Louisiana

Louisiana House removes murder charge from abortion bill

Published

2 years ago

May 12, 2022

Louisiana House removes murder charge from abortion bill

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Louisiana ladies who’ve abortions won’t be topic to homicide or different felony expenses after legislators revamped an abortion invoice Thursday night time.

The controversial invoice would have ventured farther towards abortion than lawmakers’ efforts in another state. It will have made ladies who finish their pregnancies topic to felony murder prosecutions.

The invoice by Republican Rep. Danny McCormick unleashed rising opposition from conventional supporters of abortion rights and longtime foes of authorized abortion. McCormick abruptly ended debate on the invoice and returned it to the Home calendar after the modification handed 65-26. The invoice seems unlikely for passage except McCormick decides to try to revive it.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows beneath.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Louisiana’s Home of Representatives, venturing farther towards abortion than lawmakers in another state, is debating a invoice to make ladies who finish their pregnancies topic to felony murder prosecutions.

Republican Rep. Danny McCormick pushed for a Home flooring debate on his invoice Thursday afternoon regardless of a crescendo of opposition from conventional supporters of abortion rights and longtime foes of authorized abortion. Louisiana’s anti-abortion governor mentioned he’d veto it, and Louisiana Proper to Life and the Louisiana Convention of Catholic Bishops are towards it.

“To counsel {that a} lady can be jailed for an abortion is just absurd,” Gov. John Bel Edwards, a religious Catholic and a Democrat who has lengthy damaged along with his celebration on the abortion difficulty, mentioned in a information launch Wednesday.

“Our longstanding coverage is that abortion-vulnerable ladies shouldn’t be handled as criminals,” Louisiana Proper to Life mentioned in a press release.

The Catholic bishops mentioned they’re “unequivocally” against the invoice. And the Nationwide Proper to Life Committee on Thursday issued an “open letter to the nation’s state legislators” that did not point out the Louisiana invoice particularly, however mentioned “any measure searching for to criminalize or punish ladies will not be pro-life and we stand firmly against such efforts.”

McCormick disagrees, saying a lady who has an abortion must be in the identical authorized place as a lady who takes the life of a kid after start. “Once I give equal safety to the unborn, that is the likelihood,” he mentioned in a Wednesday night cellphone interview.

The Home had not but began debating the controversial abortion laws when the constructing was briefly evacuated Thursday after the speaker interrupted proceedings and mentioned an unknown, unclaimed bundle had been discovered within the capitol’s Memorial Corridor — the cavernous gathering space between the Home and the Senate Chambers.

It got here on a day when laws was already transferring slowly as lawmakers tried to discover a compromise on McCormick’s invoice. The Home recessed for greater than an hour whereas lawmakers broke into teams behind closed doorways to debate the laws.

Pending on the time was a brand new modification by Rep. Alan Seabaugh. The Shreveport Republican is an anti-abortion stalwart. However his modification would fully revamp McCormick’s invoice, eliminating the felony penalties for ladies, permitting abortion to save lots of the lifetime of a pregnant lady and okaying using contraceptives.

McCormick’s invoice has drawn intense scrutiny in gentle of final week’s leak of a draft of a U.S. Supreme Courtroom opinion indicating the excessive court docket is making ready to overturn selections upholding a constitutional proper to abortion.

There’s no indication but that lawmakers in different states are taking over comparable laws. In Idaho, Republican state Rep. Heather Scott has proposed prosecuting ladies who get abortions, however a committee chairman mentioned Friday he wouldn’t enable it. “There are nonetheless affordable individuals within the Legislature who’re going to make sure that excessive payments like that aren’t going to get a listening to,” Rep. Brent Crane mentioned.

“In my committee, I’m not going to listen to that invoice that places a lady on trial for homicide. For those who’ll take that portion of the invoice out, should you’ll put the physician on trial for homicide … then we are able to discuss having a listening to in your invoice,” Crane mentioned on Idaho Public Tv.

McCormick launched his invoice in March in an try to finish abortion no matter what any court docket does.

Along with rewriting murder statutes to incorporate abortion, it declares that any federal legislation, regulation or court docket ruling that permits abortion is void and that any choose who blocks enforcement of the invoice’s provisions could possibly be impeached.

Edwards known as the invoice “patently unconstitutional.”

He joined critics of the invoice saying it criminalizes some varieties of contraception and elements of the in vitro fertilization course of. McCormick on Thursday mentioned types of contraception that do not destroy a fertilized egg wouldn’t be affected. And he disputes that the invoice would newly criminalize some facets of in vitro fertilization, pointing to state legislation that already grants rights to an “in vitro fertilized human ovum.”

Anti-abortion laws normally passes simply in Louisiana’s Legislature however the emphatic opposition from some anti-abortion stalwarts may bolster makes an attempt to derail the measure or closely amend it.

Louisiana already has legal guidelines on the books criminalizing abortion, together with a “set off legislation” making certain that will probably be a criminal offense if the Supreme Courtroom reverses the Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 ruling establishing abortion rights. The statutes seem to exempt ladies from prosecution, though some abortion rights advocates have recommended they want tightening.

