Sound Off Louisiana

Dr. C. Ryan Haygood (center of table) makes a point to then-Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Dan Martiny during his testimony of alleged Louisiana Dental Board corruption on April 4, 2018.

About once a week, we take a peek at the features being viewed by casual visitors to our blog.  Typically, the referrers to those posts are search engines, with Google being the most prominent of those search engines.  It seems virtually every day that goes by, multiple Google queries are made for “Ryan Haygood” which, in turn, then take the searchers to our extensive feature on Haygood of almost a year ago.  Since we’re nearing the one-year anniversary of that feature, we thought we’d take some time to update everyone on Haygood’s latest courtroom travails.

We launched last year’s feature on Haygood after a reader made observations entailing our pre-Haygood feature.  That feature entailed Shelly Sebastian’s civil service appeal blowing up in her face, which further demonstrates the incredible inefficiencies and outdated treatment afforded to Louisiana Civil Service employees who would be fired in a nanosecond were they employed in the private sector.

One reader of that feature, “Bob,” opted to make a little constructive criticism of it.  Specifically, “Bob” assessed Sound Off Louisiana‘s Burns as, “the worst writer on the planet.”  “Bob” then admonished Burns to, “work on your headlines,” in stating that, “they suck.”  “Bob” then further admonished Burns to, “write stories that people actually care about.”

If “Bob” continues to follow our blog, we hope he’s a tad more impressed than he was a year ago given that we got very strong interest in our breaking of this Ronald Greene feature and also this feature of some foulmouthed Louisiana State Troopers bragging of an “ass ‘whoppin” they’d previously administered during an arrest.  Since both those features garnered international attention, we hope “Bob” feels we’ve heeded his advice and have published features that more people “actually care about.”

At any rate, as long-time subscribers may recall, we did in fact immediately heed “Bob’s” admonition and polled a few of our most loyal subscribers and, as we mentioned on the Haygood-linked feature above, they indicated it had been a while since we’d done a feature on Haygood.  Accordingly, we published the major feature linked above to exhaustively cover Haygood from the day he graduated from Dental School until the date of our feature in early April of 2020.

For this feature, since newcomers to our blog may not wish to take the time to read the entirety of our feature of a year ago and thereby engage in what we readily admit to being a very, very deep dive into Haygood’s travails entailing the Louisiana State Board of Dentistry, and based on the encouraging feedback we received on our recent bullet-point comprehensive coverage of former Louisiana State Police Commissioner Calvin Braxton’s travails, we’re going to deploy the same format for Haygood.  Here’s a table for Haygood with bullet points similar to that produced for Braxton:

Regarding the above table, here’s the first video referenced:

April 4, 2018 Senate testimony by Haygood alleging he was targeted by competing dentists to shut his dental practice down.
[Note:  The linked litigation above was filed in Federal Court in the Western District of Louisiana on February 13, 2013.
That litigation is largely a regurgitation of litigation filed in the 1st JDC in Louisiana state court on September 26, 2011 with additional defendants
added and allegations of violations of Federal Constitutional Rights, most notably Title 42, Section 1983.]

And here is the second video referenced:

May 8, 2019 Senate Commerce Committee hearing at which Sen. Cortez admonishes Sen. John Milkovich not to declare folk guilty who have not been convicted of crimes.  He also expressed his concerns at Haygood’s disparaging testimony the week before entailing the Smith letter, which Haygood asserted “slandered” him and was “full of lies.”  Meanwhile, Haygood had to be defended in absentia by Milkovich, who emphasized that Haygood had incurred “hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees” fighting what he perceives as “LSBD corruption.”

So, there’s the latest on Shreveport dentist Dr. C. Ryan Haygood.  Since there is no evidence that attorneys for defendants in his Federal litigation have gotten around to drafting a final order to award their attorney fees against Haygood, we can’t speak for them, but we believe we’d be asking, “What’s the holdup?”

If you would like to be added to our Sound Off Louisiana email list to be notified of future posts, simply go to our home page and scroll to the bottom (mobile devices) or to the top of the right-hand column (desktops).  Supply your email address within the subscribe box.  You’ll then receive an automated email from Word Press, and all you have to do is click on the blue “confirm follow” bar contained within that email, and you’ll begin receiving great posts such as the preceding one above.

