Perceived criminal-court caseloads vary wildly across parishes
With no uniform definition of what makes a ‘case,’ legislators must blindly guess at court caseloads.
Author: Katy Reckdahl
- About Katy Reckdahl
- Katy Reckdahl is The Lens’ editor. Reckdahl was a staff reporter for The Times-Picayune and the alt-weekly Gambit before spending a decade as a freelancer, writing frequently for the New Orleans Advocate | Times-Picayune, The New York Times and the Washington Post.
Did faulty court data drive the legislative push to cut 11 judges and clerk in Orleans Parish?
Filings tracked by the Louisiana Supreme Court significantly undercount the number of people processed in Orleans Parish Criminal District Court in 2025.
Louisiana income has hovered near nation’s lowest for 50 years now
Louisiana income ranked third-lowest in the nation in 1970 and has maintained that rank. Higher incomes are tied to levels of education, foreign-born population, and — in New Orleans — being white.
‘I’ll fight for your rights like I fought for my own freedom’
Calvin Duncan, an uncommon man with an all-too-common story, is vying to become clerk of Orleans Parish Criminal District Court – and his campaign may have gathered enough momentum to draw fire from high-powered Louisiana officials.
Finding hard-fought stability after the storm
“There’s something full circle about our Katrina baby protecting swimmers in the Lower 9th Ward from deep water,” Lens editor Katy Reckdahl writes in an essay about the city and her son, who was born 23 hours before Katrina struck the city.
Power out, profits gone: how Louisiana’s grid failures harm local businesses
Lost Coyote restaurant in Treme was on track for its first record-profit day during Memorial Day weekend, when a sudden blackout brought it all to a standstill.
Big boots to fill
Anthony Hingle Jr. didn’t touch beads or feathers for 32 years. Now he’s back in town, continuing the work of his father, Flagboy Meathead, a legend among Black Masking Indians.
Explaining Jessie Hoffman
People still say, ‘That’s not the Jessie I knew.’ But most didn’t know what he endured at home – and that’s likely what drove him on that day, psychiatrists say.
Planting a flag in the Lower 9 ‘wilderness’
Every year on August 29 – the day that Katrina hit, in 2005 – Green’s family gathers by the place where his mom's house once stood, in shirts that read “Roof Riders." Then they walk the two-block route taken by the floating house, to the oak tree where it stopped.
Fifth Circuit appeals court sides with Angola’s Farm Line workers
Though the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals differed with some of the district court’s July 2 decision, the higher court agreed that Angola Farm Line workers deserve water, rest, and equipment to protect from heat
