Louisiana Voice

We’ve known all along that he was a desperate despot. Even those delusional souls who held fast to their belief that despite against all odds and 62 court decisions that went against him had to know that former guy was not going to be “reinstated” to the presidency.

Except for the Qanon devotees, of course. They still believe a furniture company is selling babies to a pizza parlor in Washington, D.C. so they can start forest fires in peach tree dishes with Jewish lasers.

They had to know deep down that when his own appointed judges and other Repugnantcan jurists continued to throw his cases out of court on five dozen occasions that the election was not going to be overturned.

Yet, it wasn’t until yesterday during testimony before the House select committee investigating the January 6 riot that we learned to just what nadir of desperation Pvt. Bonespurs had descended as he cast about for someone to serve as front man in his quixotic bid to remain at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

It seems that Don of Orange wanted Jeff Landry as his special counsel to investigate election fraud.

Now that’s really grasping at straws.

That little bombshell was dropped during testimony by former UA Attorney General Steven Engel.

Ouch. The Lone DeRanger, the walking tanning bed warning label, the Great Orange Hairball of Fear, actually desired the services – the investigative services yet – of one Jeff Landry, the man who couldn’t even investigate a jailhouse rape in Union Parish. A man who was reduced to hiring a political crony as some kind of “special investigator” even though he possessed no qualifications for the position. A man who hired a woman convicted of felony fraud to head up the AG’s fraud section.

Okay, okay, I admit it, I have a case of TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) I’ve never denied that the man left me more than a little deranged and totally perplexed that anyone could support such a narcissistic, dishonest person when there are legitimately honest persons who are willing to put the interests of the nation above their own selfish considerations.

And lest anyone get the wrong impression, let me be clear: I have no tolerance for anyone who would use public service to advance personal advantages or enrichment, be they of either political stripe.

But Der Groepenfuehrer, aka the Tangerine Orangutan, holds a special place in the annals of duplicity and grifting.

Still, if ever there was a perfect match for the Fraud of Fifth Avenue, it would be Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry, a man who has managed to carry on the great tradition of Louisiana’s unique brand of political chicanery. Rather than list all his transgressions again, I would suggest you read my post of July 14, 2021 by clicking HERE.

Engel testified yesterday that Forrest Trump was “vocal” about the need to appoint a special counsel to investigate election fraud and that former US Attorney General William Barr (Trumpty Dumpty had quite a number of AGs in those final days) sought his (Engel’s) advice.

“The request was whether the attorney general could appoint as a special counsel a state attorney general to conduct an investigation,” Engel testified.

Though Engel never mentioned Landry by name, he did note that “state law, the state was Louisiana, that the state law precluded the Louisiana attorney general from accepting any official position on behalf of the United States government.”

It’s not like Landry didn’t try to help the White Pride Piper. NBC News obtained a copy of a recording that went out as a robocall from the Rule of Law Defense Fund (RLDF), the fundraising arm of the Repugnantcan Attorneys General Association (RAGA) that said in part, “At 1 p.m., we will march to the Capitol building and call on Congress to stop the steal.” (Just for the record, the date of that planned “march to the Capitol” was Jan. 6, 2021.)

Landry was the RAGA chairman for 2020, and on Nov. 10, he announced that the organization was filing an amicus brief endorsing a challenge to a Pennsylvania State Supreme Court ruling allowing up to three days post-election for the counting of absentee ballots.

Also, Landry was listed as a co-director of RLDF, according to 2018 tax documents filed by the organization.

To read details of that RLDF effort on behalf of Tiny Hands Twitter Spitter, click HERE.

Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry has ARRESTED nursing home owner Bob Dean on 15 felony counts of cruelty to persons with infirmities, Medicaid fraud and obstruction of justice.

The arrest is ostensibly for the evacuation of more than 800 residents from seven of his nursing homes in the wake of Hurricane Ida nearly a year ago to a warehouse in the Tangipahoa Parish town of Independence. That warehouse proved woefully inadequate to care for the elderly and frail patients, more than a dozen of whom died.

But the action by Landry, who is an officially unannounced but assumed Republican candidate for governor in the 2023 election, carries deep political overtones. The sheriff of Tangipahoa Parish is Daniel Edwards and the Independence police chief is Frank Edwards. Both men are brothers to Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards who has often been at political odds with Landry. The patriarch of the Edwards family, Frank Edwards, for whom the Independence police chief is named, was also sheriff of the parish.