Russell J. Stutes, Jr., a Lake Charles attorney and alleged sender of an April 23, 2015 email openly posing the potential for an underling in his office, Kim Bienvenu, to “sneak a smooch” from contractor Billy Broussard on his next-day visit to drop off a cashiers check.

Contractor Billy Broussard recently contacted us and spoke at length regarding this Advocate article wherein Attorney General Jeff Landry, who is Broussard’s cousin and served as his legal counsel regarding debris removal in the aftermath of Hurricane Rita, was the focus of attention regarding the handling of alleged sexual harassment transpiring in Landry’s office.  Broussard was particularly stunned at the apparent plans the article references that Landry and Pat McGee, Landry’s former hand-picked head of the Attorney General’s Criminal Division, to excuse McGee’s alleged sexual harassment as “merely joking around.”

Broussard sought an opportunity to appear on Sound Off Louisiana to call upon Landry who, along with co-counsel Robin Sylvester, flopped badly representing Broussard in District Count in Calcasieu Parish, to order the removal of Lake Charles attorney Russell J. “Rusty” Stutes, Jr. from any matter entailing Broussard.  Broussard seeks for Landry to have Stutes removed from matters entailing Broussard as a result him firing off  this April 23, 2015 email to an underling in his office, Kim Bienvenu, wherein Stutes suggests that she may be able to “sneak a smooch” from Broussard in the law office’s conference room the next day as Broussard comes to the office to deliver a check.  From the email:

From: Billy Broussard [email protected]
Subject: Re: Judgment
Date: April 24, 2015 at 1 :31 PM
To: [email protected]
I read your email from Rusty last night… What the heck is he talking about????

Sent from my ipad

On Apr 23, 2015, at 2:42 PM, “Russell J. Stutes, Jr.”
> wrote:

I assume you will be taking care of this and getting the check. Maybe you can sneak a smooch from him in the conference room.

—– Original Message —–
From: Billy Broussard [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, April 23, 2015 2:12 PM
To: Kim Bienvenu; Russell J. Stutes, Jr.; Laura Landry
Subject: Re: Judgment

I am planning on being in Lake Charles after lunch tomorrow can I come into your office so I can bring the cashiers check and get some sort of receipt?

Let’s take a few minutes to listen in on Broussard’s rationale for why he strongly believes Stutes should be removed from any legal matters entailing him as a result of the sending of that email on April 23, 2015:

Broussard engages in a Sound Off feature with founder Robert Burns on Thursday, March 25, 2021 entailing his thoughts on Stutes’ sending of that email and why he feels Attorney General Jeff Landry should insist upon the removal of Stutes from any legal matter pertaining to Broussard.

As Burns mentioned in the video above, on the very first Broussard Sound Off Louisiana feature, Burns was largely unfamiliar with Broussard’s whole plight.  That was a tad over four years ago.  As Burns states in the video above, he now likely could obtain a PhD on the “Billy Broussard Indian Bayou fiasco.”  That fact results from Broussard being the single most featured individual we’ve covered since Sound Off Louisiana‘s inception .  The bottom line is that, as Burns states on the video above, Broussard was “screwed, glued, and tattooed” out of over $1 million in debris removal reimbursement in the aftermath of Hurricane Rita.  Broussard hired then-private-citizen attorney Jeff Landry to represent him in legal efforts to obtain reimbursement.

In the early days of Burns’ extensive efforts to delve into Broussard’s plight, he discussed the matter with a very prominent Baton Rouge attorney whom we’re not going to name.  Burns suggested that perhaps this particular area of practice (i.e. contractor legal issues) may not have been Landry’s forte.  Burns then suggested to that attorney that, “It just may have been that Jeff Landry found himself in over his head.”  The attorney’s immediate response are words we’ll never forget!  He stated:  “Robert, Jeff Landry would be in over his head in small claims court!”

