a local blog is sporting a letter dated today (13 november 2008) from city of alexandria council president louis marshall to city of alexandria, la. mayor jacques roy and others.
as you can see below, council president marshall's letter is captioned "request for executive session" and is stamped "received nov 13 2008 mayor's office city of alexandria." so obviously this is the mayor's copy.
click here to download one page letter .pdf [235 kb]
click here to download one page complaint .pdf [217 kb]
the blogger who just happens to be a local attorney has responded by filing an open meetings law violation complaint to the rapides parish district attorney's office as well as to louisiana attorney general "buddy" caldwell.
unfortunately, the complainant doesnt explain in his letter or accompanying blog post exactly how, by statute, this letter is indicative of a "clear and open violation of the open meetings laws."
knowing the hi jinx of all this crew, like we do, the first thought that comes to mind is to wonder whether or not council president marshall was set up.
notice in his letter council president marshall writes that "after having several discussions with trey gist, i think it would be best to go ahead with the executive session..." trey gist is mr. howard b. gist, iii, esq. and long time city of alexandria, la. attorney. why didnt mr. gist advise council president marshall that such a meeting was a violation of louisiana's open meetings laws?
look at the instantaneousness of the letter and complaint being posted online. we suppose that the blogger could explain that he got the letter through a public records request but how would someone outside of alexandria city hall know of the existence of such a letter, especially -- within hours or minutes even; on the very day that it was drafted and sent?
so yeah this incident from top to bottom needs to be investigated; the louisiana attorney rules of professional conduct at rule 8.4 state that its professional misconduct for an attorney to:
(c) engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation;
(d) engage in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice;
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