New Louisiana law to treat 17-year-olds as adults in jails, sentencing now in effect

Allison Bruhl
·2 min read
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BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) — A new law in Louisiana treating 17-year-olds as adults instead of juveniles went into effect on Friday, April 19. Now, the teens will be booked into adult jails, and their cases won’t be heard in juvenile courts.

Act No. 13 was signed by Gov. Jeff Landry after the crime-related special session. It ended in late February.

“Today marks the start to a new justice system here in Louisiana,” Landry posted on X, formerly known as Twitter. “No more will 17-year-olds who commit home invasions, carjack, and rob the great people of our State be treated as children in court. These are criminals and today, they will finally be treated as such.”

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The office of Mayor-President Sharon Weston Broome released the following statement Friday.

“My commitment is to follow the law and we continue to work with the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office to facilitate the transfer to adult prison of the criminally-charged 17-year-olds within our custody who are now considered adults under Louisiana’s new law.”

The East Baton Rouge Sheriff’s Office said on Friday that the current facility doesn’t meet federal standards for housing youth offenders and found an alternative location.

“By state law, City-Parish is to provide adequate and safe housing of inmates and in compliance of federal PREA laws. The Sheriff is tasked with the security of the facility provided by City-Parish. The current facility does not meet the federal standards set forth in PREA for housing ‘youthful offenders’, how federal law defines 17-year-old offenders. The Sheriff has found an alternative location out of parish until City-Parish is able to provide the above,” said Casey Rayborn Hicks, EBRSO public information director.

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