Judge Hunter Greene, presently a family court judge in 19th JDC and candidate for Louisiana First Circuit Court of Appeal for the seat being vacated by retiring Judge J. Michael McDondald, addresses the Ronald Reagan Newsmaker Luncheon on Tuesday, July 12, 2022.
As followers of this blog are aware, we recently filed a pro se lawsuit against Louisiana State Police for what we firmly believe is an abuse of Louisiana’s public records laws to shield the public from uncovering more problematic activity by LSP troopers.
We said when we filed the suit that we’d live with whatever decision Judge Don Johnson (D-Baton Rouge) made regarding whether we got to see the requested records. What we meant by that is that we would lodge no appeal of his decision if it was not in our favor. What we did not commit to was refraining from launching an all-out attack against Johnson if he ruled against us, which he did, as he pursues a promotion to the First Circuit Court of Appeals as he is widely expected to do when qualifying takes place this Wednesday through Friday.
In fact, we said that it’s our belief that EBR voters should, “file Judge Johnson away (on 19th JDC) “as is,” which correlates PRECISELY with the wording he used regarding our proposed judgment (i.e. “file as is”), which he declined to sign and instead signed LSP’s proposed judgment denying us (and by inference, all of our subscribers and site visitors) access to the requested records.
In the previously-linked article, we listed the five (5) candidates widely expected to qualify for the First Circuit Court of Appeals seat being vacated by the retirement of long-time Judge J. Michael McDonald. While we declined to formally endorse any of the four (4) Republicans expected to qualify for the race, we stated that any one of the four would be far preferable to promoting Johnson, a Democrat with serious past problematic acts as illustrated on the just-linked feature, to a seat on the First Circuit.
On Tuesday, July 12, 2022, one of the expected four Republican qualifiers, Hunter Greene, was the guest speaker at the Ronald Reagan Newsmaker Luncheon here in Baton Rouge. Let’s take a just a few minutes to view a couple of highlights from his presentation:
Greene responds to question posed by Sound Off Louisiana founder Robert Burns entailing the adequacy of Louisiana’s Public Records Laws and whether Louisiana would be wise to adopt a statute similar to Texas’s Public Records Laws calling for any denied public records request to be automatically reviewed by the Texas Attorney General to assess whether that denial was justified.
Greene commits that, if elected, he will personally read the briefs submitted to the Court entailing cases on which he’s assigned to be a decision maker.
As we’ve previously indicated, we consider this race to be the most important race on the ballot for East Baton Rouge voters. We believe that not only because of the lack of intrigue in the other races but also because we believe it is absolutely imperative to have a responsible judge to replace McDonald. Being blunt, given his past antics (not to mention our frustration over his decision on our recent lawsuit), we certainly do not believe that Judge Johnson constitutes a “responsible” judge to replace McDonald.
We commit to provide features on any of the other expected three Republican candidates for the First Circuit Court of Appeal vacancy as they are invited to speak at luncheons and/or participate in debate forums.
Obviously, we’d be very content with a victory by Judge Greene, even if it did take him a couple of tries to pass the CPA exam (that’s meant as humor). Burns, who was also a student of Dr. Dan Kyle just like Greene, passed the exam on his first attempt. Nevertheless, Burns would quickly concede in no time flat that he lacks the patience to deal with law school or serving in the Louisiana Legislature. Greene is obviously far more disciplined than Burns in that regard. At any rate, we obviously like his standing as a CPA in addition to being a lawyer and judge.
There was one other noteworthy presentation at the meeting, and that was Coleman Brown’s frustrations entailing what he assesses as a high-priced ($1 billion +) Interstate 10 expansion and replacement just off the Mississippi River Bridge East bound. We covered details of Brown’s proposal 2 1/2 years ago, and here’s video of him (and others) voicing frustration at DOTD’s current plans for the work:
Brown (and others) voice frustration at the current DOTD proposal for expanding and replacing a section of I-10 Eastbound off the Mississippi River Bridge.
CLICK HERE for the luncheon in its entirety.
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Excellent video production coverage of all the topics, especially our concern on I -10 widening and corrections thereto.
No elected officials or any of the media attended or covered the Federation of Civic Associations meeting Thursday night on the I-10 widening .
It’s insane that after over 1000 days after the Terrace exit was opened nothing has been done to keep one car per minute from cutting off eastbound traffic at Washington’s exit.
I’ve had so many that live in that area ask me “ Why do we need the Washington exit? “