Louisiana
Parole committee for people convicted by nonunanimous juries advances
Incarcerated people with nonunanimous jury convictions would be able to send an application for parole to the committee within its first year.
Ul Lafayette Redii Roadshow Stops In St. Landry
USDA-funded UL Lafayette REDII Roadshow in St. Landry: free workshops on manufacturing, e-commerce, IP & planning.
BATON ROUGE — A bill that would allow a committee to recommend parole to incarcerated Louisiana residents who received convictions through nonunanimous jury verdicts advanced 4-3 along party lines in a Senate judiciary committee.
Senate Bill 215 would allow the Department of Public Safety and Corrections to create a committee to review the appeal records of cases with nonunanimous convictions.
Incarcerated people with nonunanimous jury convictions would be able to send an application for parole to the committee within its first year. The committee would end after three years.
Democrats and advocacy groups opposed the bill, saying it did not go far enough to correct the problems.
The bill is meant to address possibly unjust convictions that are no longer legal in Louisiana after a constitutional amendment requiring unanimous verdicts passed in 2018.
The original law, allowing for convictions on as little as a 9-3 vote, was part of the 1898 constitutional convention, and it was designed to dilute Black jurors’ votes.
Louisiana changed the requirement to a 10-2 vote during the 1973 constitutional convention. Oregon, the only other state that allowed nonunanimous juries, had the same requirement.
Under the new bill, clerks of court would provide applicants with their records free of charge, and district attorneys and victims could respond at hearings.
Sen. Patrick McMath, R-Mandeville, who wrote the bill, said the legislation was a compromise between district attorneys who believed in the validity of convictions and criminal justice advocates.
“There’s likely not a way that either of those groups can come to a full consensus, but I think it was important to have the discussions and to continue to have the discussions,” McMath said.
Bradley R. Burget, president of the Louisiana District Attorney’s Association, supported the bill.
“We’re not exactly happy with it,” Burget said. “There’s a lot of the members of the DA’s association that may not be 100% for this, but I think this is something that they can live with.”
Zachary Daniels, the association’s executive director, liked the bill’s provision giving the committee authority to determine which nonunanimous convictions are just since “many of these contain strong evidence and are valid convictions where the prosecutor played by the rules at the time.”
Before the legislative session, the association found at least 1,215 cases a committee could analyze.
Daniels said it would be impossible to retry all of these cases because witnesses, officers and victims may no longer be available, and evidence may no longer exist.
The extensive list of issues the committee could consider includes the length of jury deliberations, the strength of the state’s case, the effectiveness of the defense attorney and evidence of racism.
Former Rep. Randal Gaines, who is now chair of the Democratic Party of Louisiana, filed a similar bill in 2022 that included the same list of issues that could be reviewed.
Herman Evans, who spent 37 years in prison after a nonunanimous jury convicted him in 1989 for a second-degree murder he did not commit, opposed the bill. Even after the perpetrator confessed in 2012, Evans did not get a hearing until 2024.
“That bill ain’t going to do nothing,” Evan said. “They’ve got the parole board. They’ve got the clemency board. It’s about the same board. And it costs about the same if you bring them back and let them get denied.”
Daniels said the expected cost to implement the bill is $1.8 million, based on a study resolution written for the 2025 legislative session by Sen. Charles Owen, R-Rosepine.
Owen also filed House Bill 219 that would allow courts to have resentencing hearings for nonunanimous convictions. The House Committee on Administration has not heard the bill yet.
One issue that arose in the meeting was the governor’s impact on the committee.
The governor would appoint to the committee three retired appellate court judges or Louisiana Supreme Court justices, one retired district attorney or assistant district attorney and one retired public defender.
The district attorney and public defender appointees would come from a list of three nominations from the Louisiana District Attorneys Association and the state public defender.
Although all five members would need to agree that a conviction was unfair, the current bill would allow the governor to make final decisions on releasing applicants.
The current bill does not provide details on the governor’s power. Daniels said the bill would eventually include that language after input from attorneys from the governor’s office.
Daniels also noted that there may be some conflict between the committee’s final decision and Gov. Jeff Landry’s tough-on-crime approach.
Sarah Gozalo of the Promise of Justice Initiative expressed concerns about the governor’s ultimate power.
