News & Commentary

Renata Singleton was the victim in a criminal case and served five days in jail. That’s right, the victim. And Orleans Parish District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro is to blame.

The ACLU of Louisiana today condemned statements by Caddo Parish Sheriff Steve Prator, in which he argued that “good” people are needed in jail to perform prison labor. Sheriff Prator stated that it is a “necessary evil” to keep the “good ones that we use every day to wash cars, to change the oil in our cars [and] cook in the kitchen.”

People awaiting trial before a Baton Rouge criminal court were coerced into paying hundreds of dollars to a company before they were released from jail – even after they had paid their bail, according to a lawsuit filed last night by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the ACLU of Louisiana.

NEW ORLEANS — The New Orleans City Council yesterday unanimously approved an ordinance that will eliminate bail for most nonviolent municipal offenses, becoming the first major city in the state to pass a meaningful bail reform plan. The fight for bail reform in New Orleans has been tirelessly led by the Orleans Parish Prison Reform Coalition (OPPRC), of which the ACLU of Louisiana is a founding member.

U.S. District Judge Lance Africk has approved a settlement to end litigation over the fate of the Orleans Justice Center, known as Orleans Parish Prison (OPP). Operational control of the jail facilities will be ceded to a “compliance director,” who will be appointed in a joint effort between Orleans Parish Sheriff Marlin Gusman, Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s office, the U.S. Justice Department, and the MacArthur Justice Center, which represents the inmates in the suit.