Report blasts sheriff, judge for hiring spouses but cites no improprieties

By Zoe Sullivan
Contributing Writer

Ed Quatrevaux, New Orleans’ Inspector General, released a report on July 11 exculpating the Orleans Parish Sheriff, Marlin Gusman, and former Admin­istrative Judge with the Municipal Court, Paul Sens, from criminal wrongdoing. At question was whether the reciprocal employment of the officials’ spouses was illegal. While the report did release the two public officials from legal scrutiny, in it, Quatrevaux said “legality is an essential baseline, but it is an insufficient standard for elected officials.”

The two women, Ann Sens and Renee Gusman, were hired by the other spouse’s office within a month of each other at the end of 2010 and early 2011. Ms. Gusman was hired to provide drug counseling to people in a program for non-violent first offenders charged with marijuana possession. According to the Office of the Inspector General’s (OIG) report, Judge Sens created the program to help defendants avoid a criminal record. It went on to state that Sens and the City Attorney had agreed not to prosecute those who completed the counseling program.

Ms. Gusman was hired to provide counseling services at a rate of $40 per month per participant. A footnote in the OIG’s report noted that while the funds used to pay Ms. Gusman did not come from the Judicial Expense Fund or the City’s General Fund, “they are public funds because they were legally coerced by the Court, and defendants had no choice in the counselor they could use.”

The program began in mid-January 2011, and Ms. Gusman was hired although her web site, listing her multiple areas of counseling expertise, did not include drugs.

Ms. Sens works as a licensed real estate agent. The report states that Peter Rizzo, Chief Deputy of the Civil Division of the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office, told the OIG investigator that Sheriff Gusman requested Ms. Sens be added to his office’s list of appraisers and that she was the only person he requested. In the report, the Sheriff rebutted this statement, affirming that he had also asked for others to be added. The office generally pays $150 per appraisal, although the state limit is $350. The Sheriff’s office handles auctions for properties that have been foreclosed on.

A spokesperson for Sheriff Gusman criticized the OIG’s report, telling The Louisiana Weekly in an email that “There is no basis in the law or fact to support the presumptions and inferences expressed.” Judge Sens, who is no longer serving as an Administrative Judge, but who still sits on the Municipal Court bench, did not respond to phone calls from The Louisiana Weekly requesting comment.

The OIG’s report stated that it began its investigation because of reports in the press about the apparent impropriety. The Lens broke the story in February of this year.

Noting that the actions of the two elected officials were “poorly documented” in relation to the hirings, the OIG’s report offered a sharp critique, even as it affirmed that the law had not been violated. “These actions took place barely a month apart,” the report stated, “and both officials were unaware of or ignored the appearance of impropriety created by their actions. The appearance of impropriety undermines confidence in government, and both the judge and the sheriff are elected officials in a city in which there is substantial and warranted mistrust of government.”

This article originally published in the July 23, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.