Louisiana Voice

It’s got to be the lingering effects of Agent Orange’s trailer park cage fight on the White House lawn. There can be no other logical explanation.

Whatever it is, a trio of men representing the institutions of law enforcement, the judiciary and most recently, spiritual inspiration have engaged in various forms of fisticuffs and mud ‘rasslin’, two of which appear to have been helped along with the aid of devil al-ke-hol.

And it’s cost one of those involved his career with the plea bargain of St. Tammany Parish SHERIFF RANDY SMITH who agreed to resign from office following an encounter May 29 in which he pounced on social media critic Bobby Couvillion in a Madisonville restaurant after running up a courage-boosting $346 bar tab.

Lost in all the hoopla over Smith’s confrontation with Couvillion was the simultaneous resignation of Smith’s Chief Deputy, Jeff Boehm, who stepped down Monday “in the best interest of the agency…”

That prompted the immediate question: Why is his resignation in the “best interest” of the sheriff’s office? All we could find online was a single sentence that said, “His departure comes amid significant internal turmoil within the office.”

Bret Ibert was promoted to Chief Deputy upon Boehm’s resignation and will now move up to interim sheriff until an election can be held for a permanent sheriff–permanent being a somewhat relevant term in St. Tammany Parish.

From over here in Livingston, two parishes removed, it would appear the St. Tammany Sheriff’s Office is in dire need of a general housecleaning. The previous sheriff was defeated for reelection by Smith and his subsequent arrest in 2019 on state charges of rape, incest and indecent behavior with a juvenile.

But, hey, that’s ancient history when we have ongoing brawls to turn our attention to, right?

Like 23^rd JDC JUDGE STEVEN TRUEAU, who back on 2023 got involved in his own altercation that ended with his honor and two women sprawled amongst the garbage and mud behind a Gonzales restaurant. The story became current again when the Louisiana Judiciary Commission set a September hearing date to consider charges against the robed rogue.

AND NOW LAAAAY-DEEEES and GEN-TEEEL-MEN—the main event of the evening! In this corner, in dark blue pinstriped suit, red tie and holding a Bible, here to protect his sheep…..REV-REND TONNNNEEE SPELLLLLL!

And in the other corner, the emerging challenger, the 20-year-old mystery man.

Spell, pastor of Life Tabernacle Church, REFUSED TO TURN THE OTHER CHEEK and instead, charged his adversary following a not-so-Christian exchange during which Spell says the neighbor, in the bravado of pre-fight hype, threatened to rape and kill his family. A video of their neighborly encounter appears to show the younger man throwing the first punch but it was Spell who finished matters, pummeling his younger opponent convincingly enough get the good reverend arrested for second-degree battery.

“I’m a pastor who shepherds his flock,” he said. “It’s not the job of the sheep to attack the wolves; it’s the job of the shepherd to protect his sheep.”

Back at his Tuesday night services after bonding out of jail, Spell told his congregation that he fulfilled the scripture by laying hands on the sick. “I don’t know how much recovery they’re going to have, but I laid hands on them.”

North Louisiana Medical Center in Ruston appears to be on life support following a devastating laundry list of deficiencies found during a five-day inspection tour of the center last month by an eight-person team from the Louisiana Department of Health.

The medical center, once the pride of north central Louisiana, was given until Wednesday (June 24) to submit a comprehensive plan of correction to the LDH Health Standards Section or face the prospect of losing its Medicare status and possibly even its hospital’s license and/or certification.

Among the findings included in the 87-page report by LDH:

• Staffing logs for the third-floor Progressive Care Unit revealed eight shifts where no RN was scheduled to work.
• Failure to ensure adequate numbers of RNs, LPNs, and support staff to provide nursing care to all patients.
• Failure to ensure a registered nurse was immediately available on each unit of the hospital at all times.
• Unsanitary conditions in the hospital kitchen, insects in the windows of some ICU rooms.
• Patient call bells that reportedly hadn’t worked for several months.
• Patients going unmonitored
• Dried red or brown residue and spatters on furniture and bedframes
• Clean and dirty equipment stored together because the hospital was out of tags to mark clean items.
• An emergency room patient who apparently slipped through the procedural cracks and suffered a medical emergency unsupervised because the LPN apparently assigned to the patient didn’t know anything about the patient or having been given her care.
• No specific policy regarding assessment or reassessment of patients in the emergency department
• Eight patients on telemetry monitoring, but only five who were actually being monitored. (Leads were off the other three.) 
• Failure to ensure that patients received care in a safe setting.