The timing of Dean’s arrest and the certain legal maneuvers to come just as the political season heats up in Louisiana could prove to be a political embarrassment for the Edwards clan.

In early September 2021, only days after Hurricane Ida struck, 843 residents were removed from the warehouse, which had no air conditioning, no electricity, no oxygen concentrators, and no means by which to prepare food for the residents.

Seven deaths were immediately attributed to the ordeal and several subsequent deaths followed but both Sheriff Daniel Edwards and Police Chief Frank Edwards issued STATEMENTS that they did not intend to investigate the deaths, according to Landry.

In a statement to CNN, Sheriff Edwards said the case was “not connected to the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office. It is under the purview of the Independence Police Department under Chief Frank Edwards.” But Police Chief Edwards told the network that his department was too small and lacked sufficient resources to investigate. Additionally, he said his office had been overwhelmed with recovery efforts following Ida.

The Louisiana Department of Hospitals (LDH) came under fire from LEGISLATORS who appeared a little to eager to shift the blame on LDH in their scramble to find a scapegoat for the debacle. And while the governor’s office was not directly involved, it all happened on Gov. Edwards’s watch and Landry obviously was chomping at the bit to embarrass his nemesis, or at least his brothers and by association, the governor himself, as the state moves into another election cycle.

It’s not like Daniel Edwards needed this for his department.

His office and that of the Hammond Police Department were RAIDED by the FBI in 2016 in connection with a federal investigation of a drug task force that saw deputy Johnny Domingue PLEAD GUILTY to three drug conspiracy charges and a single count of abuse of office. RELEASED in March 2019 after being given credit for 34 months he spent in jail awaiting trial, he found himself BACK IN JAIL three years later after his arrest for attempting to smuggle 8 kilos of cocaine into Houston in what was actually a sting operation.

A second deputy, Karl Newman, was sentenced to 42 months in prison in the same case which also took down a prominent DEA agent, Chad Scott.

And only last week, the Tangipahoa Sheriff’s Office came under fire again in a botched rape investigation that eventually saw a state judge award CUSTODY of the child from the encounter to the alleged rapist and the mother, the victim, ordered to pay child support.

It’s shaping up to be an interesting campaign already and nobody has even announced for a single office yet.

Surely, Landry would take the high road and choose not to make all this an issue in the campaign.

So, Doug Cain is leaving with his head held high.

That’s nice to know.

Lt. Col. Cain, the second in command at Louisiana State Police (LSP) is retiring after 25 years of “rewarding law enforcement service,” according to the Baton Rouge Advocate.

I suppose it’s rewarding that he was part of the attempted cover-up of the beating death of Ronald Greene in May 2019. He will deny any culpability in that tragic event, but there is this lingering question over why his cellphone was swiped just as the investigation into Greene’s death at the hands of rogue state troopers was heating up.

His phone and those of former LSP Superintendent Kevin Reeves, former LSP Chief of Staff Mike Noel and former LSP legal counsel Faye Morrison were all SANITIZED about the time litigation was being filed over Greene’s death, thus destroying potential evidence in that civil matter as well as a possible criminal investigation.

Any representative of any law enforcement agency, including a local constable’s office, but especially an assumed “professional” department such as state police would know the importance of preserving evidence and the legal implications of destruction of same.

That would especially appear to apply to the residing in-house legal counsel and to the man who harbored the desire to become LSP superintendent – only to retire abruptly after 25 years in the wake of ongoing investigations into the coverup of police brutality and PHONE ERASURES.

That doesn’t present a good look, no matter how high he’s holding his head on the way out the door. It could be that he’s doing so to keep from drowning in a flood of investigations. Some might even conclude that the phone swiping could be considered as obstruction of justice.

Reeves took a powder as soon as he felt the heat but even in retirement, continues to pack, as evidenced by his recent appearance at the June meeting of the State Police Commission – even though there were several well-armed state troopers in attendance.

Kevin Reeves packs heat in ankle holster

We can all take some comfort in the knowledge that there are those within the department who have – and who continue to do so – put forth honest efforts to do the right thing in the Greene matter. The downside of their attempts to shed light on wrongdoings is that they have either resigned or retired in disgust or been suspended by panicky LSP hierarchy.

