Debate centered around competing visions: whether to provide imprisoned people more second chances or to toughen their penalties.
Family members of murder victims wept, lawmakers’ voices broke and advocates packed into committee rooms as the state Legislature advanced over a dozen bills backed by Gov. Jeff Landry that aim to toughen penalties for a slew of crimes.
Those bills — which passed out of legislative committees Tuesday — seek to expand execution methods in the state to include by nitrogen gas and electrocution, toughen penalties for carjacking, put 17-year-olds in the adult justice system and let people carry concealed handguns without permits, among over a dozen others.
Some Democrats tried to slow Landry’s priorities on the second day of the Republican governor’s special crime session by voting against some of his favored bills and delivering impassioned speeches. Landry’s legislation still sailed through the State Capitol on Tuesday, a day of emotional debate that showcased the strength of Republicans’ tough-on-crime agenda in Louisiana’s increasingly conservative statehouse.
“Today was a big win for victims, Louisiana families and our law enforcement,” Landry said in a statement.
Debate over those bills often centered around competing views of how Louisiana should approach crime: by providing imprisoned people more second chances or by toughening their penalties.
Wayne Guzzardo, whose daughter, Stephanie, was slain in 1995 by death row inmate Todd Wessinger, told the House Administration of Criminal Justice Committee how he has fought for nearly 30 years to see Wessinger’s sentence carried out.
“While Todd Wessinger is on death row, he gets to see his mother and father,” Guzzardo said, banging his hand on the table. “He gets to talk to them. Me and my wife go to the cemetery to talk to our daughter’s grave. She doesn’t talk back.”
Death penalty methods
The death penalty bill, House Bill 6, drew dozens of opponents and supporters for a debate that stretched several hours. But it ultimately advanced out of the criminal justice committee without objection in a committee that includes nine Republicans and five Democrats.
“It’s horrific to me that there were no objections to that bill,” said Rep. Aimee Freeman, D-New Orleans.
Louisiana has not executed anyone since 2010. In the eight years he served as Louisiana’s attorney general, Landry railed against then-Gov. John Bel Edwards for failing to surmount a shortage of lethal injection drugs that had halted executions. Landry advocated for using nitrogen gas, hanging, electrocutions and firing squads to address that issue.
The bill advanced Tuesday, carried by Rep. Nicholas Muscarello, R-Hammond, would let the state use nitrogen gas and electrocution to execute death row prisoners. In an interview, though, Muscarello said Landry's "preferred method" for carrying out executions remains lethal injection.
Parts of the bill that aim to shield drug manufacturers from scrutiny will make it easier to secure those drugs, potentially allowing the state to forgo using nitrogen hypoxia or electrocution in the future, Muscarello said.
He and other supporters — including Landry — say restoring the death penalty would fulfill a promise to carry out justice in the form determined by judges and juries who handed up capital sentences.
Nitrogen gas has gained favor among death penalty supporters after Alabama executed Kenny Smith, convicted of a 1998 murder-for-hire killing, using that method last month. But the new method has drawn scrutiny from anti-death penalty advocates over eyewitness accounts of Smith’s death, with a lawsuit filed in Alabama federal court Tuesday describing it as a “botched” human experiment.
"It was more violent than any previous execution I’d witnessed in Alabama," Lee Hedgepeth, an Alabama journalist who viewed Smith’s execution as well as four previous attempted executions, said in an interview. Hedgepeth said he watched as Smith rocked his gurney until it shook, then appeared to struggle for air. He died after 22 minutes.
Post-conviction appeals
The committee took up the death penalty bill after over an hour of debate over another measure, House Bill 4, that would tighten limits on post-conviction appeals for prisoners. Sponsored by Rep. Julie Emerson, R-Carencro, the bill would halve the time that prisoners have to request relief after discovering new information to back their claims, reducing it to one year. The bill would also prevent those who pleaded guilty from seeking post-conviction relief.
Emerson pitched the bill as a way to mete out justice more quickly for those with valid claims, while preventing repetitive or unfounded requests from clogging the court systems.
But Innocence Project New Orleans Executive Director Jee Park argued the bill could cause “frivolous” claims to be filed only to meet the new, shortened deadline, and would exclude a large percentage of people from arguing their innocence: nearly 25% of people who are exonerated have pleaded guilty to the crime, she said, citing national data.
Sullivan Walter, who was exonerated from a rape he did not commit after serving 36 years in prison, told the committee, “I believe that everybody deserves a chance at proving their innocence.” But with only a year to offer their evidence, he predicted, many wouldn’t.
The criminal justice committee approved the bill on an 8-6 vote. In all, the panel advanced five of Landry’s favored bills.
Concealed handguns, treating 17-year-olds as adults
The governor’s priorities progressed at a similar clip in the upper chamber. Republicans on the Senate Judiciary C Committee passed six more measures Tuesday that they said would reduce crime, brushing aside criticisms that their claims were unfounded.
Passage of the legislation shows that “people think their representatives are serious about wanting to do something about public safety,” Sen. Jay Morris, R-Monroe and the committee chairman, said in an interview afterward.
One high-profile measure would reverse 2019’s Raise the Age Act by no longer allowing district attorneys to charge 17-year-olds as juveniles. It is Senate Bill 3 by Sen. Heather Cloud, R-Turkey Creek. Tony Clayton, the district attorney of Iberville, Pointe Coupee and West Baton Rouge parishes, said 40% of the crime committed in his area is by 16- and 17-year-olds.
“Why? Because they don’t care,” Clayton told the committee members.
Opponents said existing laws allow prosecutors to charge those accused of violent offenses as adults but that 17-year-olds accused of lesser crimes should be rehabilitated rather than sent to prison with hardened criminals.
A second high-profile measure would allow people to carry a concealed weapon without obtaining a permit first, as current law requires.
“This bill is trying to put law-abiding citizens on equal footing,” said Sen. Blake Miguez, R-New Iberia, sponsor of Senate Bill 1. Senate Bill 2, which would limit civil liability for people who use handguns if they have concealed carry permits, also cleared the Senate’s Judiciary B Committee.
Angelle Bradford, legislative leader for the Louisiana chapter of Moms Demand Action, said the need for permitting is shown by 1,000 applicants being denied a permit in Louisiana in 2022.
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