Federal Medicare Requirements for hospitals participating in Medicare require:  

• An adequate number of registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and other personnel to meet patient needs.
• A registered nurse must supervise and evaluate nursing care.
• An RN must be immediately available for patient care needs.
• Staffing must be based on patient acuity and census.

Louisiana licensing rules similarly require hospitals to:

• Maintain sufficient nursing personnel at all times
• Provide qualified staff appropriate to patient needs.
• Ensure nursing services are organized and supervised by qualified nursing leadership.

To be assigned to ER, ICU or Labor and Delivery, one is required to be an RN.

Alluding to the ER patient who “slipped through the cracks,” one observer, a healthcare professional, said the surveyors would have likely asked a number of followup questions:

• Who assigned the patient?
• Why wasn’t the patient entered into the system?
• Why was there no documented RN triage assessment?
• Who was responsible for monitoring the patient?
• Why wasn’t the assigned nurse aware of the patient?
• What polity existed for reassessment of ER patients
• Was there adequate staffing that day?

“It seems that Bordelon would rather hire an LPN [and] pay a lower hourly rate of pay compared to that of an RN. It looks as though the LPNs at NLMC are practicing outside THEIR SCOPE OF NURSING,” the observer said.

It is particularly noteworthy that the LDH report cited the “governing body.” When surveyors cite governance failures, they essentially are saying that oversight failures occurred at the highest, or administrative, levels. At NLMC, those would be the CEO and CNO.

NLMC must submit a plan that is “specific, realistic,” detailing how the deficient practice[s] will be prevented from recurring, according to Interim Deputy Assistant Secretary of LDH’s Health Standards Section Cecile Castello.

The plan will be reviewed by the Health Standards Section which will then conduct an unannounced site visit to determine compliance. If found still out of compliance, a recommendation will be made to the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that NLMC’s Medicare provider agreement be terminated effective Aug. 30.

That would mean a virtual death sentence for NLMC in that it would no longer be able to treat Medicare patients and could not receive Medicare reimbursement for eligible services.

NLMC is part of a widespread network of medical facilities headquartered in Bossier City and run by Allegiance Health Management. Most are in Louisiana.

The IRS has filed federal tax liens against NLMC for not paying about $9.4 million in payroll taxes. Vendors also have gone unpaid and the hospital currently has an occupancy rate of only about 25 percent with staff reportedly at a number insufficient to care for that many

IRS tax liens were filed against a number of other of the facilities run by Allegiance and its owner, Rock Bordelon, who claims the liens have since been settled.

Monica Adams was recently named to replace Kathy Hall as Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Also named to the hospital’s administrative positions were Jennifer Patton as Chief Nursing Officer (CNO) and Arnie Young, Chief Operating Officer (COO).

Left to right: Jennifer Patton, Monica Adams, Arnie Young.

Adams has run several facilities for Bordelon, most recently as CEO of Winn Medical Center in Winnfield. Winn Medical is another of Allegiance-affiliated entities.

The timing of the administrative shakeup at NLMC is especially interesting. The LDH team conducted its survey in late May. The new executive team at NLMC was publicly announced on June 8 and LDH released its findings on June 19.

Adams, as might be expected anytime there is a crisis of any kind, be it airline safety, worker safety issues or medical care, invoked the time-honored “HP clause,” in something of a 3-for-1 catch-all assurance, saying, “Patient safety, quality care and regulatory compliance remain our highest priorities.”

Though the future of NLMC is up in the air for the moment, it’s not like Rock Bordelon doesn’t have friends in high places. He does.

He hunts with Donald Trump, Jr., he’s generous with his campaign contributions, almost exclusively to Republican candidates, and in giving rides to key government officials.

He and his company, Allegiance Health, has given more than $380,000 in campaign money to Republican candidates, including more than $35,000 to Jeff Landry and his political action committee, Cajun PAC II.

In 2024, he provided FREE AIR TRANSPORTATION to and from Washington, D.C. for key state health care officials, including then-Surgeon General Ralph Abraham, Health Secretary Michael Harrington, Deputy Health Secretary Peter Croughan, Health Undersecretary Drew Maranto and health department general counsel Nicholas Gachassin (who should have known better).

The officials were in the Washington area for discussions with officials with the U.S. Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services, the federal agency which has considerable sway over how much hospitals, doctors and other health care providers receive in payments for providing treatment of Medicaid patients.