As Burns mentioned in the video above, mainly for the benefit of our newer subscribers, we’re now going to provide hyperlinks for the entire list of Broussard features in chronological order.  Subscribers and casual visitors are welcome to read/view as many or as few as desired.  They collectively tell an absolutely incredible story:

February 27, 2017:  Drainage Board legal counsel Rusty Stutes threatens to “report your fraud to the FBI” if Broussard does not back off making public records requests.

March 8, 2017:  14th JDC Judge David Ritchie advises Broussard to “choose your attorney carefully” rather than utilizing an attorney like Jeff Landry. [Sidebar:  In our opinion, demonstrating that sort of rank prejudicial commentary made by a state district judge regarding an attorney appearing before him, especially when uttered in open court (see bottom of second page here) ought to be grounds for the whole case to have been reheard by a different judge]!

May 1, 2018:  Former Calcasieu Parish DA John DeRosier testifies that, if Louisiana’s 10-person jury rule is “a vestige of slavery,” then, “it is what it is.” (Note:  The vast majority of this post focuses on Broussard and all of the extensive efforts to block any form of investigation into just what transpired entailing his cleanup operations in the aftermath of Hurricane Rita).

February 7, 2019:  Broussard conducts meeting with Legislative Auditor Daryl Purpera’s officials during which Jeffrey Jones FALSELY portrays himself as a FEMA employee when he is not!

February 10, 2019:  At that same Legislative Auditor’s meeting, Broussard stuns everyone in attendance by playing an audio tape of former GOHSEP Deputy Director Mark DeBosier stating (regarding the Legislative Auditor’s Office):  “They’ll just close their eyes, stick their fingers in their ears, and we make sure there’s no fingerprints on it.”

February 13, 2019:  Citing “crooked judges” as a factor, Broussard attorney Robin Sylvester terminates her representation of him.

March 7, 2019:  Frustrated with Sylvester’s sudden termination of her representation of Broussard, he sends her a certified letter demanding that she provide the name of her malpractice insurance carrier.

March 14, 2019:  When Sylvester would not provide her malpractice insurance carrier, Broussard filed an extensive complaint with the Louisiana Office of Disciplinary Counsel.

April 1, 2019:  Broussard is tersely denied a request for an agenda item to appear on the next Drainage Board public meeting.

November 11, 2019:  Former Calcasieu Parish DA John DeRosier was the focus of a major investigative feature outlining his office’s very obvious money-laundering operations entailing retail gift cards.  [Note:  The Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s Office has since stated that DeRoiser may have broken the law with his gift card program.]

December 5, 2019:  Broussard provides extensive rebuttal evidence to Sylvester’s response to his ODC complaint via yet more damning secret recordings of Sylvester when she was Broussard’s attorney.

March 24, 2020:  Contractor Billy Broussard uses Moon Griffon show to express dire need to insist upon accountability for Louisiana’s share of upcoming $1 trillion – $2 trillion in Corona Virus aid.

May 18, 2020:  In assessing Calcasieu Parish DA race to replace DeRosier, contractor Billy Broussard offers alternate take on Sen. Cortez’s emphasis on “innocent until proven guilty” entailing testimony of Shreveport dentist Ryan Haygood.

May 27, 2020:  Contractor Billy Broussard sounds off entailing AG Jeff Landry as he appeals ODC’s decision to drop complaint against attorney Robin Sylvester.

Broussard reiterated to us again once the video feature above concluded that, “I know exactly what happened here, and I am determined to clear my name!”  We don’t think anyone can question his resolve in that regard!

If you would like to be added to our Sound Off Louisiana email list to be notified of future posts, simply go to our home page and scroll to the bottom (mobile devices) or to the top of the right-hand column (desktops).  Supply your email address within the subscribe box.  You’ll then receive an automated email from Word Press, and all you have to do is click on the blue “confirm follow” bar contained within that email, and you’ll begin receiving great posts such as the preceding one above.

To say that our feature last week entailing three Louisiana State Police (LSP) troopers’ successful obtaining of a Temporary Restraining Order stopping the administrative investigations of their alleged use of excessive force, turning off of body cameras, and lying entailing prior arrests was our most viewed post ever in the history of Sound Off Louisiana is no understatement!

