Louisiana Voice

Read daily news stories in the New Orleans Advocate, and you’d be hard-pressed to come up with another city with the record of violence as New Orleans where carjackings have surged to the number-one contact sport.

Same for the Baton Rouge Advocate, where drive-by shootings are as common as gumbo at the Chimes Restaurant.

But, according to 24/7 Wall Street, that publications that produces surveys and rankings on just about any subject you can imagine, neither New Orleans nor Baton Rouge are even among the top 50 cities in the nation in terms of aggravated assault or violent crimes.

In fact, the city with the highest rate of violent crimes out of 1,122 cities surveyed (2,969.1 per 100,000 population) in 2020 is Monroe, which also just happens to be the number one city in the one-year change in the rate of aggravated assault (an increase of 1,271.7 percent).

Monroe’s rate of aggravated assaults (2,582.8 per 100,000 population) is the highest of 1,123 cities surveyed and the one-year change in all violent crime (an increase of 1,203.5 percent from 2019 to 2020) is also highest of 1,119 cities included in the survey.

All that for a city of 48,241 people.

And lest Alexandria feels smug, Louisiana’s hub city ranks 22^nd in the nation in the change in its aggravated assault rate (an increase of 158.7 percent) and seventh-highest in both the rate of aggravated assault cases (1,459.1 per 100,000 population) and in the rate of all violent crimes (1,848.4 per 100,000).

The 278.6 percent increase in all violent crimes was 12^th highest of 1,119 cities included in the survey.

Alexandria’s population of 47,012 is comparable to that of Monroe.

Granted, statistics can be influenced to a much greater extent in smaller cities like Monroe and Alexandria because any change at all has greater impact on the numbers.

But Shreveport, a city of 192,035, has a population comparable to Baton Rouge’s 227,470 and Shreveport’s change in aggravated assault cases from 2019 to 2020 showed an increase of 158.7 percent, which was 50^th highest in the nation.

Shreveport’s 1,284 aggravated assault cases in 2020 was 59^th highest and the rate of aggravated assaults per 100,000 population (691.9) was 68^th highest of 1,123 cities surveyed. The city also was 68^th highest in the one-year increase in all violent crime (143.5 percent). Shreveport’s violent crime rate (923 per 100,000) was 74^th highest of 1,122 cities surveyed.

The figures for the survey were taken from the FBI’s 2019 and 2020 Uniform Crime Reports. In order to concentrate the survey on urban areas, cities with fewer than 25,000 people were excluded.

The majority of cities on the list are from South.

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I know I joke about begging for money like some shameless televangelist or some cheap, failed certain businessman/politician/real estate investor/grifter/female molester/adulterer/owner of bankrupted casinos, universities, internet service, airline, steaks, but seriously, good, solid, investigative reporting is not cheap. There are bills to pay – phones, travel, legal expenses, and copies of documents.

Today’s post is an example what happens when the media don’t do their jobs. Honest, well-meaning people who want nothing more than to provide a safe, happy home for an innocent infant are taken advantage of by those who exploit the weaknesses in Louisiana’s nearly non-existent adoption laws.

Please do what you can to help the cause of journalism. You can contribute by credit card by clicking on the yellow DONATE button to the right of this post, or you can mail a check to: LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727. NOTE: Unlike contributions to a certain former president’s so-called “legal defense fund,” this is NOT a recurring contribution. But all who give $100 or more will get a signed copy of my new book, It’s All TheIRS, the fictional story of a man who takes on the IRS over a wrongful assessment and literally stops the US government in its tracks (It has to be fictional for him to take on the IRS and win).

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In a state where flower arrangers and hair braiders are more stringently-regulated than child adoptions, it’s somehow typical that a bill to hold expectant mothers who scam the system accountable barely squeaked by in committee and was passed in the House strictly along party lines.

Andrea B. Carroll, in her 2011 LSU Law School Journal ARTICLE, wrote, “More than 50 years ago, state law on domestic infant adoption changed to uniformly prohibit the practice of baby selling, a development that eliminated the ‘black market’ for babies that many argued previously existed.”

But did it? Carroll went on to contend that the system “is broken even today,” with the cost structure of the domestic adoption scheme being the “greatest offender,” costing around $40,000.