McCormick mentioned the present legal guidelines are insufficient to present fetuses equal safety underneath legislation. “It is a debate we have to have in Louisiana,” he mentioned. “There are good individuals on either side of the talk.”

___

Related Press author Holly Ramer contributed to this report from Harmony, New Hampshire.

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Louisiana

What a hyperactive hurricane season means for Louisiana’s oil and natural gas industry

Published

2 hours ago

May 27, 2024

Press Room

What a hyperactive hurricane season means for Louisiana’s oil and natural gas industry

(Courtesy NASA)

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Thursday issued its most aggressive Atlantic hurricane season forecast on record.

Due to near-record water temperatures and the development of La Niña conditions in the Pacific, NOAA predicts an 85% chance of an above-average season with between 17 and 25 total named storms. A typical year averages about 14 named storms.

A particularly intense Atlantic hurricane season would pose a significant threat to the U.S. oil and natural gas industry, as refineries along the Gulf Coast—many of which are located in Louisiana—account for nearly half of U.S. refining capacity. Those refineries risk flooding and power outages in the event of a major storm, and many operators will evacuate nonessential personnel and halt production if they believe severe weather might damage facilities or injure employees, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Refineries along the Louisiana Gulf Coast, including ExxonMobil’s Baton Rouge refinery, account for 3.3 million barrels per day of refining capacity. More than 1 million bpd of capacity could be taken offline in anticipation of a major storm, and refineries that sustain major damage or flooding may be taken offline for longer periods.

In severe cases, the EIA notes, damage may lead to a refinery permanently closing. Notably, Phillips 66’s Alliance refinery in Belle Chase closed in 2021 after sustaining major damage from Hurricane Ida.

Offshore crude oil and natural gas production units must contend with some of the most severe hazards associated with hurricanes and tropical storms, and they too will evacuate nonessential personnel and halt production if necessary. In 2023, Gulf of Mexico crude oil production accounted for 14% of U.S. crude oil production; Gulf of Mexico natural gas production, 2% of U.S. natural gas production.

According to the EIA, hurricanes could also disrupt supply chains for petroleum products, as fuel supplies are shipped on barges from Gulf Coast refineries such as those in Louisiana and Texas.

All this to say: An intense Atlantic hurricane season has the potential to significantly disrupt oil and natural gas production along the Gulf Coast, and that’s something that could send shockwaves throughout the entire U.S. oil and natural gas industry.

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Louisiana

Manhunt in Louisiana for 4 escapees, including 3 homicide suspects

Published

9 hours ago

May 27, 2024

Press Room

Manhunt in Louisiana for 4 escapees, including 3 homicide suspects

How common are prison escapes?

03:29

Authorities in Louisiana are searching for four inmates who escaped from the Tangipahoa Parish Jail, just north of New Orleans — and three of the four are homicide suspects, the parish sheriff’s office says.

Sheriff Daniel Edwards said in a statement that they got out through the jail’s perimeter fence during recreation time on the yard.

Later inspection showed that “a section of the fence was … vulnerable and easily maneuvered in such a way that a small statured body could slide through.”

The three homicide suspects were identified as Omarion Hookfin, 19, of Hammond, La.; Avery Guidry, also 19, of Natalbany, La.; and Travon Johnson, 21, also from Natalbany.

The fourth escapee was Jamarcus Cyprian, 20, of Amity, La., the office said.

Hookfin, Guidry and Johnson were behind bars for their alleged roles in a 2022 homicide in Hammond, and Cyprian was doing time on armed robbery and weapons charges, the office said, with more time tacked on for alleged aggravated battery while he was locked up in Catahoula Parish.

CBS New Orlans affiliate WWL-TV reports that the counts against Johnson, Hookfin and Guidry stemmed from a 2022 home invasion in Hammond that ended with a 33-year-old man dead and his 12-year-old daughter hospitalized.

Brian Dakss

Brian Dakss is a longtime New York-based editor and writer for CBS News, at the Radio network and with CBSNews.com. He has written and edited for NBC News, Dow Jones and numerous radio stations and been a radio anchor and reporter.

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Louisiana

Southeast Louisiana’s first heat advisory of 2024 issued for Memorial Day

Published

16 hours ago

May 27, 2024

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Southeast Louisiana’s first heat advisory of 2024 issued for Memorial Day

Southeast Louisiana’s first heat advisory of 2024 will go into effect on Memorial Day, when National Weather Service forecasters expect to see the kinds of high temperatures and humidity that often lead to heat-related illnesses.

The advisory will be effectual from noon to 8 p.m. on Monday and includes most of southeast Louisiana and parts of southern Mississippi. Forecasters expect to see daytime highs in the low to mid 90s in New Orleans, Baton Rouge and Lafayette, with heat index values, or “feels like” temperatures, nearing 108 degrees.

From the National Weather Service

Forecasters said residents should take extra precautions while outside in these conditions. Wear lightweight and loose fitting clothing, drink plenty of water, try to limit strenuous activities to early morning or evening and watch out for the signs of heat exhaustion and heat stroke.

There’s also a chance that severe thunderstorms could hit portions of southeast Louisiana Monday evening, particularly in areas north of Interstate 10. The storms could bring gusty winds of up to 60 mph and large hail, according to the National Weather Service.