Baton Rouge Criminal Lawyers Blog

Derek Quebedeaux, a Louisiana man sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for driving while under the influence of alcohol and killing three college students, asked for a reduced prison sentence on Wednesday. That sentence was delivered following Quebedeaux’s conviction on three counts of vehicular homicide, two counts of first-degree vehicular negligent injuring and five counts of felony hit-and-run. He asked for credit for time served while he was not in jail but electronically monitored, but that request was denied.

The deadly accident occurred back in back in 2009 when he drove his pickup into his roommate and a crowd of other students, many of whom were his friends, after leaving a night of drinking at a club. 

Last month, a Slidell woman who apparently lost her job as a cook at a seafood restaurant as a result of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster pleaded guilty in federal court to charges of wire fraud. According to prosecutors in the case, she admitted to sending false earnings statements to a disaster assistance organization in exchange for money.

The 36-year-old woman now faces up to 20 years in prison, as well as three years of supervised release and up to a $250,000 fine when at sentencing. The claim was filed in September 2010 with the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, an organization that dispensed disaster assistance funds to those affected by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Houston was accused of wiring a fraudulent earning statement to the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, claiming to have lost $8,640 due to the disaster.

When an American citizen is charged with marijuana possession in Louisiana, the penalties can range from up to six months in jail and a maximum $500 fine to up to 40 years in prison and a fine as high as $400,000 - depending on the amount of marijuana found in the person's possession and the number of prior offenses.

A recent U.S. Supreme Court case illustrated that the penalties can be much more severe when the individual accused of the crime is a legal resident in the United States, but not a citizen. The case involved a man who came, with his parents, to the United States when he was only three years of age. He had been in legal status in the U.S. since he arrived in the country in 1984.

According to a new survey conducted by The Partnership at Drugfree.org, as well as MetLife Foundation, prescription drug abuse among teens is a growing national problem. Since 2008, the number of high school students abusing prescription drugs has risen from 33 percent, with 13 percent of teens acknowledging having experimented at least once with either Ritalin or Adderall that was not prescribed to them.

The survey found that 20 percent of teens who admitted to having abused prescription drugs said their first experience occurred before the age of 14. Around 27 percent of these teens said they mistakenly believed that prescription drug abuse is safer than taking street drugs.