“If we find that miscarriage of justice, the solution is, we will ask the governor — the one person who, in 2018, opposed getting rid of nonunanimous jurors,” Gozalo said.
Other opponents of the bill suggested keeping the bill in committee until it was amended to address their concerns.
Bruce Reilly, deputy director of Voice of the Experienced, and Erica Navalance, a criminal defense attorney, recommended adding post-conviction evidence to the records the committee sees to prove claims of ineffective defense counsel or prosecutorial misconduct.
McMath declined to defer the bill.
“I think that holding it up in this committee doesn’t necessarily give the chance to continue to move on through the process, where we all know that things sometimes can change and get new input,” McMath said.
Sen. Royce Duplessis, D-New Orleans, who had a similar bill in 2025 that did not pass, objected to the bill’s advancement.
“Just know that this is not an easy objection for me,” Duplessis said. “And if this bill does advance, I want to continue, or at least I want to work with you, to try to find a solution, because it’s been stated repeatedly, we’re not quite there.”
Louisiana
Special Olympics Mississippi moves state games to Louisiana, holds swimming events in-state
BILOXI, Miss. (WLOX) — Special Olympics Mississippi will hold its State Summer Games May 22–24 at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond, Louisiana, with swimming competitions continuing to take place in Mississippi.
Officials with the Special Olympics said the games were moved from Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi to Louisiana because of security concerns.
“When they canceled the state games this year, it made it a little bit rough on some of the athletes, but they continued to train,” Sharon Patterson, Director for Area 3, said.
The swimming competitions will take place in Mississippi because Louisiana does not include swimming in its events. Two swimming events are scheduled for May 9, one in Tupelo and another at the Natatorium in Biloxi.
A torch run began in North Mississippi on Monday and will arrive in Bay St. Louis on Thursday.
“It’s a run, walk, or roll because we have wheelchairs in there as well,” Patterson said.
On Friday, the torch run will move through Pass Christian and travel along Highway 90, with law enforcement officers from each city carrying the torch through their jurisdictions.
The run will conclude at Keesler Federal Park in Biloxi, where the Biloxi Shuckers are sponsoring a celebration featuring the lighting of the cauldron. A special athlete will sing the “Star-Spangled Banner,” lead the pledge and recite the oath.
Special Olympics Mississippi includes nearly 20 areas across the state. Each area holds games to qualify athletes for the state games.
The organization will also send 126 athletes to the USA Games in Minnesota in June. The national competition occurs every four years.
See a spelling or grammar error in this story? Report it to our team HERE.
Copyright 2026 WLOX. All rights reserved.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (WAFB) – The U.S. Supreme Court denied a motion to recall its decision on Louisiana’s congressional map, making its ruling final.
The high court is sticking to its decision from last week to throw out the state’s current voting map. The ruling struck down a map that featured two majority-Black districts.
Gov. Jeff Landry canceled the congressional race due to the court’s decision, despite mail-in ballots and early voting. Several lawsuits have been filed to reverse the governor’s executive order. As of May 5, more than 128,000 votes have been cast early, according to the Secretary of State’s office.
The state Senate is expected to start discussing a new map on Friday.
Click here to report a typo. Please include the headline.
Click here to subscribe to our WAFB 9 News daily digest and breaking news alerts delivered straight to your email inbox.
Watch the latest WAFB news and weather now.
Copyright 2026 WAFB. All rights reserved.
-
News13 minutes agoU.S. military says it intercepted Iranian attacks on 3 Navy ships in Strait of Hormuz
-
New York2 hours agoCornell Is Investigating Confrontation Between President and Students
-
Detroit, MI2 hours agoDan Gilbert paid for army of Cavs fans to take over Pistons playoff game
-
San Francisco, CA2 hours agoMissing woman last seen in San Francisco found dead in Texas after 53 years
-
Dallas, TX3 hours agoDallas deck park set to reconnect Oak Cliff after decades of division
-
Miami, FL3 hours agoFuture of Miami historic landmark continues in limbo after redevelopment plan rejected by zoning board
-
Boston, MA3 hours agoCaleb Lomu’s wife predicted his path to the Patriots, then his uncle flew him there
-
Denver, CO3 hours agoCould the Dolphins Do Another Deal With Denver?