Two state senators have filed a lawsuit against the Louisiana Board of Ethics seeking to temporarily halt the hiring process of the board’s most prominent employee.
Their court action comes weeks ahead of Republican Gov. Jeff Landry gaining more influence over the makeup of the board that investigates alleged violations of state campaign finance laws and ethical conflicts of public officials.
Senate President Pro Tempore Regina Barrow, D-Baton Rouge, and Sen. Stewart Cathey Jr., R-Monroe, have asked the 19th Judicial District Court in East Baton Rouge Parish to grant a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to keep the ethics board from selecting a new ethics administrator before the end of the year. The senators want to stall that hiring process until at least January, when the governor and legislative leaders will gain more control of the board. Ethics board members interviewed four candidates this week to replace current administrator Kathleen Allen and appeared to be on track to hire her successor by the end of December before the lawsuit was filed.
“No one’s interest will be harmed, and the interests of the Plaintiffs and the public will be greatly enhanced, if the Board of Ethics is enjoined for a short period of time to enable the Board of Ethics, stake holders, and the watchful public to give more deliberate consideration to this important decision,” Gray Sexton, an attorney representing Barrow and Cathey, said in the lawsuit.
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Sexton also served as the state ethics administrator for 46 years prior to starting his law practice. Allen took over from him 15 years ago and announced in September she would be stepping down from the job at the end of the year. Barrow and Cathey could not be reached immediately for comment Friday morning. At its meeting Friday, the board voted unanimously to go into a private session, which lasted over an hour, to discuss the litigation.
The lawsuit is just the latest episode in an escalating standoff between the ethics board, Landry and legislators. It comes two days after state Rep. Beau Beaullieu, R-New Iberia, asked Attorney General Liz Murrill to investigate the board for violating government transparency laws during the ethics administrator hiring process.
Many of the concerns raised in Barrow and Cathey’s lawsuits are similar to those outlined by Beaullieu in his letter to the attorney general earlier this week. In the lawsuit, Barrow and Cathey argue the ethics administrator opening should have been advertised for a longer period of time. Applications for the job were only accepted for 10 days, from Oct. 15-25. Two of the four applicants considered qualified for the job already work for the ethics board. “Arguably, the Board may have met the minimum timeline requirements to advertise the position, but in a manner that did not allow or encourage the involvement of the public,” Sexton wrote in the lawsuit. “The short duration of the post and the lack of notice hindered the process as reflected in the low number of applicants,” he said. “The Board received only four applicants for this high-level, competitively paid, classified civil service position.” The lawsuit also alleges the ethics board violated government transparency laws. Sexton said the board did not take a public vote at its September meeting before it went into a private session to discuss “personnel matters,” which could have included the hiring of a new ethics administrator. It also did not explain why it a private session out of the public eye was warranted.
Sexton also said the ethics board might have held a private meeting to discuss a request from Senate President Cameron Henry, R-Metairie, to delay the ethics administrator hiring. If so, that discussion would have violated the state’s open meetings law, which requires government bodies to discuss most matters publicly in the name of transparency, he said.
Landry, in general, has had a fraught relationship with the ethics board for years. Prior to becoming governor, the board reprimanded him multiple times for violating ethics and campaign finance laws. In the most high-profile incident, the board charged Landry last year with failing to disclose flights he took to Hawaii on a political donor’s private plane for his job as attorney general. The board and Landry are still in private negotiations over what his penalties for that violation should be. Legislators have also started criticizing the ethics board over the last month for being “abusive” and aggressive in their investigations of potential law violations. The board has been cracking down on the activities of political action committees run by legislators.
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Shortly after becoming governor, Landry pushed lawmakers to pass the new law that expands the ethics board’s membership from 11 to 15 members in 2025. The law also requires seven of the positions to be filled quickly with appointees from Landry and legislative leaders in January. Currently, most of the board is made up of people appointed by former Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, and Republican state lawmakers who are no longer in office. Unlike the former governors and legislative leaders, Landry and current lawmakers in charge will also get to pick their appointees to the board directly because of the new law approved this year.
Previous governors and legislators could only pick their ethics board appointees from lists of people recommended by Louisiana’s private college and university leaders. The arrangement, which has been eliminated, was supposed to help insulate the board from political pressure.
This is a developing story and this article may be updated.
Louisiana pastor Tony Spell must stay 50 yards from his neighbor’s home unless he’s checking the mail after a protection order was issued against him – as shocking bodycam appears to show him using a homophobic slur to describe his alleged assault victim, just two days after he was arrested.
Spell, 48, is banned from speaking with the neighbor either online and in person, according to the order issued Friday, which has since been reported by The Advocate.
“Mr Spell may walk over and check his mailbox; other than checking his mailbox, he is to be 50 yards away from the protected person’s property,” a note on the order says.
