Louviere seeks new penalty trial

Last Thursday Glynn and Phyllis Duplantis left flowers at a bank building near Grand Caillou Road, which they do every year to mark the anniversary of their daughter’s 1996 death.

For most of the day prior to that they sat in a small Houma courtroom as attorneys for the man who killed her laid the groundwork for new court action which, if successful, will stay the lethal injection the Duplantis family has awaited.

Chad Roy Louviere pleaded guilty to 1st degree murder and other charges in connection with an Oct. 17, 1996 rampage that included a 25-hour hostage standoff inside the former ArgentBank branch where his estranged wife worked, raping female employees whom he held at gunpoint and shooting 27-year-old Pamela Ann Duplantis to death.

Since his 1999 death sentence Louviere has given few indications he wished to live, according to sources close to the former Terrebonne Parish deputy. Now, those same sources say, he is willing to aid lawyers so that he might not die.

“I am distressed by this, I think they have let things go on too long,” said Phyllis Duplantis, for whom every day carries reminders of her late daughter. “I could see it differently if he wasn’t the one who did it. We all know who did it.”

The Thursday hearing in Judge Johnny Walker’s courtroom is a first step for his lawyers, who seek post-conviction relief of the sentence, and a potential new trial.

The potential of a new hearing involving evidence being presented by those attorneys – and the spectre of a new sentencing hearing if they are successful – is significant for Terrebonne Parish as a community. Louviere’s crimes, committed while in uniform – including the rape of a woman he pulled over with his police cruiser after completing his shift, prior to heading for the bank – had profound effects. Law enforcement officers worked hard to build up trust in a community that had turned cold. The vicious nature of Louviere’s crimes, which involved several actions during the bank stand-off that went beyond the rapes in terms of degradation of victims – struck terror into the hearts of women especially. 

LIKE AN APPEAL 

Post-conviction relief is similar to a traditional appeal, but there are some major differences. In most cases when attorneys appeal to a higher court, they are seeking to overturn an error that is alleged to have occurred in the court, for example, a judge’s decision to admit evidence that is not permitted by law.

Post-conviction relief goes deeper, and relates to new evidence, failures of defense attorneys and other issues.

In Louviere’s case the court papers seek a hearing at which elements of his claims can be weighed, and eventually a new sentencing hearing.

The sentencing hearing request is significant because Louviere pleaded guilty, which in most capital cases results in a willingness by prosecutors not to seek the death penalty.

Penalty in a capital case must be decided by a unanimous jury, after a hearing process that is almost like a second trial. Louviere chose to cast his fate to the jury, and let its members decide on life or death. 

Court papers filed by Louviere’s post-conviction team allege that key aspects of his own past were not presented at the hearing.

A history of being sexually abused to the point of post-traumatic stress, followed by other personal issues and a re-triggering of psychological stressers in the months and years preceding the bank standoff, court papers allege, were not presented in detail sufficient for jurors to evaluate his mental state.

“In December of 1995, Chad was at the brink—his marriage was failing and he was deeply unhappy in his job,” the filings state. “It was at this moment of heightened vulnerability that Chad witnessed the worst trauma of his brief career: he responded to a helicopter accident in which he could do nothing to intervene while he watched a man burn to death. After the man died, he was asked to patrol the perimeter of the accident, where he encountered the man’s distraught wife trying to reach the scene of the accident to determine whether her husband had survived. Chad was forced to physically restrain her as well as inform her that her husband was dead … (he was)  haunted by the smell of burning flesh and the dying man’s screams.”

SLEEPLESS LOUVIERE

The papers also mention excessive and unrelenting hours of police work when he was a Thibodaux city cop, combined with off-duty security details. 

“For Chad, with his heightened vulnerability due to his history of childhood trauma and unaddressed mental health needs, such stressors impacted him even more severely,” the court papers state. “Chad got little sleep as he raced to meet the multiple demands in his life, and regularly took ephedrine based supplements sold at the local health store in an effort to boost his energy and to build strength needed for the rigors of police work.

Chad was motivated to serve as a police officer in an effort to protect others as he had not been protected himself as a child. Additionally, Chad felt validated by the authority that the police badge gave him, as it initially assuaged the feelings of doubt and worthlessness that had haunted him since the instigation of his childhood sexual abuse.”

In addition to sexual abuse by Harry Wrenn, a now-deceased clergyman who relocated to North Carolina from Houma years ago but was never prosecuted or convicted despite allegations of crimes from several victims, Louviere was also sexually abused by a cousin, the court papers state.

Contacted by a reporter more than a decade ago, Wrenn denied any misdeeds.

Another issue may involve evidence during the penalty hearing regarding Louviere’s alleged actions while being held in Lafayette for trial.

Louviere allegedly overpowered a female deputy, armed with a shank made from a sharpened toothbrush. 

“Pressing the weapon to her neck and threatening to kill her, defendant held the deputy hostage until he was allowed to see a female inmate,” court papers state. 

That woman said that she and Louviere had consensual sex in the jail control room … a statement the woman later said was only made out of fear of retaliation. 

Louviere was never prosecuted for the Lafayette incident, and so it should not have been brought up in the penalty phase of his case, the lawyers allege. His counsel at the time, they state, should have objected.

Unfortunately for the Duplantis family and the women victimized by Louviere 17 years ago, the post-conviction relief process could go on for some time.

Judge Walker laid the case aside Thursday because of a scheduled civil trial. He will be approaching each issue outlined in the court papers as scheduling allows.

Attorneys say the state always has the option of closing down the post-conviction proceedings by offering life in prison with no parole. That would mean no more hearings, no potential that the women who were held hostage and victimized or the Duplantis family to be asked to testify.

DIFFERENCES OF OPINION

Staffers at District Attorney Joe Waitz Jr.’s office say the likelihood of that happening is, for now, nonexistent.

The father of one victim, who asked not to be identified, said he would like to see the death penalty still pursued. But if that will mean people having to testify and relive their painful experience, he said, his thoughts might be different.

“If he couldn’t get out of prison ever rather than having my daughter and everyone else reliving this, I would say let it go,” the father said. “As long as it’s clear he don’t get out.”

Glynn Duplantis, father of the slain bank teller, in all likelihood would not want to see such a compromise, his wife said.

“My husband would want to see the execution soon,” Phyllis Duplantis said. “He feels Pamela is not at rest without it.”

The post-conviction route is one that is increasingly taken in Louisiana and other death penalty states, and is one of the means by which people convicted of crimes, scheduled for execution and later cleared by DNA evidence are exonerated.

While aspects of Louviere’s childhood and other issues relating to him were presented to jurors when they decided his fate, legal experts say a judge must very carefully decide whether the information now offered might have turned a single juror’s head when the original sentencing hearing was conducted.

HIGHEST TREE

One local attorney who is not directly involved with the case – and so asked not to be named – said courts, said the reason for that lies in the finality of the penalty. 

“The decision to execute must be unanimous,” the attorney said. “If you can show the judge that one single juror might have decided differently based on what is presented, then you could have reason enough for a new hearing.”

The potential of victims having to once again bring the events of Oct. 17, 1996 to the forefront of consciousness might not be nearly enough for some people to say the death penalty for Louviere should be abandoned.

“There are people who tell me he should have been hung from a tree outside the courthouse that day,” said Phyllis Duplantis. “It makes me feel good when I hear them say that. It means they are thinking of Pamela.”

Chad Louviere