The Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office has been under fire from multiple directions. There are citizens’ groups calling for Sheriff Marlin Gusman’s resignation. Then there is the most recent update on the federal consent decree order—a report that has been interpreted and construed to spin different narratives depending on the storyteller. A recent legislative auditor’s report, among other things, contends ineligible OPSO employees have received supplemental pay, mentions questionable dealings by a deputy sheriff in the operation of his private security business, and points to an instance in which the sheriff’s office failed to properly apply public bid law for a renovation project at the old House of Detention. Now, there is a suit challenging urging a judge to place the Sheriff’s Office under receivership.
But Gusman says isn’t having it. He is defending his record and firing back.
Monday, May 9, he along with OPSO Chief of Corrections Carmen DeSadier sat down with The New Orleans Tribune for an exclusive interview:
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