Justia Louisiana Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff Meiko Prevo was arrested in April 2000 in East Baton Rouge Parish for felony crime against nature. Plaintiff ultimately pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of criminal mischief, a misdemeanor. She was sentenced to ninety days in jail, suspended, and placed on probation for a period of one year, which she successfully completed. Plaintiff was not required to register as a sex offender based on her conviction for misdemeanor criminal mischief. In September 2008, plaintiff was again arrested and charged with distribution of cocaine. She pleaded guilty, received a hard labor suspended sentence, and was placed probation for a period of five years with the State of Louisiana, Department of Public Safety Division of Probation and Parole. Thereafter, plaintiff reported to her probation officer, David Phillips. Officer Phillips reviewed plaintiff’s criminal history which identified her as a sex offender based on a disposition for crime against nature in April 2000. He also relied on an East Baton Rouge Parish “conviction notification” which showed she was convicted of crime against nature. Based on this information, Officer Phillips advised plaintiff that she was required to register as a sex offender based on what he understood to be her earlier 2000 conviction, and if she failed to do so, she would be sent to jail to serve her five-year sentence. Plaintiff objected to being required to register as a sex offender. Plaintiff registered as a sex offender. On several occasions after registering, plaintiff continued to ask Officer Phillips to further investigate her case, claiming each time that she was not a sex offender and should not have to be registered. According to plaintiff, Officer Phillips took no action on her requests. Plaintiff obtained a copy of her criminal records, confirming she had been convicted of criminal mischief. Assigned a new probation officer, Mike Ware, plaintiff informed him that she had not been convicted of crime against nature and was erroneously required to register as a sex offender. Officer Ware investigated plaintiff’s allegations and obtained information from the East Baton Rouge Parish Clerk of Court showing plaintiff’s guilty plea to the misdemeanor charge of criminal mischief. Officer Ware informed plaintiff of his findings and began the process of having her removed from the sex offender registry. Plaintiff thereafter filed suit against several defendants, including the State of Louisiana, Through the Department of Public Safety and Corrections Division of Probation and Parole, alleging that she was "coerced" to register as a sex offender and suffered significant injury as a result. After discovery, the State filed a peremptory exception arguing plaintiff’s petition sounded in tort and was subject to a one-year prescriptive period. A five-judge panel of the court of appeal, with two judges dissenting, reversed the judgment of the district court insofar as it granted the State’s exception of prescription. The State appealed and reversed, finding that the district court was correct in its judgment. View "Prevo v. Louisiana" on Justia Law

In 1998, an Orleans Parish jury found respondent Ronald Marshall guilty of armed robbery. Following a habitual offender hearing, the trial court adjudicated respondent a second felony offender and sentenced him to 49 and a half years imprisonment at hard labor without the benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence. In 2010, respondent filed a second application for post conviction relief, asserting two claims of ineffective assistance of counsel. The court of appeal granted respondent's writ, in part, and denied, in part, concluding the trial court erred by summarily dismissing respondent's claims that his trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to discover his attorney's time sheets and to convey the plea offer. The court remanded those claims for consideration at an evidentiary hearing, concluding they were substantively different from respondent's earlier ineffective assistance of counsel claims and, therefore, neither repetitive nor successive. The court of appeal also ordered the trial court to grant respondent's motion to issue the subpoena duces tecum to obtain the time sheets. The state filed a writ application seeking review of the court of appeal's ruling, which was the subject of this opinion. Finding that respondent exhausted his right to state collateral review, the Supreme Court vacated the appellate court's judgment and reinstated the trial court's denial of claims for post-conviction relief. View "Louisiana v. Marshall" on Justia Law

Defendant was found guilty as charged by a jury of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. By agreement with the state, defendant admitted the allegations in the habitual offender bill of information and was sentenced under La.R.S. 15:529.1(A)(1) as a second felony offender to 22 years imprisonment at hard labor with the first two years to be served without parole eligibility. The court of appeal reversed the conviction because it found the state presented insufficient evidence to prove defendant intended to distribute the cocaine. The court of appeal noted that a guest in defendant’s home, rather than defendant, was found in possession of two small rocks of crack cocaine. The court of appeal acknowledged that defendant admitted to police that he sold cocaine in small quantities but nonetheless determined that a jury could not reasonably infer defendant’s intent to sell those particular "rocks" from the evidence presented by the state. Finding that the evidence presented at trial indeed supported the conviction, the Supreme Court reversed the court of appeals and reinstated the trial court's judgment and sentence. View "Louisiana v. Ellis" on Justia Law

Defendant William Graham was indicted with one count of aggravated incest. After defendant rested his case at trial and it became apparent that the State had failed to carry its burden of proof on this charge, the District Court permitted the State to add as a responsive verdict a different offense (molestation of a juvenile) than the one which had been the focus of trial and which contained an element not necessarily required by the original charge. Although neither the State nor the defendant presented any evidence concerning this new element, the jury found the defendant guilty of one of count of molestation of a juvenile, and the trial court sentenced him to serve 50 years imprisonment at hard labor with the first 25 years to be served without parole eligibility. The court of appeal affirmed the conviction and sentence. After review, the Supreme Court found that molestation of a juvenile was not a lesser included offense of the charge of aggravated incest and because defendant‘s trial was rendered fundamentally unfair when the District Court permitted the State to add "guilty of molestation of a juvenile" as a responsive verdict even though defendant had no opportunity to mount a defense concerning an additional essential element of this offense, the Court reversed and vacated defendant's conviction and sentence, and remanded the case to the District Court for entry of a post-verdict judgment of acquittal. View "Lousiana v. Graham" on Justia Law

