:)
Posted on 12/06/2006 5:58:36 PM PST by Ellesu
BAKERSFIELD - A Bakersfield man has been freed after more than a year "lost" in the chaos of the post Hurricane Katrina Louisiana jail system. Pedro Parra, 44, was booked into the New Orleans jail on Oct. 13, 2005 and not brought to court until last week. He never had a lawyer and no charges were filed against him. He was simply "lost" for 13 months, an Orleans Parish prosecutor admitted in expressing the parish's "profound apology."
"It's terrible," said the prisoner's lawyer, Daniel Rodriguez of Bakersfield. "It's just shocking. It’s just not forgivable for the system to ignore him and not afford him the basic rights of going to court."
Parra was arrested after an Oct. 13, 2005 bar fight in New Orleans. He was taken to a bus station that was being used as a jail after the city's legal infrastructure collapsed in the wake of the hurricane six weeks earlier. Somehow, his name never made it to a list of prisoners. He was shuffled from one jail to another, his questions to county employees ignored, his isolation deepened by his inability to speak English.
As he languished in the overcrowded conditions, his family in Bakersfield, without his income, lost their home. The only shelter they could afford was a rented trailer in an RV park. The oldest of his four daughters moved in with her boyfriend to lower the family's expenses.
Parra had little money on him, so the collect calls from Louisiana jails to family in Bakersfield were few. His wife tried to call the public defender's office in New Orleans, but it had been washed away in the storm. She was unable to make connection with any defense lawyers in the New Orleans area, Rodriguez said.
It all started when Parra closed his Bakersfield trucking business and headed to Alabama to work for a tree removal service. He ended up in New Orleans, where he got into a fight with co-workers. He was charged with aggravated battery and booked into the temporary jail called "Camp Greyhound." Then he was, the prosecutor said, "lost in the system" as hundreds of prisoners were moved between local jails in several parishes and to institutions run by the state prisons department.
He never was assigned a lawyer, but he spoke to other prisoners. One told his pro-bono defense attorney about Parra. That lawyer started asking questions, and Parra finally was brought to court last week.
The judge immediately released him from jail. Prosecutors have a month to decide what to do with the original charges against Parra. The Louisiana lawyer who discovered him in jail said that case can't go forward because Parra's right to a speedy trial had been violated.
Meanwhile, the Orleans Parish sheriff and the state prisons chief blamed each other for the situation.
He might have been able to help himself if he could have spoken English.
Trucking business? He had a pickup truck he hired out on weekends?
How does a man "local" to Louisiana NOT speak English...?
Ebonics?
My name...Jose Jimenez
Le prompt procès, mon bout.
:)
Creole? Nah. Likely he didn't care enough about himself of family to learn his "local" language. Or they're dancing around the words "illegal", "undocumented", or "pre-naturalized".
Crash helmet...I hope not!
I doubt that.
There are so many people in jail these days that it probably took him 13 months to find someone willing to listen to and act upon his story.
Sacré Dieu! Je déteste les crapauds français !
Español es una ramera también.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.