sparking outcry.”

Outcry my butt. This decision by Superintendent of Education Cade Brumley (and I’m certain, endorsed by Gov. Jeff Landry) makes Louisiana the sixth state to link up with PragerU, which, despite the clever name, is not a university at all, but a content provider.

But PragerU boasted in its own news release that its deal with Louisiana is “more expansive” than in other states because the Louisiana Department of Education has approved an “extensive list” of PragerU videos for social studies. The link provider earlier provides a sampling of those social studies videos which are nothing but propaganda tools with which Republicans may “groom” impressionable children.

Here are two sentences from the Advocate story today: “Founded in 2009 by conservative radio host Dennis Prager, the nonprofit produces slick online videos that the group says have been viewed billions of times and are hosted by conservative media figures, including Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens. Geared for young adults, its videos frequently attack liberal causes, including gender-affirming care for transgender youth, climate change, the Democratic party and teachers’ unions.”

Again, quoting from The Advocate story, here’s what PragerU’s 2023 annua report said: “PragerU Kids is serving families, schools, and young Americans through edu-taining, pro-American content and undoing the damage of leftist teachers’ unions.”

Other states that have accepted PragerU programs on history, civics, financial literacy, the Bible and other topics for public school children are Florida (the first to do so), Oklahoma, Montana, New Hampshire and Arizona. It should come as no surprise that the other five states have adopted propagandized programs from this outfit. The only outlier would appear at first blush to be New Hampshire until we realize that Republican Trump supporter Chris Sununu is governor there. And while Arizona’s governor is a Democrat, the rest of the state is of a deep red hue.

Now, the question must be asked: just who is really doing the grooming here?

Folks, that’s real cojones when you can claim with a straight face that your opposition is grooming kids even as you’re infusing pure political propaganda into public classrooms.

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