State Supreme Court rules against post-conviction plea agreements | Louisiana

(The Center Square) — The Louisiana Supreme Court struck down a law that allowed the district attorneys to pardon violent offenders, saying the power of clemency rests solely with the governor’s office.

In the decision, the justices said since the law allowed a court to overturn a conviction without a finding of legal defect, it “unconstitutionally allows the judicial branch to exercise the governor’s exclusive pardon power, and, therefore violates the doctrine of separation of powers” provided by the state constitution.

“Crime is ravaging our state; and instead of doing more to increase public safety, some officials have been fueling the fire,” said Attorney General Jeff Landry in a news release. “I am proud to fight for crime victims; and today, we ensured they receive the justice they were promised.”

In 2021, the Legislature passed and Gov. John Bel Edwards signed into law Senate Bill 186, which allowed district attorneys to issue pardons to violent offenders without limitations. 

On Feb. 9, 2007, William Wayne Lee Jr. was convicted of second-degree murder and he was sentenced to life in prison. On Oct. 25, 2021, the defendant and Warren Montgomery – the district attorney for the 22nd Judicial District which covers St. Tammany and Washington parishes – came to a plea agreement after new evidence surfaced in May 2020 over the victim’s death, which would’ve bolstered the defense’s case. The charges were reduced to manslaughter and Lee’s sentence was reduced to 35 years in prison. 

In the decision, the justices also said the law “serves to upend the work of the jury, the prosecutor, and the judge in the trial of the case without identifying a legal defect in those proceedings.” 

On March 9, 2022, Landry filed a lawsuit saying that the plea agreement violated the governor’s exclusive right to clemency under the state constitution. 

A district court on June 15, 2022 ruled against Landry’s suit and he took it to the state Supreme Court, which reimposed the original conviction and sentence.