Day: February 2, 2010

Will someone in a position of authority PLEASE put a bullet in AIG’s head and stop both the misery and insanity

If there is one reason (besides that special interest infested monstrosity also known as Health Care Reform) that the Democrats will get their asses kicked at the polls come November I’ll give it to you in 3 letters: A.I.G.

It’s bad enough the the company is insolvent and taxpayers will never see a return of all the money we sank into that bottomless snake pit, but to actually pay more bonuses to the dumb mother fuckers that caused the implosion of both AIG and our financial system simply defies description. Up next will by Timmy Geithner hitting the airways talking contract sanctity. Marketwatch has the story:

In the midst of bonus season, the people deciding compensation policy at American International Group Inc. believe they’ve reached a deal. The majority of the controversial financial-products group at the company will take a 10% haircut on their bonuses in return for an early payout, as soon as next week. Read AIG bonus story in WSJ. Continue reading “Will someone in a position of authority PLEASE put a bullet in AIG’s head and stop both the misery and insanity”

There is a Broussard in the woodpile: The politics of drunk driving and the Jefferson Parish criminal justice system

It was in the fall of 2006 that I attended my second funeral for a person killed in an accident involving a drunk driver but this time it was extra tough as the victim was a 5 year old girl that was killed on US Highway 98 in Marion County when a drunk driver rammed into the back of the SUV driven by her daddy. The force of the impact caused the SUV to flip several times after it went into the median. Momma was also in the vehicle and her legs were crushed. At the time the surgeons did not know if one of her legs could be saved. She couldn’t come to her baby’s funeral due to those injuries. As I approached the family and the casket I was worried as I didn’t know what words of comfort I would offer to the family. All I could do was shake my head when I got to the front of the line as I was uncharacteristically at a loss for words. “The funeral home did a wonderful job for my baby” her dad remarked to me as we gazed at her in the casket. Indeed they had as half her face had been crushed in the accident. To this day I don’t think he has recovered from that loss.

Jim Brown rekindled those memories for me with his recently published column that took Louisiana’s courts and DAs to task for not enforcing the existing DUI laws. In response to that column we were pleased to have the Avoyelles Parish DA stop in with us begging to differ with the premise of Jim’s column but we also noted that Jim stuck to his guns in his reply. Curious as to the real cause of the problem I sent out some email inquiries to several of the Louisiana based lawyers that we count as regular Slabbed readers and that input, along with my remembrance of a fairly recent story involving a repeat DUI offender in Jefferson Parish resulted in this post where we’ll explore the politics of the DUI as it exists in Jefferson Parish.

Let’s begin by backing up to August of last year and the case of Craig Codina, a serial drunk driver who finally killed someone in his fourth alcohol fueled accident as Paula Devlin reported for the Times Picayune:

When State Police handcuffed Craig Codina last weekend for plowing his truck into the back of a car on Airline Drive, sending the other driver to the hospital and fatally injuring a passenger, it marked his fourth drunken-driving arrest in just eight years.

In fact, the 25-year-old Destrehan man is scheduled to appear in court this week for trial in the third case, a frighteningly similar crash in which he is accused of smashing into the back of a teenager’s car on Causeway Boulevard in October. Continue reading “There is a Broussard in the woodpile: The politics of drunk driving and the Jefferson Parish criminal justice system”

Justice can wait part deux: Local Magistrate releases inmate because he had tickets to the NFC Championship

From the you can’t make this stuff up file I ran across a story in today’s Times Picayune that highlighted Jefferson Parish Magistrate Carol Kiff releasing an inmate so he could attend the NFC Championship game. Does anyone else wonder how the perpetrator could afford Saints tickets but not his court costs and probation fees? Paul Purpura has the story for the Times Picayune:

A 24th Judicial District Court magistrate released a Metairie man from jail for two days last month so he could attend the Jan. 24 NFC championship game.

But James Buisson, 31, who was jailed on a probation violation, returned two days late to the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center.

The order from Magistrate Commissioner Carol Kiff freeing Buisson caught correctional officers by surprise, leading them to double check with the magistrate to ensure it was accurate, Sheriff Newell Normand said.

“Release from 1-23-10 at noon until 1-25-10 at noon so he can go to the Saints-Vikings game – He has tickets,” Kiff wrote in the Jan. Continue reading “Justice can wait part deux: Local Magistrate releases inmate because he had tickets to the NFC Championship”