Nickey Picard will surely be shaking his head even harder today.
On Monday The Independent reported in the story “Pope & His Posse” that records obtained in late January from the Lafayette Parish Sheriff’s Office revealed that Lafayette City Marshal Brian Pope had deputized 72 individuals since taking over the position in January 2015. The overwhelming majority of them are reserve deputies who are supposed to serve as a support staff for full-time deputies.
“That’s 10 times what I had,” Picard, Pope’s predecessor who served for three decades, told The IND for that story. Pope, however, provided The IND with the names of only 64 individuals for that same time period.
Picard, by contrast, swore in a total of seven deputies in his last two years in office, the LPSO’s records show.
When asked in an early March why his deputy numbers didn’t jibe with those from the LPSO, which as a courtesy printed the deputies’ commission cards for Pope (a courtesy Pope appears to no longer be taking advantage of), the marshal responded in a written statement that the Lafayette Parish Clerk of Court, which administers the oath to the deputies, and the Louisiana secretary of state “maintain the master listing of all commissioned deputies.” Pope also said in the statement that he was “not privy to any alleged commissioned deputy list generated by the [LPSO].” In fact, the marshal said he got the list he provided the paper from the clerk’s office.
In effect, if names were missing, it wasn’t his fault. And he didn’t seem to care, likely because he long ago lost track. Ironically, Pope’s own new website states that the office has “up to ten reserve deputies at one time.”
Records obtained Tuesday from the clerk’s office show just how short his numbers fall, revealing 20 more names than Pope submitted to the paper on Jan. 21. Perhaps more disturbing is that the record-breaking pace of commissioning deputies — nothing more than political patronage when it comes to the bulk of the reserves — has continued since The IND began inquiring about the commissions in January. Eleven of those missing 20 were commissioned after the paper submitted its original public records request in mid-January, leaving nine unaccounted for in Pope’s initial response.
According to the clerk’s records, Marshal Pope, who is under grand jury investigation for his actions related to a public records dispute with this paper, has now sworn in a whopping 84 deputies.
[Editor's Note: In fairness to the full-time deputy marshals, we have adjusted this list to reflect their status. Their names (the ones provided to this paper by the marshal in late January) now appear in bold face. The IND submitted a public records request to the marshal on Aug. 3 to determine if any of the more recently commissioned marshals are full-time employees. We will update the list once he responds.]
- Charles Clause 2. Steven L. Dunn 3. Floyd Antley 4. Jeffrey Mahler 5. Shane Duplechin 6. Allan Roger 7. Rodney Paul LeBlanc 8. Sallie Spears 9. Darlene Noel 10. Julie Albarado
- Philip Conrad 12. Amber Vincent Hatley 13. Dean Harry Paul Morgan 14. Jean Paul Broussard 15. Nathan G. Broussard 16. Kevin R. Poirrier 17. William R. Delahoussaye 18. Ernest Roy Payne Jr. 19. Kimberly G. Guidry (resigned) 20. Armound J. Alwert 21. Emma Ray Hebert (Ret.) 22. Shaquille O’Neal 23. Michael McQuade 24. Bobby Rhyne 25. Myron Fonseca 26. Victor Rodriguez 27. Brandon Briscoe 28. Charles Burnell 29. Derrick D. Mallet 30. Michael D. Mallet 31. Ernest J. Guilbeau 32. Darville Jolivette (Ret.) 33. Joseph Milton Benoit (Ret.) 34. Taufiq M. Sekhani 35. Kyler Folse 36. Sanford Menard 37. Tim Breaux 38. Chris Wadlington (resigned) 39. Billy Barrett Jr. 40. Brian Doiron 41. Raney Redmond 42. Brannon Decou 43. Kevin Mire 44. Jacob Williamson 45. Kenneth Franques 46. Frank Michael DiBenedetto 47. Oren Haydel 48. Joseph Allgood 49. Chris Starling 50. Keith Talamo 51. Gregory Scott Carriere 52. Lane Cortez
- Joseph R. Calliet Jr. 54. Ronald J. Mahtook 55. Madeline Domingue Breaux 56. Ricky Carmelo Williams 57. Thomas Gregory LeBlanc 58. Francis Fontenot 59. Arif Shad 60. Virginia Lee 61. Mark B. Chaisson 62. Daniel Viator 63. Nolvey Stelly Jr. 64. Michael E. McKinney 65. Karli Brooke Haydel 66. Robert Scott McElligott 67. William Howard McElligott 68. Gary P. Copes 69. Sean Paul Stelly 70. Troy M. Venable 71. Kevin Porrier
- Leroy Calais
- Tyrell Fenroy 74. Knowles Leroy Jones 75. David Menard 76. Robert G. Cormier 77. Tommy Caillier 78. Rene Prejean 79. Glen Clay Higgins 80. Harold Wax 81. Clarence Glenn 82. Brennan Miller 83. April Lavergne 84. Paul Marion Toce III