Lafayette state Rep. Rickey Hardy says he feels
confident a bill he has introduced to outlaw public displays of nooses used for
intimidation will become law. Yesterday, the House Criminal Justice committee
unanimously approved the bill, which now moves on to the full House for a vote.
Hardy says he expects a floor vote on Tuesday. “I feel very confident,” he
says, citing President Bush’s own speech last February calling the recent
racial feud in Jena, La. involving a hanging noose a “shameful chapter in
American history.” Teenagers who hung the noose were not prosecuted under
federal hate crime laws because they were juveniles. The incident garnered
international attention and sparked a national civil rights rally in the small
North Louisiana town. “We want to make sure that we work to eradicate that type
of behavior,” Hardy says. “We don’t need to have negative publicity in terms of
35,000 people protesting.” Hardy modeled his bill after a state law banning
cross burning. In committee, the bill was amended from a maximum penalty of 15
years incarceration and a $15,000 fine down to a max one-year incarceration and
a $5,000 fine. “I’m comfortable with that,” Hardy says. “The bottom line is to get a law on the books.”
In rendering his ruling, District Judge John Trahan all but called the real estate developer a liar for inconsistencies in his accounts of what prompted him to punch a school teacher unconscious.
Frank’s Casing Crew, now doing business as Frank’s International, will make its final appearance on ABiz’s list of the Top 50 Privately Held Companies in Acadiana this year, and once again it will likely be at the top with more than $1 billion in annual revenues. The 75-year-old company specializing in tubular fabrication and installation services to the oil and gas industry plans to offer shares of its stock to the public for the first time.
The defeat, or rather highjacking of House Bill 420 in the final days of this year's Legislative Session, say Reps. Vincent Pierre and Terry Landry, is the result of the propaganda spread by one unidentified local media outlet and an unnamed former state Representative, but nothing to do with the original legislation's lack of checks, balances or details.
City-Parish Council Chairman Brandon Shelvin heaped steady doses of condescending ire on a Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Louisiana executive while failing to reveal his financial ties to a BC/BS rival.
Abbeville native David Primeaux was a popular professor until his death late last year, and while he was successful at camouflaging a dark past, he couldn’t outlive it.
Tehmi Chassion’s failure to recuse himself in the school board’s selection of a group health benefits provider raises ‘serious questions’ on whether he violated state ethics law.
He’s a singer. A songwriter. A piano man. A family man. He’s even got his own Wikipedia entry. He’s David Egan. And he knows ancient secrets about the monolithic stones of Stonehenge that he’s not willing to share.
Subscribe to this comment's feed