The reason for that is directly attributable to Associated Press reporter Jim Mustian directly linking our feature with his own the next day.  Mustian’s direct link, in turn, led to many other major national publications including a direct link to our feature as well.  A few examples include this Washington Post feature, this New York Daily News’ feature, and even far-flung publications like this Aljazerra feature, which not only directly linked our feature but even moved that link to the top of their own feature.

We’re only aware of one publication which chose to publish material on the matter without so much as referencing the first word that much of its material originated from us, and that would be this Advocate feature from our own hometown of Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Of course, we guess we shouldn’t be surprised at The Advocate’s slight of us given that it took a full week for The Advocate to even run with ANYTHING concerning our original feature exposing the Ronald Greene matter.  Mustian, who is a former Advocate reporter, immediately followed up our feature on Greene and, once coverage was appearing all over the world, apparently the top brass at The Advocate decided maybe an article on their part just may be in order!

We also gained a ton of subscribers from last week’s post, so we want to welcome all of our new subscribers.  We hope you’ll be happy with our features, and we also hope you’re quite content with the price of subscribing!  We promise, you won’t EVER see ANY form of advertising on this blog because we steadfastly will not accept advertising dollars, nor will we accept donations from our subscribers.

Of course, long-time subscribers may recall one anonymous follower of our blog who did send us a snail-mail letter stating that we could expect a monthly payment in the mail if we would merely agree to refrain from casting former Louisiana Gaming Control Board Chairman Ronnie Jones in a negative light.  In the preceding feature, we expressed appreciation for the offer,  but we also let whomever sent the anonymous letter and all other parties know that we’ll shut this blog down in a second before accepting a dime from anyone!  Simply put, we intend to report on the facts as we’re able to substantiate them without any regard for advertisers (since we won’t ever have any) or donors (again, because we won’t have any).

Now, just as The Advocate chose to deploy our material for the linked feature above, we’ll invite them to do the same for today’s feature because there was no reporter from The Advocate in 19th JDC Judge Ron Johnson’s courtroom earlier today to report upon his ruling entailing the troopers’ Temporary Restraining Order.

Much of the court arguments were repetitive of the Troopers’ Appeal Brief (though LSP attorney Faye Morrison argues it’s only “couched as an appeal,” and is, in reality, a direct attempt to impede LSP’s investigation and try to keep the troopers from losing their jobs), together with LSP’s Counter Brief.  For that reason, we’re going to repeat our video of each side’s arguments in full at the LSPC meeting of March 11, 2021 in the video below:

Entirety of arguments of Michael DuBos (troopers’ attorney) and counter arguments of LSP attorney Faye Morrison at LSPC meeting of March 11, 2021 regarding whether the LSPC has the authority to stop an administrative investigation due to rules violations regarding conducting such investigations.

As we originally reported, Judge Johnson asked for submissions of Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law by Monday, March 15, 2021, and he further indicated that he would make his ruling either on Tuesday, March 16, 2021 or Wednesday, March 17, 2021.  Instead, Judge Johnson chose to utilize an already-scheduled court hearing of today (Thursday, March 18, 2021) to make his final ruling.

Judge Johnson indicated that the Court “struggled” with the issue of exactly which venue (LSPC v. District Court) is appropriate for a matter wherein the Louisiana Legislature has granted exclusive jurisdiction to a body (in this case, the LSPC) versus potential “hybrid jurisdiction” when an allegation of Louisiana Constitutional Rights violations are asserted.  The troopers assert that, because the administrative investigation was not initiated within 14 days of LSP top brass becoming aware of the incidents, their rights have been violated.

Morrison countered that there have been no Louisiana Constitutional violations but rather only alleged violations of LSPC rules regarding the conducting of administrative investigations.  She emphasized that, while the LSPC has jurisdiction over the matter, the LSPC cannot grant the specific remedy being sought by the troopers, which is for the investigations to be stopped.  She indicated that, when an alleged violation of the rules is filed (i.e. a trooper appeals any discipline imposed by LSP Colonel Lamar Davis to the LSPC), the available remedies are for the LSPC to either reduce, modify, or reverse the discipline.

