A Jefferson Parish councilman is doubling down on a threat to sue the state if officials don't make major changes at the Bridge City Youth Prison.
"It's something we still have discussions on, and it's something we may pull the trigger on in the next 30 days if we don't see a great improvement," Councilman Deano Bonano told WWL's Tommy Tucker. "Basically, (we'd ask) a judge take control over that facility, for lack of a better word, and order certain things to be done, hopefully, to close it."
Bonano says the state has been silent about what happened during last weekend's escape at the Bridge City Youth Prison.
"We get almost no communication from the Office of Juvenile Justice," Bonano said. "I sent an email Monday specifically asking for some details about what occurred over the weekend. As of Friday, five days later, I still haven't been given a response."
What's more: Bonano says the state is taking its time moving the inmates to the Angola State Penitentiary.
"They're not doing it this week. They said when they get something ready at Angola over the next 30 days they'll move them. So to my knowledge, they're still there."
Bonano says he's skeptical the state will follow through with its promises to make the prison safer because, he says, officials broke earlier promises.
"It's difficult for myself and my residents not to feel skeptical because so many promises have been made to us in the last year, and almost to a "T," all of them have been broken promises," Bonano said. "They were supposed to have extra man power. They were supposed to put in this high-tech motion detection system around the premises to alert them when anybody escaped. They were supposed to fix the holes in the fences. I could go on and on, and none of that occurred. None."
