Asylum Seekers Are Being “Disappeared” in Private Louisiana Jails
(Some names in this story have been changed to protect those criminalized for migration.) There isn’t much to see around
Louisiana
Petrochemical Giants Are Slowly Killing Black Louisiana Communities
Milton Cayette Jr. has just returned from a birthday party at the senior center in Welcome, one of the unincorporated hamlets nestled beside the earthen levee running along the east bank of the Mississippi River in the 5th District of Louisiana’s St. James Parish. Sitting in the kitchen of his home, Cayette begins listing the petrochemical facilities in the area, starting about five miles upriver near the Sunshine Bridge, where a chemical plant run by the company Mosaic produces diammonium phosphate and ammonia. Next door another plant produces styrene, a chemical used to make rubbers and plastics.
Court: Non-Unanimous Jury Verdict Unconstitutional Based On Racism
A district court in Louisiana ruled the state’s use of non-unanimous juries is unconstitutional and violates the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment. The court found the “non-unanimous jury verdict scheme in Louisiana was motivated by invidious racial discrimination.” “All cases that are currently pending trial and all cases on direct review must now be adjudicated subject ot a unanimous jury requirement,” the court ordered. However, prior cases and convictions may not be challenged. According to the state’s constitution and a section of the state’s criminal code, cases involving capital punishment require a unanimous decision by jurors.
‘Major Victory’: Legal Challenge Halts Construction Of Bayou Bridge Pipeline
While celebrating the win, activists noted that “construction of the Bayou Bridge Pipeline continues in other parts of the Atchafalaya Basin” and vowed to keep fighting to completely shut down the project. In a “major victory” for local landowners and pipeline activists who are fighting to block the Bayou Bridge Pipeline in Louisiana, the company behind the project agreed to halt construction on a patch of private property just ahead of a court hearing that was scheduled for Monday morning. The path of the 163-mile pipeline runs through Atchafalaya Basin, the nation’s largest wetland and swamp. Local landowners and activists have raised alarm about the threat the pipeline poses to regional water resources, wildlife, and communities.
Forcible Arrest Of Water Protectors At Illegal Pipeline Construction Site In Louisiana
Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) is the same company responsible for the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL), which was met with significant resistance from the local indigenous population in North Dakota as well as from their allies from across the country. ETP and its hired security frequently engaged in violent tactics against peaceful Water Protectors on the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota, with the help of both local police and police from surrounding states. If completed, the Bayou Bridge Pipeline (BBP) will connect with the DAPL system. The BBP is slated to transport crude oil originating from the Bakken Oil fields of North Dakota. The pipeline is to run 162 miles from southeast Texas to St. James, Louisiana. The oil transported would enter international markets.
Louisiana Law Enforcement Officers Are Moonlighting For A Controversial Pipeline Company
Pipeline protester Cindy Spoon was trying to stop Energy Transfer Partners’ heavy tree-cutting equipment from coming onto a pristine cypress forest-covered island in Louisiana’s Atchafalaya Basin. As she paddled in the bayou on Aug. 9, fan boats roared around her, blowing her canoe backward and kettling her in a smaller bayou. Within minutes, Spoon and fellow activist Sophia Cook-Phillips were handcuffed and yanked out of the canoe by armed officers who refused to fully identify themselves. “What law enforcement agency are you with and where are you taking me?” Spoon asked repeatedly, her voice cracking and growing increasingly frantic as she was pulled up a steep embankment and dragged onto Energy Transfer Partners’ Bayou Bridge pipeline easement.
Pipeline Protest Arrests Raise Questions About Controversial Louisiana Law
An oil pipeline developer and local authorities in Louisiana are using a controversial new law to crack down on protests there, with at least nine people arrested this month within weeks of the law's entry into force. So far, none of the protesters has been formally charged with a crime, and their arrests are raising questions about the ambiguity of the law. The arrests include three separate incidents. In the first, three activists were pulled off a canoe and a kayak in a bayou on Aug. 9. Four more people, including a journalist, were detained on Aug. 18 on private property. Two more were arrested the following day at the same location. Louisiana law requires that anyone arrested go before a judge within 72 hours for a hearing where bond can be set.
[Act Out! 170] – #RiseTogether Against Dirty Energy + How To Hack Apathy
This week on Act Out! The #RiseTogether weeks of action against dirty energy projects and their financiers continue, and I share what I witnessed in the swamps of Louisiana as the fight against the Bayou Bridge Pipeline escalates. Next, Dr. Kristin Laurin joins us to talk rationalization and the power of human psychology in addressing – and indeed, not addressing the greatest socio-political problems of our time.
Years After EPA Cited Health Risks From Chemical Plant, Is Enough Being Done To Protect Its Louisiana Neighbors?