Pastor Tony Spell allegedly assaulted his neighbor’s son after he threatened to kill and rape his wife. WBRZ
Spell, the pastor of Baton Rouge’s Life Tabernacle Church, will appear in court in September after being charged with second degree battery over last month’s assault that unfolded opposite the church.
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He claimed Scott Sherwin’s son had threatened to rape and kill his wife before delivering 35 blows.
But two days after the brawl Scott Sherwin reported Spell for allegedly mowing his lawn at 4 a.m., WBRZ reported.
“He’s doing this to intimidate my victim son,” Sherwin claimed in bodycam video seen by The Post.
“Do you cut your grass at 4 in the morning?” he asked the responding officer.
“You gotta get him to stop man,” the furious dad said.
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Sherwin claimed his family was unable to sleep – alleging Spell was carrying out “psychological warfare.”
An enraged Sherwin then swore at his neighbor, allegedly flipping him off, according to the bodycam.
Tony Spell kneeling and holding a goat. Tony Spell / Facebook
“I was asleep when this started at four in the morning,” Sherwin stressed, aggressively pointing at his phone.
The cop then went over to Spell, who was sitting on his lawnmower, before asking for his name.
“Everybody in the world knows my name,” Spell brazenly replied to the cop.
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Spell, who faces up to eight years in prison if convicted, then labeled Sherwin’s son a “f—-t” and seemed to take pride in the now-viral beatdown.
“He’s just sore because I beat the crap out of his f—-t boy,” he said.
“And he’s next if he comes over here and harasses these boys,” Spell said, speaking while a group of teens gathered nearby.
He has been embroiled in a rivalry with his neighbor. Tony Spell
Spell then started his lawnmower up and told the boys “get to work,” essentially ordering them to clear off.
Spell strongly defended his actions after being released from jail over the assault.
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“Number one, I’m a husband, number two, I’m a father, and number three, I’m a pastor who shepherds his flock,” he said. “I will not allow a man to murder my children when I’m gone,” he told reporters.
He revealed what Sherwin’s son allegedly said, which prompted the beatdown.
“He said, ‘Tony, I’m going to rape your wife, I’m going to rape all your grandchildren, and the next time you go out of town, I’m going to kill them,’” Spell said.
He addressed the altercation to his congregation and compared it to “domestic terrorism.” He also cited a Bible passage from Mark 16:18, WAFB reported.
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“In my name, they shall lay hands on the sick. And they shall recover,” he said.
“So today, I fulfilled the scripture. I laid hands on the sick. I don’t know how much recovery they’re going to have, but I laid hands on the sick.”
Spell has been in a longstanding feud with Sherwin; the pastor filed a lawsuit during the pandemic in 2020 over surveillance cameras that were installed.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Spell was ticketed for holding in-person church services, defying Louisiana’s social distancing restrictions.
Spell claimed the cameras were installed to monitor him.
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In April 2020, Spell was accused of attacking a protester outside his church. Police alleged that Spell backed his church bus in the direction of the protester, who was identified as Trey Bennett, according to news station WAFB-TV.
He was arrested for aggravated assault but never formally charged.
A new study from researchers at LSU’s Pennington Biomedical Research Center, FMOL Health | Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center, and the Metamor Institute found that metabolic and bariatric surgery can be delivered safely and effectively for adolescents and young adults living with severe obesity, leading to significant weight loss and improvements in obesity-related health conditions.
Published in Obesity Surgery, the study examined outcomes from 76 patients ages 10 to 25 who underwent bariatric surgery through a Louisiana-based program at the Metamor Institute between January 2020 and March 2025. Researchers evaluated safety outcomes as well as longer-term health improvements associated with surgical obesity treatment.
The study found that patients achieved an average total body weight loss of 29%-32% maintained over one to five years. Among patients with available follow-up data, 94% experienced remission of type 2 diabetes, 67% showed improvement in hypertension and dyslipidemia and 64% experienced improvement in gastroesophageal reflux disease. Surgical complications remained low, with only 5% of patients experiencing complications within 30 days of surgery.
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Researchers noted that these outcomes were likely supported by a comprehensive, multidisciplinary care model that included experienced surgeons, nutritional guidance, behavioral support and coordinated medical follow-up. The study population represented a broad cross-section of Louisiana patients, with nearly 75% covered by Medicaid, highlighting the importance of ensuring access to effective obesity treatment options across socioeconomic backgrounds.
The findings support current American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations that adolescents age 13 and older with severe obesity and related health risks be evaluated for metabolic and bariatric surgery as part of comprehensive, evidence-based obesity care.
Meta Platforms Inc. has committed to spending an additional $40 billion on its sprawling data center campus in Louisiana, pushing its total expected investment beyond $250 billion for the site as it continues to grow its artificial intelligence computing footprint.
