Legal Question in Criminal Law in Louisiana

Re: Criminal law

Dear LawGuru Friend,

I do not know all of the situations where the Attorney General may handle a case filed by the District Attorney, or perhaps even the Attorney General, in a state district court in Louisiana; but for sure where the District Attorney has a conflict of interest, the D.A. can request that the state Attorney General enter the case on the district court level and prosecute the case. In one particular local case tha that I know of, the District Attorney was a personal friend of the defendant; so the Attorney General was called in to handle, and did so handle the prosecution of that case. There is more to it all than this, but this is something to think about.

Sincerely,

Hardy Parkerson, Atty.

Lake Charles, LA

Re: Criminal law

Mr. Parkerson is correct about conflicts of interest. This is the most common reason for recusal.

There are other reasons why a DA might prefer the Attorney General to handle a case. Sometimes the Attorney General might have staff available to handle matters that would be unusual for a smaller DA's office such as "white collar" offenses or environmental crimes. A rural District Attorney with five or fewer assistants might not have the rescources to handle something that unusual.