Defendant Toby Fruge was charged with the forcible rape of two women, R.A. (count 1) and J.H. (count 2), in two separate incidents that occurred approximately two years apart. The State’s petitioned the Supreme Court for review of those portions of the appellate court's decision that reversed the district court’s imposition of the maximum sentence for defendant’s simple rape conviction and remanded the case to the district court with instructions for resentencing. Upon review of the appellate court record, the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the appellate court, in part, reinstated defendant’s simple rape sentence, and remanded to the district court for execution of sentence. View "Louisiana v. Fruge" on Justia Law

Defendant Terrence Roberson was charged with armed robbery and attempted second-degree murder for offenses which allegedly occurred in 2012, when the defendant was sixteen years old. The issue this case presented for the Supreme Court's review centered on whether the Juvenile Court’s dismissal of defendant's case for expiration of the time period for adjudication provided in the Children’s Code prevented the District Attorney from later obtaining a grand jury indictment against defendant and bringing the case to District Court. In this case, the District Court quashed the defendant’s indictment on the basis of the Juvenile Court’s prior dismissal of the juvenile petition with prejudice. The Court of Appeal reversed the District Court’s grant of the motion to quash. Finding no reversible error in that decision, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Louisiana v. Roberson" on Justia Law

In November 2008, a grand jury indicted defendant Lamondre Tucker for the first degree murder of Tavia Sills. After a trial, the jury found the defendant guilty as charged. At the conclusion of the penalty phase of the trial, the jury unanimously returned a verdict of death, finding aggravating circumstances that: (1) the defendant was engaged in the perpetration or attempted perpetration of second degree kidnaping; and (2) the defendant knowingly created a risk of death or great bodily harm to more than one person. The trial court sentenced the defendant to death in accordance with the jury's determination. Defendant appealed his conviction and sentence, raising 55 assignments of error, combined into 21 arguments. After a thorough review of the law and the evidence, the Louisiana Supreme Court found no merit in any of the assignments of error. Therefore, the Court affirmed defendant's conviction and sentence. View "Louisiana v. Tucker" on Justia Law

In a cold-case prosecution initiated over 12 years after the victim died, the state charged defendant by grand jury indictment with second degree murder. A jury found defendant guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to 40 years' imprisonment at hard labor. On appeal, the Third Circuit reversed defendant's conviction and sentence after finding that the evidence presented at trial did not support a verdict for either the charged offense or for its responsive verdict of manslaughter, an apparent compromise, and entered a judgment of acquittal. The state appealed. After briefing and argument and independent review of the record, the Supreme Court agreed with the court of appeal and affirmed. View "Louisiana v. Robertson" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court granted the state’s writ application to determine whether a person required to register as a sex offender as a result of an offense committed as a juvenile under La. R.S. 15:542 had to comply with the sex offender identification required by La. R.S. 32:412(I) or La. R.S. 40:1321(J). After briefing and argument, it became apparent that the deficient record in this matter did not permit the Court to answer that question. Rather, the record made clear that the respondent in this case, K.L.A., was not required by La. R.S. 15:542 to register as a sex offender, though he agreed to do so by plea. Based on the specific facts of this case, the Court found he was also not required to obtain the sex offender identification. The judgments of the district court and the court of appeal were affirmed, solely as to their ruling that respondent himself was not required to obtain the sex offender identification required of sex offender registrants. View "Louisiana in the interest of K.L.A." on Justia Law

Relator’s convictions stemmed from unrelated attacks on two different women in the 1990s: a 1991 attack on a victim identified as K.T.; and a 1994 attack on a victim identified as A.R. In both cases, the investigations went cold. More than a decade later, Orleans Parish law enforcement authorities began DNA testing of its voluminous stored evidence in an effort to resolve cold cases, and a Combined DNA Index System (“CODIS”) search identified relator as a match for biological evidence collected in both attacks. The district court sentenced him to three terms of life imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence, 50 years imprisonment at hard labor, 20 years imprisonment at hard labor, and 10 years imprisonment at hard labor, all to be served consecutively to one another. The district court also sentenced relator to undergo the administration of medroxyprogesterone acetate (“chemical castration”) pursuant to R.S. 14:43.6 and R.S. 15:538. Relator appealed his convictions and sentences, and additionally filed a separate writ application seeking review of the chemical castration order. In an opinion consolidating relator’s appeal and writ application, the Fourth Circuit affirmed relator’s convictions and sentences and denied his application for review of the district court’s judgment ordering relator to undergo chemical castration. Aggravated rape and aggravated kidnapping were punishable by life imprisonment and as such are not subject to a prescriptive period per La.C.Cr.P. art. 571; consequently the Supreme Court affirmed relator’s convictions and sentences on those counts. However, the portion of the trial court’s sentence requiring that relator undergo chemical castration pursuant to R.S. 14:43.6 (enacted in by the legislature in 2008) was vacated. "Although some remedial regulations may be applied retroactively without violating the constitution, the chemical castration requirements of the new statute are expressly part of the punishment that a court may impose for the sex crimes enumerated in La.R.S. 14:43.6. Because the Ex Post Facto Clause prohibits retroactive application of new laws that increase the penalty for which the crime is punishable, and because we find no clearly expressed legislative intent to apply this substantive change in the law retroactively, the portion of the court’s sentence requiring that relator submit to chemical castration is vacated." View "Louisiana ex rel. Nicholson v. Louisiana" on Justia Law