DuBos, who participated in the Court hearing via Zoom, countered that Morrison’s statement that, “the LSPC cannot grant the remedy,” sought by the troopers is a tacit admission that the LSPC lacks jurisdiction and therefore adjudication in 19th JDC is appropriate.  DuBos also argued that LSP asserts that the LSPC can only concern itself with appeals of discipline.  He thus emphasized, just as he did beginning at the 8-minute mark of the above video, that, in making that assertion, LSP is essentially saying that troopers must, “Wait ’til it’s all over.  Wait until everything has all happened, and then you can clean up the mess.  Let us do the damage then………”  Morrison countered emphatically that, “no trooper has the right not to be investigated for alleged wrongdoing!”

Judge Johnson also inquired what property rights have been violated that would rise to the level of a violation of Louisiana’s Constitution.  Morrison pounced all over that inquiry like a basketball power forward who’d just been provided a perfect lob just above the basket by a point guard as she wound up for the basketball-equivalent of a thunder-dunk (yeah, it’s March Madness time!).  Morrison emphasized to Judge Johnson in response to his inquiry that, “These troopers remain on their jobs.  They are not behind a desk or on patrol, but they are at their homes continuing to be paid for up to 400 hours of administrative leave.”  Morrison’s point is that there have been no property rights violations.

Those 400 hours of administrative leave would be the “taxpayer-funded vacations” that:  1) LSP Col. Lamar Davis lamented indicating that, “the public is having an outcry because, hey, police officers are being treated special;” and, #2) Belinda Parker-Brown, founder of Louisiana United International, voicing frustration that, “taxpayers are being burdened” with the costs of keeping rogue troopers on the job and they are being allowed, “to go on taxpayer-funded vacations for murdering innocent people.”

Judge Johnson rendered his decision in open court in stating that he, “simply cannot justify not permitting the agency to gather information and facts” pertinent to the incidents.  He therefore ruled to dissolve the Temporary Restraining Order but indicated that, if troopers feel after the matter is concluded that Constitutional rights have been violated, they may return to 19th JDC to take that issue up with the Court.  [Sidebar:  We may be wrong, but we believe there’s a statute that says an appeal of an LSPC ruling must go directly to the First Circuit Court of Appeal and thus bypass 19th JDC.]

Prior to issuing his ruling, Judge Johnson stated that the original Temporary Restraining Order had already been modified so as to lift the block that had arisen on eight (8) other administrative investigations presently underway by LSP entailing matters other than the three troopers DuBos represents but which arose as offshoot investigations from investigations of those same troopers.

So, barring an expeditious action by Col. Davis, we taxpayers could be in for yet another exhausting of 400 hours (10 weeks!) of paid administrative leave, exhausting of compensatory time, exhausting of time-and-a-half compensatory time, exhausting of annual leave and, if no action is taken after all that (as was the case for Michael Satcher and Kasha Domingue, who was FINALLY terminated two days ago), potentially leave without pay.

What should be obvious to anyone with even a modicum of intelligence is that Louisiana needs to operate its state government employment (including LSP troopers) the same way so many other states have for decades, which is to be an at-will employment state.

What’s happening is that taxpayers are being raped by state employees who feel emboldened to engage in activities which would get a private-sector employee fired in a nanosecond.  Davis makes that point at the link above, and the public is beyond fed up with it, but no elected official at the Louisiana State Legislature nor Gov. Edwards (who is probably as pro-state-employee, anti-taxpayer of a Governor to occupy the Mansion in the last 50 years!) seems inclined to do anything to fix the problem!

The results of our antiquated civil service system are matters such as we’ve illustrated over the last seven days entailing these three LSP troopers, and it is WAY BEYOND time that it be remedied for the average, everyday taxpayer in Louisiana!

If you would like to be added to our Sound Off Louisiana email list to be notified of future posts, simply go to our home page and scroll to the bottom (mobile devices) or to the top of the right-hand column (desktops).  Supply your email address within the subscribe box.  You’ll then receive an automated email from Word Press, and all you have to do is click on the blue “confirm follow” bar contained within that email, and you’ll begin receiving great posts such as the preceding one above.