That was 11 years ago. The cost is undoubtedly even more today and adoption fraud thrives within this dark enterprise that comes perilously close to human trafficking, if not actually doing so. And the bulk of those costs are borne by the prospective adoptive parents.

Which makes it all the more perplexing as to how there could be such a thin margin in the House Administration of Criminal Justice Committee on March 17 in the 7-6 passage of HB 568 and such a partisan vote in the full House, where it was approved by a 64-36 vote.

Even more surprising is that only a single Democrat, Rep. Francis Thompson of Delhi, voted in favor of the bill while only four Republicans – Stephanie Hilferty of Metairie, Barry Ivey of Baton Rouge, Danny McCormick of Oil City, and Joseph Stagni of Kenner – voted no.

In committee, those voting against passage included Marcus Bryant (D-New Iberia), Denise Marcelle (D-Baton Rouge), Joseph Marini, III (I-Gretna), McCormick, Nicholas Muscarello (R-Hammond), and Richard Nelson (R-Mandeville). Both Muscarello and Nelson later voted in favor in the full House vote,

The bill, by Rep. Rick Edmonds (R-Baton Rouge), targets birth mothers who intentionally lie in an effort to collect living expenses and other benefits from more than one set of adoptive parents.

That is what happened to CRAIG AND SHEILA MILLS of Baton Rouge in 2013 and it’s what led to the introduction of HB 568 and two companion bills (HB 252 and HB 297) by Edmonds.

The Millses in 2013 adopted “Baby M” from Carol Lee Griffin and Thomas Franklin Carlson after retaining an attorney who specialized in adoptions and New Orleans attorney/social worker Lisa Harell to conduct the required home study of prospective adoptive parents. They also paid DeColores Adoptions International, a Lake Charles adoption agency.

A year later, Griffin was again pregnant and contacted the Millses about adopting M’s biological sibling. The Millses again began providing financial support to Griffin and Carlson.

support to Griffin and Carlson. That support included payment for housing, food, medical expenses, and phones.

In the meantime, Griffin and Carlson, unbeknownst to the Millses, had contacted a California adoption agency which referred them to DeColores for an adoption evaluation and counseling for adoption of the baby by a second Louisiana family.

That infant, Baby M’s biological sibling, was ultimately adopted ty the second family, leaving the Millses both disappointed and irate.

The same thing happened to Dyland and Kristin David of Baton Rouge a couple of years later when they began making payments to a pregnant woman who the Davids said led them to believe who would cooperate with them in an adoption plan but who, it turned out, “was also working with other families, soliciting funds for the same adoption plan.

In their case, they sued adoption attorney MICHAEL THERIOT whom they claim they made aware of the woman’s duplicity but nevertheless continued to send her money belonging to the Davids.

A warrant was issued in 2010 for Heather Hill after she had an abortion in Bossier Parish but subsequently contacted a Lake Charles adoption agency to put her “unborn child” up for adoption in March even though she was not pregnant.

A Denham Springs family began making payments to her for support, eventually paying her $6800 over 25 different occasions. The money was paid through the adoption agency. Hill called and texted the family on numerous occasions threatening to give the baby to another family if they did not send her more money.

Later, after supposedly giving birth at LSUHSC, she informed the family that she had changed her mind about giving up the child. That is the mother’s right, provided there is actually a child which, in this case, there was not. The adopting family, out of concern for the infant’s welfare, even gave Hill additional money even after learning she was “keeping” the child.

But the law says that when a mother changes her mind about adoption, she must repay the adopting family provided in anticipation of an adoption.

Even The Washington Post took note of the lax regulations on adoptions in Louisiana in 1998 when it published a lengthy story by writer Gabriel Escobar. Under existing laws at the time, Escobar wrote, a mother giving birth must be domiciled in Louisiana. But mothers who go through any of the state’s private adoption agencies are considered to be domiciled here, a gaping loophole that allowed baby brokers to import pregnant women into Louisiana.

Adoption attorneys James A. Shrybman of Takoma Park, Maryland, and Theriot made good use of that loophole to bring pregnant women from Russia to Louisiana. Theriot shrugged off the Post story as “old news,” saying that neither he nor Shrybman had broken any laws.

