NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A man who was imprisoned for nearly 30 years before being exonerated has won a landmark election in New Orleans promising to fix a justice system that failed him. Now, Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry and the GOP-controlled Legislature are racing to strip him of his job before he is even sworn in.
Calvin Duncan won 68% of the vote last November to become Orleans Parish Clerk of Criminal Court, running on a platform to reform the justice system based on his own experience fighting for access to court records while incarcerated in a maximum security prison.
Duncan rebuilt his life, in part by running for clerk’s office and winning. But Louisiana Senate Republicans voted Wednesday to revoke Duncan’s new job as part of a broader GOP effort to streamline the judiciary in New Orleans, a Democratic hub with predominantly black voters. The state legislature is overwhelmingly Republican and white, and the deep red state is leading efforts to enact the Voting Rights Act.
Duncan is scheduled to be sworn in on May 4.
He told The Associated Press that he is being retaliated against by Louisiana officials who have long denied his innocence, even though his name is listed on the National Registry of Exonerations.
Republicans say it’s not personal and defend the effort as a step toward government efficiency.
“The citizens of New Orleans overwhelmingly said: ‘I want to give this man a chance, he can make a difference,'” Duncan, a Democrat, told lawmakers at a March committee hearing. “What this bill does is, it says: ‘Thank you, but you’ve wasted your time.’ It disenfranchises everyone. “
The wrongful conviction that landed Duncan in prison
The case began with the 1981 murder of 23-year-old David Yeager and put Duncan in prison for more than 28 years. In 2011, on the eve of a trial to consider the new evidence, prosecutors offered to reduce Duncan’s sentence to the time served if he was convicted of murder and armed robbery. Duncan was freed, but he never stopped trying to clear his name.
Finally, in 2021, a judge agreed that he had been wrongfully convicted and Duncan’s conviction was completely vacated.
As state attorney general in 2023, Landry opposed Duncan’s petition for restitution for his wrongful conviction. Duncan withdrew the plea after Landry’s successor, Liz Murrill, threatened to go after Duncan’s law license in the state. When Duncan ran for clerk, Murrill promised “further action” against him if he didn’t stop calling himself “free.”
Landry and Murrill pointed out that Duncan accepted a 2011 plea deal for murder and armed robbery.
“The attorney general made it clear during the election that if I continued to speak accurately about my innocence and my innocence, I would face consequences from his office,” Duncan told The Associated Press. “We’re seeing those results today as he and the governor try to undo the will of 68% of New Orleans voters.”
Murrill said she had “no involvement” in the move to remove the office.
Republicans say the current system needs reform
Landry told the AP that eliminating Duncan’s elected office was to improve “government efficiency” and “clean up the system in Orleans Parish, which has been plagued by years of inaction and corruption.”
Proponents of consolidating the criminal clerk of courts with the civil clerk of courts say the offices are combined in other villages. Eliminating the criminal clerk of court position would save the state an estimated $27,300, according to the Legislative Auditor’s Office, which added that the costs of combining the clerks’ offices were “unknown.”
The bill’s Republican author, Sen. Jay Morris, who represents a district in north Louisiana, acknowledged that once Duncan’s elected position is eliminated, the civil clerk of courts may struggle to handle the flow of cases. The solution, he says, is to “hire someone.”
Other New Orleans elected judicial officials whose jobs could be removed in the future will be allowed to serve out their terms, but not Duncan.
Morris told lawmakers that the goal is to pass legislation in time to prevent Duncan from taking office before the start of his four-year term.
The bill, passed by the GOP-controlled House and on track to be approved by Landry, would take effect immediately with the governor’s signature.
“I’ve never seen anything so barbaric,” Sen. Royce Duplessis, a Democrat who represents New Orleans, said on the Senate floor. “I understand politics and I know you’re all going to vote how you’re going to vote. But you know, when we all get here, history has a record.”
Duncan, 62, was the driving force behind a 2020 U.S. Supreme Court decision that ended a unanimous jury conviction. He also founded a nonprofit dedicated to expanding access to the court system for incarcerated people. He said that being elected to the post of clerk was the culmination of his life’s work.
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Cline reported from Baton Rouge.
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Brooke is a corps member for reports for the Associated Press/America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that lets journalists report on issues hidden in local newsrooms.