Make a request for public records and LSP will either send you a stack of redacted pages – and I mean complete pages completely blacked out – or inform you that because no disciplinary action was taken, the records are not public. Either way, you get nothing. Your best hope is that someone on the inside will leak the documents you need, as was the case with LouisianaVoice‘s recent STORY on State Police Academy cheating.

But Capt. Mark Richards, one of those who has since retired in despair over what he’s seen LSP become, is one of those who resisted efforts to keep the Greene incident report secret. Told to block release of the report, he replied via email that he had never encountered such a request from superiors. He subsequently told state legislators that he felt LSP brass wanted release of the report blocked so as to prevent media from obtaining potentially embarrassing material.

It’s not like LouisianaVoice and other media outlets didn’t try to shed some light on State Police years ago.

Want to hear about some good ol’ down home Christian values? Ken Paxton seems to have a direct line to God and he’s willing to tell us all about the Almighty’s great plan for humanity.

Paxton’s the Texas attorney general.

Never mind the inconvenient fact he was indicted seven years ago on FELONY SECURITY FRAUD CHARGES. He stands accused of failing to disclose he was being compensated for pushing investors to purchase stock in a technology firm.

Never mind the fact that the FBI in 2020 opened a SECOND CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION into claims that Paxton abused his office to benefit a wealthy campaign donor. It seems that one of his top deputies ratted him out when he helped the donor, a troubled real estate developer who hired a woman with whom the married – and coincidentally, evangelical conservative – Paxton had had an extramarital affair.

Wow! Those evangelicals sure know how to party down.

And never mind the fact that Paxton was cleared of bribery allegations by his OWN OFFICE (well, what other outcome would you expect?).

Never mind the fact that Paxton filed that QUIXOTIC LAWSUIT Quixotic lawsuit challenging the 2020 president election that was dead on arrival.

And never mind that just last month the Texas state bar filed a PROFESSIONAL MISCONDUCT LAWSUIT against Paxton for his attempt to overturn that election.

None of that matters because, you see, Paxton, that evangelical conservative, has that direct line to God and apparently God told him the slaughter of those 19 kids and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24 was just okay.

Now those aren’t my words, mind you. They’re Paxton’s – or maybe God’s as uttered through his messenger Ken Paxton.

Honest to Paxton, that’s the latest word out of Texas. The attorney general, who is up for reelection this year, says the butchery was part of God’s plan – just like in the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy in the Old Testament.

Today’s Christanity: Trumbo cutout, Christian cell phone service booth

And all this time we thought it was a deranged nut who just happened to have a brand-spanking new AR-15 in his hands when he went off the rails. All this time we were blaming the easy access to assault weapons, the encouragement of same by gun nuts in general, and the lack of action by our NRA-bought-and-paid-for elected officials.

But no, it’s all part of God’s plan, Paxton says now. At least that’s what he said the day following the mass executions when asked by North Texas Baptist minister Trey Graham what he (Paxton) would say to the victims’ families.

“I’d have to say, look, there’s always a plan. I believe God always has a plan,” he replied. “Life is short no matter what it is.”

That’s it? “Live is short”? Seriously?

Perhaps the attorney general thought he was commiserating with a sympathetic listener, given the recent revelations about Southern Baptists and issues of abuse within the church.

But I gotta say if it was truly part of God’s plan to murder 19 innocent children and two of their teachers (which would certainly be consistent with the events of the aforementioned books of the Holy Bible), then I can’t really see a damned thing I need to seek forgiveness for in my life, as imperfect, shameful and at times, disgusting, as it most assuredly has been. Rather, I might struggle mightily with finding forgiveness in my heart for God for being such a demented, twisted, sick jerk

Now, having said that, I am fully cognizant of the fact that Paxton is privy to no such communication from the Creator. He is, in fact, a mere mortal, subject to the same frailties as the most infirm of us, his pious, asinine observations notwithstanding.

But most of all, he has revealed himself to be not at all Christian – evangelical or otherwise – but instead, just another opportunistic Repugnantcan hypocrite who feels (so very incorrectly) that he has license to judge others and to assure us that he has peered into God’s heart and now tells us that Yahweh had programmed the carnage at Uvalde all along as part of some grand master plan for mankind.

