MacArthur Justice Center Louisiana

06/24/2025

“A 2021 study by the MacArthur Justice Center found that [ShotSpotter] triggered more than 40,000 police deployments in Chicago over a 21-month period that led to no evidence of any gun-related crime. Civil rights advocates argue that the technology reinforces biased policing patterns with little proven benefit.”

New Orleans police are testing a new gunshot detection system. Will it work?

03/12/2025

In the third of three exonerations based on Dr. West’s false bite-mark “matches,” the Mississippi Supreme Court wrote that the court “should not uphold a conviction and death sentence on the testimony of a proven unreliable witness, Dr. West.” Louisiana should not execute a man who was convicted based on this same discredited expert’s bad science.

Bite mark identification analysis is a discipline that has been called into question.

02/13/2025

"The death penalty not only takes away the life of the person strapped to the table - it takes away a little bit of the humanity in each of us."

-Clint Smith, a poet and scholar who works as a staff writer at The Atlantic

A Rapides Parish man could be the first person Louisiana puts to death in 15 years after the district attorney there obtained a warrant Monday for his ex*****on.

09/13/2024

We are proud to have successfully sued officials of the Louisiana Department of Corrections—including the then-Secretary on behalf of five men who stood up for their rights to release. This new report explains that our work isn’t done yet.

As the article states, “In 2023, the Department of Justice found the state regularly violated the Constitution by detaining people for too long. For a period in 2022, 1 in 4 inmates were held past their release dates, federal investigators said, estimating that such errors cost the state $2.5 million a year as it paid to continue housing inmates.”

As attorney William Most said in the article, “Doing time in prison is hard. But it is even harder to be in prison when you know you should be free — and no one will tell you when you are going to get out."

For years, inmates have been held past their release dates.

07/24/2024

For far too long, the prison telecom industry has preyed on incarcerated people and their loved ones by charging exorbitant rates for calls and video visits.

This is great news.

The changes are expected to save incarcerated people and their families at least $500 million a year in exorbitant phone and video call fees.

04/11/2024

WE'RE HIRING: The MacArthur Justice Center seeks a seasoned, strategic, and creative Director of Communications to lead our communications team. They will oversee all aspects of MJC’s comms, including media relations, issue-based campaigns, thought leadership, events and partnerships, rapid response, and overall visibility. This senior-level role will lead communications across our expansive list of cases, campaigns, and initiatives.

APPLY HERE: macarthurjustice.org/career/director-of-comms/

03/29/2024

“Using rigorous statistical and experimental control methods, both economics and criminal justice studies have consistently found that there is no evidence for deterrence of violent crimes in states that allow capital punishment.”

Capital punishment must come to an end. It does not deter crime, is not humane and has no moral or medical basis

02/26/2024

“Current state law has some exceptions to qualified immunity. Plaintiffs can defeat an immunity claim if they can show an officer’s acts were criminal, malicious, intentional or negligent. Bacala’s proposal dilutes those exceptions by eliminating negligence as an exception and requires a plaintiff to prove an officer committed criminal, fraudulent or intentional misconduct.”

The Louisiana House passed a bill to make it significantly more difficult to sue police officers who injure or kill someone or violate their civil rights.

02/21/2024

The officer is accused of sexually assaulting an 11-year-old boy.

"These are not the first troubling allegations that have come out of the infamous Brave Cave that the department and the FBI are now investigating. The facility was permanently closed back in August after the WAFB I-TEAM first exposed beatings and illegal strip searches that were allegedly carried out there."

A new federal lawsuit filed Tuesday, February 20, 2024 details new sexual assault allegations that reportedly happened inside the Brave Cave back in June 2023.

02/20/2024

“Crime rates have fallen in Louisiana…. A return to warehousing nonviolent offenders would only cost state taxpayers more money and not impact overall public safety.”

Policy researchers cautioned Louisiana lawmakers to make decisions based on actual crime data rather than on gut feelings and anecdotes.

12/18/2023

“The NOPD consent decree, in the view of these troopers, is a toxic thing that prevents cops from being cops, as if they have to choose between following the Constitution and policing," said Elizabeth Cu***ng, a MacArthur Justice Center Louisiana attorney who has represented people in abuse cases against Louisiana State Police.

Three years after Louisiana State Police quietly pulled out of New Orleans, a return of troopers in force appears close at hand.

12/11/2023

"The 2017 law made some nonviolent offenders eligible for parole earlier and overhauled drug sentencing to allow lighter sentences. By lowering Louisiana’s incarceration rate, which is still the highest in the country, the law generated millions of dollars in savings, much of which was invested in reentry programs."

Gov. John Bel Edwards remarks as Gov.-elect Jeff Landry, who has criticized the 2017 reforms, gets ready to take office in January.