Louisiana Voice

Periodically, I have written accounts of abuses at private prisons operated by LaSalle Corrections in Louisiana, Texas and Georgia.

LaSalle is headquartered in my home town of Ruston and has grown from the initial juvenile facility in north Louisiana to operating the most active immigrant deportation center in the nation through the company’s connections with two Repugnantcan governors (Jindal and Landry).

LaSalle is not alone, of course, nor is it the biggest detainee center working for the Department of Homeland Security. Those distinctions belong to CoreCivic and GEO Group. But unlike those, which are publicly-traded entities, LaSalle is a tightly-held family-operated enterprise headed by Billy McConnell, a graduate of Louisiana Tech University and a civil leader in Ruston who was the recent commencement speaker at his alma mater.

But the most comprehensive story yet to be published about LaSalle was published by the online news service Hunterbrook, which is not only a media outlet but an investment firm as well. What makes Hunterbrook unique is that it (a) partners with law firms to litigate on its findings and (b) places bets on the outcome of its investigations. Those are rather unusual sources of income streams, to say the very least.

But what Hunterbrook has done is to take a deep dive into LaSalle and its tangled labyrinth of corporate entities. The resulting story tells more about the company than has ever been revealed before.

Be forewarned: set aside plenty of time to digest what follows. It’s lengthy and it’s more than a little complicated. But if you ever wanted a true picture of a man and a company who make their money by placing people in cages, read on:

LaSalle Corrections: The Accountability Shell Game