Louisiana’s attorney general and a state senator have urged residents not to pay tickets issued by a constable in West Baton Rouge Parish, arguing that they were an illegally issued “money grab.”
Ward 2Constable Ron Tetzel allegedly issued thousands of tickets to the parish’s residents unfairly, according to Unfiltered With Kiran (UWK). State Sen. Caleb Kleinpeter brought the issue to light and referred to the scheme as a blatant abuse of authority.
During a phone interview with UWK, Kleinpeter explained that he started investigating the matter after receiving a slew of complaints from his constituents. “This is nothing but a money grab,” he said. “Nothing was being accomplished by this, like if you had an impaired driver or a kid unrestrained. [The officers] couldn’t have done anything because they didn’t have a vehicle. They were out there on foot, hiding behind signs,” the lawmaker said.
Tetzel issued the speeding tickets near Lukeville Elementary School using a handheld radar gun and later mailed the citations to drivers in violations of Louisiana’s Act 103, according to the report.
The law says local authorities may only use these devices in school zones during designated hours on school days. Moreover, cooperative agreements must be formed between school boards and municipalities to share revenue from the tickets. Yet, no such agreement existed in this case, according to Kleinpeter. “They were told if you operate within the parameters of the statute then you can clearly do it, and they weren’t,” he told UWK.