As Louisiana State Police Commission Chairman Simien abruptly resigns, all eyes turn toward Gov. Landry to see if he opts to reappoint controversial Member Caruso-Riecke to another six-year term.

Louisiana State Police Commission (LPSC) Chairman Eulis Simien, Jr., prepares to announce his resignation on Thursday, December 12, 2024.

Only two (2) Members of the LSPC have served on that body since we began filming the meetings in January of 2017:  Eulis Simien, Jr., and Jared Caruso-Riecke.  Simien has served as Chairman since the  unceremonious departure of then-Chairman (and active Trooper) T. J. Doss occurred after first being videotaped (by Sound Off Louisiana‘s Burns) checking into the Watermark Hotel mere hours after an LSPC meeting.

Ordinarily, there wouldn’t be anything unusual about checking into a hotel; however, since Doss was filmed checking into the hotel with then-Vice Chairman Monica Manzella (who also unceremoniously departed mere days after Doss’s departure), it was just one more act which has caused many to openly question just how much “integrity” Members of the LSPC have.

On Thursday, December 12, 2024, Simien abruptly announced his resignation.  Here’s a brief video of him doing so along with the praise heaped upon him by Vice Chairman (and active Trooper Member) Monty Montelongo:

 12/12/24:  LSPC Chairman Simien resigns followed by showering of praise by Vice Chairman Monty Montelongo.

There’s plenty we could say about Montelongo’s praise entailing Simien; however, we are going to save that for a future feature because we want to immediately shift gears to the one (1) remaining LSPC Commissioner since the days we began filming:  Jared Caruso-Riecke.

Riecke is, by far, the unquestioned most controversial Member of the LSPC, and his term actually expired on December 5, 2024, but he is actively seeking reappointment to another six-year term which would not expire until December 5, 2030.

Accordingly, on Thursday, December 5, 2024, LSPC Executive Director Jason Hannaman sent this email to Dillard University Interim President Monique Guillory which contained (as attachments) this documentation explaining the process for submitting names for up to three (3) candidates to serve in Riecke’s position for the next six years.  From the email (sent to [email protected]) and letter:

Importance:High

Dear Interim President Guillory,

I am emailing you to call your attention to the expiring term for the State Police Commissioner representing the 1^st Congressional District. That vacancy, under the provisions of Article X §43 of the Louisiana Constitution is to be filled by a nominee from the President of Dillard University. Today is the end of the term; therefore, the new term commences tomorrow and you have 30 days (starting tomorrow) to submit three nominees to the governor. Please see the attached correspondence relative to this impending vacancy. Due to the time-sensitive nature of filling vacancies, I am contacting you initially through this email correspondence and will also follow up by regular U.S. mail.

 

I appreciate your time and consideration in selecting three (3) qualified nominees for consideration and submitting those nominees to the Office of the Governor between December 6, 2024, and before the deadline of Saturday, January 4, 2025. Due to the time-sensitive nature of the request, you may also forward a scanned copy of the nomination list to my attention and I will forward it to the Director of Boards and Commissions. Please contact me if you have questions regarding the process.

Mr. Jared Caruso-Riecke has served as a member of the State Police Commission representing the First Congressional District since his appointment to an unexpired term by Governor Edwards on June 6, 2016. He was subsequently reappointed to a full term on January 8, 2019. Mr. Riecke is an active member with regular attendance; he is interested in continuing his service and bringing his unique business insight to the Commission; and, he is hopeful to be nominated once again so that he may be considered for a new term on the Commission.

The governor is required to make his appointment within thirty (30) days of receiving your list. Should the governor fail to appoint one of the nominees within thirty days, the nominee whose name appears first on the list of three (3) nominees you submitted shall become a member of the State Police Commission, with consent of the Senate. If you fail to submit a list of three (3) names within the allotted thirty (30) days, the governor may select any qualified resident from the First Congressional District for appointment to this commission, with consent of the Senate. The individual selected will fill a new term set to expire on December 5, 2030.

Our website’s visitors may recall this February 1, 2024 feature entailing a letter sent out by the collective LSPC Members concerning the campaign of Collin Sims, who was seeking election to a full term as St. Tammany Parish District Attorney after having served in an interim capacity upon the passing of Warren Montgomery.

