If you can’t find a parking spot in the downtown garage this morning, it’s because a pool of 500 potential jurors from Lafayette Parish are reporting to the courthouse for jury pre-qualifications for the Vince Marinello murder trial. Marinello, a well known New Orleans sportscaster, stands accused of the second degree murder of his wife, Liz Marinello. She was shot in a parking lot in Old Metarie in broad daylight. The trial was moved to Lafayette because of the difficulty in seating an impartial jury in New Orleans, due to the publicity that followed Marinello’s arrest after the September 1, 2006 murder. Potential jurors are being asked questions today to see if they can be exempted for jury duty. Jury selection for the trial begins December 1.
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.