Only a couple of weeks before that trip, Landry unilaterally INCREASED MEDICAID PAYMENTS by $22 million to seven hospitals, four of which are owned by Bordelon. The action came less than a month after the state health department said it might be forced to cut services for children and those with disabilities because of an impending budget deficit.

Landry’s decision to increase payments and the comped flights for state officials came six years after Allegiance agreed to PAY $1.7 MILLION to the federal government to avoid litigation alleging it had overcharged Medicare for unnecessary outpatient therapy services.

NOTE: Names of the students had been redacted but were somehow visible when copies of the transcripts were posted. That was by error and the images of the transcripts have subsequently been removed.

An anonymous whistleblower complaint alleging falsification of student academic records and graduation eligibility at Haughton High School in Bossier Parish has been forwarded by email to the Louisiana Legislative Auditor Michael Waguespack and to Louisiana Department of Education Superintendent Cade Brumley. The sender copied LouisianaVoice with the complaint.

The complaint, while citing specific actions on the part of administrative personnel at the school, does not identify anyone by name. The letter’s author self-identified only as a “concerned employee,” presumably of the Bossier Parish School Board.

“On or about May 14, 2026 (two days prior to graduation), six senior transcripts at Haughton High School were reportedly deemed to be academically ineligible for graduation due to missing coursework and unmet graduation requirements,” the complaint says.

“Following those findings, it is my understanding and belief that counseling staff, with approval and direction from school administration, altered official student records in order to make certain students eligible for graduation,” the three-page letter says, adding that the actions were “allegedly carried out with the knowledge and approval of Haughton High School administration.”

The conduct, according to the letter, reportedly included:

• Changing grades and course classifications;
• Adding credits and coursework after students had already been deemed ineligible;
• Entering grades for courses students did not actually take;
• Creating transcript entries for courses not offered at Haughton High School;
• Fabricating grades and coursework for classes not actually attended or completed…

One specific example involved the addition of “Speech II” to a student transcript despite the fact that Haughton High School does not offer that course within its curriculum and the student allegedly never took the class. Another example included credit for a science not offered at Haughton High and changing another science grade from a “C” to an “A” to make the student immediately eligible for graduation. 

One of the individuals involved had reportedly been previously disciplined for changing grades in the past, raising serious concerns regarding repeated misconduct and lack of internal controls, the letter says.

“There is also widespread concern among employees that [one of those involved] was specifically moved into the senior counselor position, by higher-level parish administration this year, because she was willing to facilitate actions designed to artificially improve graduation statistics and school performance metrics,” it says. “Employees further believe Haughton administration gave counseling staff the ‘green light’ to manipulate records in order to protect graduation rates and school achievement scores.”

The letter’s author said one individual “did not even possess her own system passcode or access credentials until May 2026. “This raises significant questions regarding how mid-term grades, transcript modifications, or other academic record entries may have been submitted prior to that date, including whether another employee’s credentials or administrative access were utilized. It also raises concerns regarding whether another individual may have been performing work, entering grades, or modifying records … prior to her receiving official system access credentials.”

If substantiated, it said, the actions may constitute:

• Fraudulent alteration of official public records;
• False reporting to state education authorities;
• Unauthorized access or misuse of academic record systems;
• Violations of Louisiana Department of Education graduation standards;
• Potential misuse of state and federal funding tied to accountability metrics and graduation performance.

“The implications are substantial. Artificially inflating graduation rates, school achievement scores, and academic performance metrics impacts state accountability reporting, public trust, school rankings, and potentially the allocation of taxpayer-funded state and federal education resources.

“This conduct undermines every legitimate diploma earned by students who completed graduation requirements honestly and damages confidence in the integrity of Bossier Parish Schools.”

The letter’s author requested:

1. An immediate independent investigation into all transcript and graduation-status changes made at Haughton High School during the 2025–2026 school year;
2. Preservation of all electronic records, transcript audit logs, emails, login records, and internal communications;
3. A forensic review of all course additions, grade changes, counselor access logs, administrative approvals, and user credential activity;
4. Verification that all courses appearing on affected transcripts were legitimately offered and completed;
5. A review of prior disciplinary findings involving transcript or grade manipulation by counseling staff;
6. Protection for employees who report misconduct or cooperate with investigators under applicable Louisiana whistleblower protections.

“This complaint is submitted in good faith and in the interest of protecting the integrity of public education, academic records, and taxpayer-funded educational programs,” it concluded.

