More questions than answers remain over the Orleans Parish grand jury's decision to indict Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill on 16 felony counts. Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry says he wants State Police to find some of those answers through an investigation of the grand jury, but one legal analysts say that investigation may cause a new set of problems.
"That raises a lot of concerns," Loyola University law professor William Snowden said.
Snowden told WWL's Tommy Tucker that a state police investigation into the Orleans Parish grand jury could make Louisiana residents fearful of serving on grand juries.
"I worry about how everyday Louisianians and New Orleanians would perceive law enforcement being deployed on these everyday citizens doing their civic duty, which they showed up to do, and possibly being intimidated by law enforcement at their front door," Snowden said. "That's definitely something I'm concerned about."
According to Snowden, because the grand jury already spends a significant amount of time reviewing cases, those jurors are less likely to launch an unnecessary or improper investigation.
"They also have to convince the other grand jurors that this is worthy of an investigation, that this is worthy of our time," Snowden said. "In this instance these New Orleanians have already been giving up time once a week over a period of weeks to review the cases that the prosecutor is going to be presenting. They might be less likely to do these little side-errand investigations that one of the grand jurors might want to propose if it seems that that grand juror is really just trying to unnecessarily or improperly investigate something that's happening in their personal world."