But private adoption agencies, Escobar wrote, were not required to work in the best interest of the child. A birth mother is represented by the adoption agency and not an attorney. Moreover, Louisiana laws against buying and selling babies excluded those private agencies.

Baton Rouge attorney Todd Gaudin said during a contradictory hearing last June 21 there were “no rules” sufficiently regulating the perpetuation of fraud by a birth mother. “Double-dipping is, essentially, that a couple is receiving money from one couple while they’re receiving money from another.”

So, does that 7-6 committee vote mean that six members are in favor of double-dipping and human trafficking? Does it mean that those 36 in the full House are?

Of course not. Marino, who voted against the bill, said he feared the bill would not prevent a birth mother from being arrested when she legitimately has a change of heart about adopting her baby out.

But Edmonds believes it’s long past time that adoptive parents are protected from the greed and scams of those would take advantage of well-meaning, sincere efforts to provide a loving home to an innocent child.

Babies are not pawns and bartering human beings is still illegal. It’s time to put some teeth into enforcement against unscrupulous practitioners in the baby selling racket.

This is the time of year when we need to remain on high alert: the Louisiana Legislature is in session and it has a sudden, unexpected influx of federal money. That’s a certain formula for disaster.

That’s also why it’s more important than ever that you support the efforts of LouisianaVoice.

Our semi-annual fundraiser is underway and will run through the month of April and I am asking for your continued support.

This is our first fundraising effort in a year, having waived the October effort in favor of encouraging you to support your local food bank.

I’m working on several important stories. They involve the baby adopting scam being run in Louisiana and apparently illegal jury selection methods in a north Louisiana judicial district.

And for the past seven and one-half years, I’ve been covering Louisiana State Police, an agency that seems to have no checks and balances and one that is seemingly out of control.

Your financial assistance will help us in pursuing records, paying travel expenses, and fighting legal battles where necessary.

To pay by credit card, please click on the yellow DONATE button to the right of this post or, if you wish to pay by mail, you may send a check to LouisianaVoice, P.O. Box 922, Denham Springs, Louisiana 70727.

Those contributing $100 or more, please including your mailing address so that I may send you a signed copy of my latest book, It’s All TheIRS. It’s a novel about a man who takes on the IRS after being wrongfully assessed a large penalty and literally brings the US government to a grinding halt.

As always, your help, no matter how large or small, is appreciated more than I could ever say.

When you have such far-flung facilities as LaSalle Corrections, you apparently need transportation to get from one place to another quickly.

Never mind a judge’s CITING LaSalle for its lack of training for its employees.

And never mind that same judge’s finding that LaSalle falsified documents in abuse cases.

Forget about the “pattern, practice, and custom of unconstitutional conduct toward inmates with serious medical need” or the practice of performing unauthorized HYSTERECTOMIES on Latino detainees.

LaSalle’s FAILURE to pay benefits to 122 contract employees at its Tullos facility? No problem.

LaSalle’s part in the GOUGING of detainees with exorbitant taxi fairs upon their release? Fake news, of course.

And LaSalle’s efforts to protect its investment, even to the point of DEPRIVING the ex-wife of one of the company’s principals of her stock in the company? Well, that’s a personal matter.

What really matters, when all is said and done, is this company, with an estimated worth of $300 million and growing, needs a way to get its officers to its 19 facilities scattered from Georgia to Arizona.

To that end, while employees go untrained, while benefits go unpaid, while training documentation is falsified, LaSalle has obtained a 14-year-old, eight-seat Cessna jet that formerly belonged to a politically-active northeast Louisiana company.

The age of an aircraft isn’t nearly as important as the hours it has flown and though no sales price was available, an online check of that year and model Cessna shows that it TYPICALLY SELLS for about $3 million.

The plane previously was owned by Kennedy Rice Dryers, Inc., of Mer Rouge, Louisiana in Morehouse Parish. Coincidentally, Kennedy Rice Dryers and its officers and LaSalle and its officers made generous campaign contributions to many of the same political candidates over the past two decades.

It’s certainly refreshing to know that:

• LaSalle-run prisons are thriving so that corporate execs found that they need a jet to get to their facilities (though it would be interesting to see just how often they actually visit any of their 19 facilities).
• LaSalle execs travel in comfort, style, and convenience while LaSalle refuses to comply with federal mandates for transportation of prisoners upon their release.