LouisianaVoice contacted both the Legislative Auditor’s office and the Louisiana Department of Education to determine if the emails had been received and if any official action was planned on the claims. The auditor’s office’s legal affairs representative said they respond to inquiries about complaints only to the complaintant. The Education Department has not responded as of this writing.

The year was 1993 and the empire of high-roller financier Steven Hoffenberg, built on an elaborate $500 million Ponzi scheme rivaled only by that of Bernie Madoff, lay in ruins, thanks to the efforts of the late John Hays, the chain-smoking, whiskey-drinking publisher of Ruston’s Morning Paper, a free-distribution shopper thrown in 25,000 driveways every Wednesday night.

Hays, in 1976, started his tabloid publication that offered a weekly map of garage sales in the area as the result of a running battle he had with Ruston’s Mayor—and cousin—Johnny Perritt, and after Tom Kelly, publisher of the larger daily newspaper where I cut my own journalistic teeth, The Ruston Daily Leader, rejected one of Hays’s letters to the editor in which he desired to protest a local tax issue. By necessity, we were early adversaries but in the end, we were destined to become close personal and professional friends.

By the time Hoffenberg came along with his TOWERS FINANCIAL CORP. investment scheme, Hays had already exposed a couple other smaller Ponzi Schemes: the so-called Pine Tree Caper and the $55 million ALIC Investment scam, shutting them down in their tracks.

Hoffenberg ended up being sentenced to 20 years in prison—he actually served 18 of those, unusual in today’s system of jurisprudence—and was ordered to pay a $1 million fine and $463 million in restitution to his victims. Following his 2013 release, he settled a civil suit with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for $60 million.

It’s not as though Hoffenberg didn’t have friends in high places: he did. Among those who went to bat for him were Ben Barnes, a business ally of former Texas Gov. John Connally; Thomas B. Evans Jr., a former co-chairman of the Republican National Committee in Louisiana; Victoria Reggie, the daughter of a prominent state judge and the future wife of Ted Kennedy; Mickey Kantor, who would go on to serve as President Clinton’s trade representative; Prince Bandar bin Sultan Al Saud and one JEFFREY EPSTEIN, who he described as the “mastermind” behind the fraud of an insurance bond scheme and the “technician” of a Wall Street stock manipulation scheme.

Hoffenberg claimed in court documents that Epstein was intimately involved in the Ponzi scheme. Epstein left Towers Financial before its collapse and was never charged for his involvement.

That’s probably because Hoffenberg did not turn evidence against Epstein in the beginning, claiming—perhaps even fearing—that Epstein “had traction” with the U.S. Department of Justice. “You cannot grasp the magnitude of [Epstein’s] controlling effect,” he said of his one-time partner. He said Epstein had worked up a “detailed plan” to turn Towers Financial into a major player in funding money products around the world and to do so “illegally.”

From discovery of the Towers Investment scam through sentencing of Hoffenberg, Hays never let up. He kept relentless pressure on Hoffenberg and SEC regulators alike. The small-town editor Hays made such an impression on the professional news reporters that The New York Times published a two-page profile on him on April 4, 1993.

Hays CEASED PUBLICATION of the Morning Paper a decade later, in July 2013, ending 37 years of hard-hitting, informative journalism, when his cancer spread, weakening him to the point he could no longer pursue his craft. He DIED in August 2014. Wife Susan moved back to Austin, Texas, whence they had originally come way back in the 1970s, to be near their daughter.

It was with feelings of nostalgia mixed with sadness that I learned this week that the Ruston City Council is considering condemning John and Susan’s former home in Ruston. The house that John built himself—he was a contractor in a previous life—has not been lived in since Susan left 12 years ago and has fallen into disrepair.

As I reminisced about those heady days when journalism was real and the rewards tangible and the media trustworthy, I couldn’t help but wonder what new scandal, what other scam, he might have uncovered had he lived and continued publishing what was derisively called “that rag” in its earliest days of existence but which would doggedly persevere to gain the respect of a staid but reputable publication like The New York Times.

Maybe it was a rag, and maybe it was launched out of spite. But John Hays and his Morning Paper in time became synonymous with no-holds-barred, take-no-prisoners journalism. He showed us what real news reporting could be—consequences and threats of advertising boycotts be damned—when you don’t have a corporate board looking over your shoulder and calling the shots. It’s an approach all media would do well to revisit today.