What should be done about a chemical plant in Louisiana’s St. John the Baptist Parish that releases chloroprene — a chemical so toxic that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) determined nearby residents face the highest risk in the country of developing cancer from air pollution? The answer is simple, according to Retired Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré: “Fix it, move it, or shut it down.” Honoré is founder of the Green Army, a coalition of environmental groups and concerned citizens fighting against pollution in their communities. But local, state, and federal regulators haven’t resolved issues swirling around emissions released by the Denka Performance Elastomer plant, located in LaPlace, Louisiana. The plant is next to the Mississippi River, on a stretch of land between New Orleans and Baton Rouge known as Cancer Alley.
Indigenous And Environmental Water Protectors Fight To Block Louisiana Pipeline
Half an hour outside of Lafayette, Louisiana — almost three hours west of New Orleans — the proposed route of the Bayou Bridge pipeline crosses the road. It’s a seemingly minor bend in the crooked path of a 162.5-mile pipeline that, if completed, would snake underground from Lake Charles near the Texas border to St. James in “Cancer Alley” — the dense stretch of refineries and other petrochemical facilities lining the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans. But this bend matters to Cherri Foytlin, a Diné (Navajo) and Cherokee activist, journalist and mother, whose organization owns the small plot of land around which the pipeline’s route skirts. Here, a few small structures and a long line of tents make up the L’Eau Est La Vie (“Water Is Life”) resistance camp.
Tree Sits Established To Stop Bayou Bridge Pipeline
Deep in the Atchafalaya Basin, one of the largest swamps in North America, tree-sits have been established directly on the path of the Bayou Bridge Pipeline. Water protectors are currently occupying multiple sits on the pipeline easement. We have petitioned, filed lawsuits and demonstrated. We have carried out nearly 50 worksite actions. But despite these efforts, construction of the Bayou Bridge Pipeline has continued. We are left with no other choice but to put our bodies, and our lives on the line to stop this pipeline. The tree-sitters and their support team are living in inhospitable conditions, with limited resources and under close watch of Energy Transfer Partners. THEY NEED YOUR SUPPORT.
Louisiana Residents Arrested For Delivering Judge’s Orders To Stop Bayou Bridge Construction
(St. James) Twenty Water Protectors brought construction of the Bayou Bridge pipeline to a halt this morning in St. James Parish, an area where the pipeline company is currently under a judge’s orders to stop construction. Bayou Bridge LLC has defied Judge Alvin Turner’s order to halt construction, not only continuing construction in the fragile coastal zone but accelerating it. Water Protectors intervened today to enforce the law that the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources is failing to enforce. Two women were arrested at the site. “St. James residents haven’t been listened to,” said Alicia Cooke, a Water Protector with 350 New Orleans who was arrested in this morning’s civil disobedience. “We’ve been fighting this pipeline on every level through every legal means for over a year. I’m not sure how many more ways Louisianans can say we don’t want this or need this. Our bodies are on the line, because that’s all we have left.” A video of the morning’s events is available here.
Under Louisiana Bill, Peaceful Protesters Could Face 20 Years In Prison
"It's a good bill," he said, then motioned for favorable passage. Ninety-seven legislators voted yay, three voted nay, and just like that, all 4.6 million residents of Louisiana took a step toward losing their First Amendment rights. Should the bill become law, it would impose severe penalties on peaceful protesters engaged in nonviolent civil disobedience actions at sites considered "critical infrastructure" by Thibaut's bill. In fact, simply planning to take such an action, considered "conspiracy" by HB 727, could be punishable by fees of up to $10,000 and prison sentences as long as 20 years. With the crack of a gavel, Louisiana joined the growing number of states across the nation with similar "critical infrastructure" bills moving swiftly through the courts and onto governors' desks.
A Death In Louisiana’s Cancer Alley Reinforces Small Town’s Fears Of Industry Impacts
Sixty-year-old Keith Hunter lived in St. James, Louisiana, for roughly 27 years, and during that time, he watched as the sugarcane farms gave way to oil storage tanks and as a railroad terminal was being built down the road, all visible from his front yard. Hunter was an outspoken critic of the industrialization of his neighborhood. And in a similar fashion as some of his neighbors, Hunter died on February 10 following a respiratory illness. The town of St. James lies in St. James Parish, about 50 miles west of New Orleans. Despite its location along a stretch of Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge known as both the “Petrochemical Corridor” and “Cancer Alley,” St. James remained partially rural until fairly recently. In 2014 the parish adopted a land use plan, which allowed industrial development along the Mississippi River in a portion of St. James known as District 5.
Bayou Bridge Protesters Arrested As Louisiana Advances Bill Toughening Penalties For Pipeline Protests
On Thursday, April 5, opponents of the Bayou Bridge pipeline attempted to shut down its construction by blocking an industrial supply company’s facility in Iowa, Louisiana, just outside of Lake Charles on the same day a bill spelling out harsher penalties for pipeline protesters was advanced to committee during the Louisiana legislative session. For about two hours starting at 6:30 a.m., roughly 20 protesters blocked the entrance to Yak Mat, an industrial yard that supplies access mats used to create temporary roadways at pipeline construction sites and enable trucks to pass through muddy areas. The site is close to the starting point of the Bayou Bridge pipeline, which spans south Louisiana from Lake Charles, near the Texas border, to St. James, along the Mississippi River.