Louisiana news briefs

Police chief indicted for malfeasance, stalking
LEESVILLE (AP) — A Vernon Parish grand jury has indicted Rosepine Police Chief James “Dennis” Parrott on charges of malfeasance and felony stalking.
The grand jury last week formally charged Parrott with two felony charges of malfeasance in office, sexual conduct, along with one count each of felony stalking and malfeasance in office.
The 49-year-old Parrott, who recently won re-election, was arrested in August after an investigation into criminal complaints against him. Parrott was accused of stalking his estranged wife and using the department’s database to illegally run a license plate number.

‘Blue dog’ artist’s hometown blue for Christmas memorial
NEW IBERIA (AP) — Some people have griped that New Iberia’s Christmas lights are too subdued this year, but the blue lights lining trees, store windows and other decorations on Main Street are a quiet memorial to hometown artist George Rodrigue, whose blue dog paintings became internationally famous.
Rodrigue died a year ago.
It’s a temporary change from white lights lining trees, store windows and other decorations, Phyllis Mata of the Magic on Main committee said.
“I think the decorations are what’s needed, as a one-time theme for one of our favorite citizens,” Mata said. “When the idea came up, I loved it, and still do. The idea of honoring George Rodrigue, I felt, was an important one. Important to his family and to New Iberia.”
Son Jacques Rodrigue said, “Dad never forgot his New Iberia roots. He always said if he wasn’t from New Iberia he may never had started painting to begin with. The uniqueness of the culture and the landscape really inspired him to start to start painting.”

LSU Law Center offers buyouts to cut budget
BATON ROUGE (AP) — LSU’s Law Center is offering an incentive to seven professors if they retire next summer as it looks to cut costs amid a dwindling interest in law schools nationally.
The professors, all older than 65 and tenured faculty members, have until Monday to decide whether they will retire June 30 and get paid a bonus of roughly a year’s salary in return.
Law Center Chancellor Jack Weiss told a recent LSU Board of Supervisors meeting that the cuts are part of a necessary effort to provide additional financial flexibility for the Law Center.
The LSU Law Center’s fall 2014 enrollment is about 570 students.
The LSU Law Center’s tuition has gone up. Tuition today is about $20,997 a year.

Police say marijuana sold from
snow-cone stand
OPELOUSAS (AP) — Police say a snow-cone stand less than half a mile from an elementary school and two blocks from a church apparently was selling more than cool treats.
Opelousas authorities say highly potent marijuana also was being sold from T&E Soul Food and Sno-Balls.
After weeks of investigation by St. Landry Parish narcotics agents, Sgt. Clay Higgins says 37-year-old Jermaine D. Doucet and 32-year-old Bryant C. Fields were arrested last week.
Higgins says agents seized an undisclosed amount of hydroponic marijuana, a high-potency type of weed that’s grown indoors without soil.
He says there’s no evidence the weed was sold to children.
Doucet and Fields were booked with marijuana possession, drug paraphernalia possession and possessing illegal narcotics within a drug-free zone.

Woman pleads guilty to tossing daughter from car
WINNSBORO (AP) — A Franklin Parish woman could spend 28 years in jail after pleading guilty to what prosecutors called a “heinous crime.”
LaSasha Allen, 24, of Winnsboro, entered a guilty plea last Thursday to a charge of second-degree cruelty to a juvenile.
According to the Franklin Parish Sheriff’s Office, Allen placed her 20-month-old daughter in an unrestrained position in a car in June and opened the car’s door while rounding a curve. The child fell from the vehicle and sustained multiple injuries, including a broken arm, skull fracture and abrasions.
Mack Lancaster, district attorney for the 5th Judicial District, called Allen’s actions a “heinous crime.”

Ascension Parish schools win discrimination case
GONZALES (AP) — A federal judge has ruled that the public school assignment plan on the east bank of Ascension Parish does not discriminate against minority students or deny them educational opportunities offered to other students in the parish.
The ruling, issued last week, settles a 6-year-old civil rights lawsuit filed against the school board by Darrin Kenny Lewis Sr., the father of two black children who were once in the East Ascension High School feeder system.
In a 41-page ruling dissecting the plaintiffs’ case, which was the subject of a three-day bench trial in February, U.S. District Chief Judge Brian Jackson in Baton Rouge found the plaintiffs’ evidence of discrimination wanting and ruled for the School Board, upholding the parish’s school assignment plan.

New Orleans police: Many rape kits just in storage
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — New Orleans police say that only about half of more than 400 untested rape kits may need testing.
In a Saturday news release, police Superintendent Michael Harrison said that the department is storing 220 of 429 kits. Most of the stored kits are from people who got tested by medical personnel but declined to get the police involved.
The untested rape kits were disclosed during a New Orleans City Council hearing Thursday that examined failings in the department’s handling of rapes and child abuse. They can be important elements in an investigation, especially when a victim is attacked by a stranger and DNA is essential.
“We are committed to clearing the backlog of sexual assault kits that require testing once and for all and we are actively putting systems of accountability in place to ensure it never happens again,” Harrison said in a statement.
He said in the release that in 2010, the city decided to store kits indefinitely in case a victim wants to seek prosecution later.

Funding for pre-K revamp uncertain
BATON ROUGE (AP) — Despite landing a $32 million federal grant this month, child care advocates say they are stumped on how Louisiana will pay for sweeping changes in its early childhood education system.
Jonathan Pearce, president of the Child Care Association of Louisiana, said money is the biggest issue, and right now, there is no
The worries focus on a 2012 law pushed by Gov. Bobby Jindal.
It is supposed to replace a preschool setup that critics contend is plagued by inequities in funding and quality and is confusing to parents.
But the measure became law without any appropriation attached, and backers have spent months asking how the state can provide better-qualified teachers, serve more children and offer better oversight without additional dollars.
The issue surfaced again last week during a joint meeting of the House and Senate Education committees.
State Superintendent of Education John White, responding to questions, said four options are worth exploring.
He said they include raising private dollars and reallocating existing state resources.
White said local districts can also blend a wide range of state and federal aid to offer more seats to 4-year-old students from impoverished homes, which he said has been done well in the West Baton Rouge Parish and West Feliciana Parish school districts.
“Of course, the state has no money,” White said in an interview a few days later.
State services face a $1.4 billion shortfall for the financial year that begins on July 1 to maintain spending at current levels.
That means any kind of major funding injection for early childhood education is highly unlikely in 2015 and probably beyond that.
The state recently landed a federal grant of up to $32 million to provide new and improved classes for about 10,500 youngsters in New Orleans and elsewhere. However, the assistance in the first of four years is just $2.4 million, and it applies only to 4-year-olds.
“That will be very helpful, so that is great,” said Melanie Bronfin, executive director of the Policy Institute for Children in New Orleans. “But that is just the tip of the iceberg.”
Bronfin has been sounding alarms for nearly a year about how the early childhood overhaul will be financed.