Excuse me, I think I just stepped in a pile of fresh dog Paxton.

Once more Louisiana is a laughingstock to the world and there’s plenty of blame to go around.

Among those sharing the blame – and the shame – are the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office, led by the governor’s brother, the 21^st Judicial District Attorney’s Office, headed up by Scott Perrilloux, and 21^st JDC Judge Jeffery Cashe.

Together, they have managed to send a message to the rest of the world, as noted by a Tangi resident:

Women have no rights in Louisiana. None. Zilch. Nada. Zero. Nil. Fuggedaboutit.

And the message has been picked up by the national media as well as the Daily Mail in the United Kingdom. Oh boy, what the Brits must think of Louisiana now.

You see, Judge Cashe somehow saw fit to award custody to a man who is accused of raping and impregnating a girl when she was only 16 and he was 30. To add insult to injury, Cashe ordered the mother, Crysta Abelseth to pay child support for the child, a daughter, now 16.

Abelseth says she met JOHN BARNES at a bar in 2005. A 16-year-old in a bar is bad enough, even by Louisiana’s lax standards, but she says Barnes offered to take her home but instead, took her to his home where he raped her on his living room sofa, a sexual assault that resulted in her pregnancy.

Barnes learned he was a father when the girl was five years old, Abelseth claims, and he began pursuing custody. When DNA tests confirmed the parentage, he was granted 50 percent custody in 2015.

When she learned that had the option to do so, Abelseth filed rape charges against Barnes. Even if the sex had been consensual, which she denies, no one under the age of 17 may legally consent to sexual intercourse under Louisiana law.

She said she had been under the impression that he was required to file charges immediately. She learned after meeting with a trauma counselor that she had 30 years after turning 18 in which to file charges.

She reported the rape to the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office in 2015, the same year Barnes was granted 50 percent custody. Daniel Edwards, brother of Gov. John Bel Edwards, is the parish sheriff. Abelseth says she was told by sheriff’s detectives that her complaint would be followed up on, but it never was.

Edwards now admits that his department FUMBLED THE INVESTIGATION badly. “You would certainly have, at a minimum, a carnal knowledge situation that that should have been realized by the deputy who took the report and it should have been assigned an actual detective at that time,” Edwards told a local cable channel.

No kidding, Sheriff? You think?

“I gave them phone numbers and everything they asked me for,” she said. “No one has contacted me. I’ve made multiple phone calls to the detectives. I’ve sent emails asking for the status of the case. No response. It was never assigned to any detective and nothing was ever investigated.”

Then she revealed the silver bullet that Barnes apparently possessed: close ties with the local justice system.

A check of secretary of state corporate records showed Barnes as the only officer of a company called Gumbeaux Digital Branding, LLC, an internet web construction company and State Ethics Board records revealed that his only foray into politics was through Gumbeaux when he made a $1500 contribution to the campaign of Ernest G. Drake, III, who ran for a 21st JDC judgeship in 2019 but was defeated by Brian Abels.

But one of his clients is said to be the Ponchatoula Police Department.

Oops. Crap! We can’t be investigating our pals in Louisiana. It just doesn’t work that way.

Meanwhile, Judge Cashe ordered Abelseth not to give her daughter a cell phone, which would seem to infringe on the First Amendment rights – except, as I was once told decades ago, juveniles in Louisiana have no rights.

Abelseth, in defiance of the judge’s order, gave her daughter a cell phone, Barnes claimed when he filed for full custody – a claim she denies – and Judge Cashe, in a snit over having his wisdom questioned, granted custody and ordered Abelseth to pay child support – to her alleged rapist.

Enter Perrilloux, who says his office is going to REVIEW the case.

That’s nice, Mr. DA. But where you been these past seven years? Oh, he says his office never received anything on the case. Well, I guess that absolves you of any responsibility.

Because of the age of the daughter, court records in the matter are under seal.

So, there you have it. A DA apparently in the dark about events in his district, a sheriff’s office too damned lazy to investigate the rape of a juvenile by an adult with apparent political connections, and a judge too dense ensure that he didn’t violate any judicial canons by not doing his due diligence in checking for any felony offense that might influence the outcome of the case.

What else would you expect in a place like Tangipahoa Parish in a state like Louisiana?