In that feature, we highlighted some of the past controversies of Commissioner Riecke, and we repeat them at this time:

3.  Sometime in May, 2023:  Counter-clock podcast entailing the murder of Caruso-Riecke’s former business partner, Bruce Cucchiara.  As Burns explained in the video above, Counter Clock’s reference to Sound Off Louisiana features on Riecke caused a skyrocket in hits to those features and, at the time, Burns had absolutely no idea why those hits were transpiring.

4.  October 30, 2019:  Our replica of the Brain Scratch’s  podcasts focusing on the Cucchiara murder.

 

The Counter Clock podcast referenced above is one of the absolute best and most thorough features of investigative journalism that Sound Off Louisiana founder Robert Burns has ever encountered.  Obviously, the feature centered around the murder of Riecke’s business partner, Bruce Cucchiara, in 2012 (Riecke, after first suing New York Life for payment, received $5 million from a life insurance policy as a result of Cucchiara’s death).

Beyond the Cucchiara murder, however, the feature goes into great depth about the lives of both Cucchiara and Riecke.

In fact, the feature even goes so far as to provide the December, 2005 actual plea agreement (Episode 9) that one of Riecke’s companies agreed to entailing a guilty plea and accompanying alleged-record EPA fine of $2.1 million for violations of the Federal Clean Water Acts, together with $12.862 million in remedial costs for damages associated with those violations (see bottom of page on just-linked document).

The involvement of both Riecke and Simien in the Sims campaign angered a significant number of residents in St. Tammany Parish.  Riecke is alleged to have been a strong supporter of Sims’ opponent, Vincent Winn.  Sims absolutely clobbered Winn by a margin of 69-31 in the March 23, 2024 election.

That anger ran so high that a group of seven (7) St. Tammany Parish residents, incensed by the apparent involvement of Riecke in the DA race, sued all seven (7) Members of the LSPC alleging an Open Meetings Violation entailing the then-collective group’s corresponding with one another to mail that infamous letter to the Sims campaign.

They have been especially vocal about their displeasure of the appearance of Gov. Landry’s name on prominent display on the letterhead and the implicit signal it sent that Landry, like Riecke, supported Winn in that election.  We have inquired of the Landry administration entailing whether Gov. Landry did in fact support Winn over Sims; however, his office declined to respond to our written inquiry entailing the matter.

On September 19, 2024, Belinda Parker-Brown, a Plaintiff in the litigation, served the LSPC with discovery requests which also made inquiry of past alleged problematic acts by Riecke.  We’ll repeat a few of those discovery items at this time:

Please admit that Defendant Riecke had a feature role in a reality television show featuring teams of race cars speeding across the nation’s highways at speeds exceeding 100 MPH.

Please admit that, pertaining to Request for Admission Number Six, Defendant Riecke is on video making a $50,000 bet on one such racing team.

Please admit that, pertaining to Request for Admission Number Six, a race car team is on video opening the trunk of a car to expose approximately 10 or more license plates for swap out, “in the event our license plate is called out over our inboard police radar scanner.”

Please admit that, pertaining to Request for Admission Number Six, Defendant Riecke is on video bragging about concealed radar-detection equipment in the right dashboard of his vehicle.

Please admit that, pertaining to Request for Admission Number Six, Defendant Riecke, after exposing his inboard radar detection and police scanner capabilities, then replaced the in-board façade dashboard utilized to conceal that equipment and also stating on video that, “police tend to frown on this sort of thing, so….”

So, for all those folk in St. Tammany Parish upset with the fact that Riecke even still remains on the LSPC, we’ll offer these suggestions of actions:

# 1.  Contacting Dillard University’s Interim President, Monique Guillory, via email at [email protected].

and EITHER:

# 2.  Indicating a desire to serve on the LSPC, OR

#3.  Letting any negative sentiments anyone may have toward Riecke being reappointed to another six-year term be known to her.

In addition to sending an email to President Guillory at [email protected], anyone is also welcome to copy that email to Gov. Landry’s Head of Boards and Commissions, Ryan Roberts, at [email protected].

The final decision rests with Gov. Landry on whether he wishes to have Riecke serve another six years or not, but we just figured we’d take the process out of the dark secrecy and provide a little sunshine on how the whole process transpires.

We also commit to inform everyone once Landry’s decision is made with regard to both Simien’s replacement (irrespective of how long it may take to find someone of his caliber as per Montelongo) and whomever Landry chooses for the next six years entailing Riecke’s expired term.