Jeffrey Victory
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Justice Jeffrey P. Victory has been a member of the Louisiana Supreme Court since 1995.
Legal Education and Experience
Justice Victory entered Centenary College on an athletic scholarship and graduated in 1967 with a B.A. degree in History and Government. In the Fall of 1967, he entered Tulane University School of Law on a Regional Scholarship, where he served on the Law Review. While in law school, he joined the Special Forces, Airborne, Louisiana National Guard. After finishing Tulane Law School in 1971, he practiced with the prestigious law firm of Tucker, Jeter and Jackson in Shreveport, Louisiana.
In 1981, Justice Victory was elected to the First Judicial District Court, and in 1990, he was elected to the Second Circuit Court of Appeal for a term beginning January 1, 1991. He served there until he was elected as an Associate Justice of the Louisiana Supreme Court for a term beginning on January 1, 1995.
Associations and Judicial Responsibilities
Justice Victory was a charter member of the Louisiana Sentencing Commission and has been a director of the Louisiana Judicial College for many years, currently serving as chairperson of the Board. He is a member of the National Lawyers Association and the American, Louisiana State, and Shreveport Bar Associations.
Political Affiliaion
Republican. In his 2004 judicial election, Justice Victory raised $504,431; 95.1% came from the business sector; 4.6% came from the Republican Party, and .3% of contributions came from labor.[1]
Death Penalty Upheld in Cases of Child Rape
Justice Victory wrote the majority opinion (6-1) in a 2007 case involving the rape of an 8 year-old girl. Victory defended his stance, despite a Supreme Court ruling in 1977 that said a convicted rapist--in this case, of an adult woman--could not be sentenced to death, as the punishment, in their opinion, outstripped the crime. "Justice Victory said the death penalty in this case was particularly warranted by the brutality of the crime, in which the victim was so badly injured that she required surgery."[2]
In the opinion, Justice Jeffrey Victory wrote, "Our state Legislature and this court have determined this category of aggravated rapist to be among those deserving of the death penalty, and, short of a first-degree murderer, we can think of no other non-homicide crime more deserving." Victory wrote that the Louisiana law meets the U.S. Supreme Court test requiring an aggravating circumstance--in this case the age of the victim--to justify the death penalty.[3]
Judicial Privilege
Louisiana state law requires lawyers and judges to complete 12.5 hours of CLE, or Continuing Legal Education, including course work in professionalism and ethics, each year. This features a "Summer School for Judges," which is comprised of seminars run singly or jointly by the Louisiana Judicial College and the Louisiana Bar Association, as well as the "Nuts & Bolts" seminar geared exclusively toward judges and courthouse personnel. Over the course of the weeklong event, judges and lawyers have been able to earn up to 25 hours of credit, or twice the mandated annual requirement of 12.5 hours.[4]
While the conference located in Sandestin, Florida offers an array of educational offerings for judges, it has taken on the trappings of a paid vacation for them and their families. Judges receive generous housing allowances with which they rent exclusive beachfront homes or deluxe condominiums, and they typically avail themselves of daily reimbursements that exceed federal guidelines. The courthouse crowd's annual Sandestin get-together unfolds against an academic environment that is far from rigorous, and education often takes a back seat to relaxation. Despite ample opportunity to complete CLE requirements during their week in Florida, nearly half of the local judges who attended in 2004 failed to do so, a review of their transcripts shows. In 2004, it cost $238,231 to send 73 local judges to the conference, an average cost of $3,219 per judge. Included among the attendees were 10 judges over the age of 65, at which point the state CLE mandate expires. The Sandestin blowout absorbed 40 percent of the $590,591 that was spent on continuing legal education by local jurists in 2004, records show. CLE costs are covered through taxpayer dollars and courthouse fees.
While the judges insist Sandestin is not a subsidized family vacation, they acknowledge the housing allowance provides a chance for luxurious living while paying next to nothing out-of-pocket. Some years judges such as Judge Landrieu, Orleans Parish Criminal District Court Judge Raymond Bigelow, and Supreme Court Justice Jeffrey Victory rent sprawling beachfront houses in Four Mile Village next to the Tops'l that go for close to $3,000 a week.
Youths Not Guaranteed Trial By Jury
Louisiana juveniles do not have the right to a jury trial, according to a May 14 ruling by the Louisiana Supreme Court. The court, by a 6-1 margin, reversed the June decision of Orleans Parish Juvenile Court Judge Hearn Taylor, who had granted a jury trial to Darrell Johnson and Alfred Anderson, two youths charged a year and a half ago in a school shooting at Carter G. Woodson Middle School.[5] Jury trials are one of the few U.S. constitutional rights accorded to adults but not juveniles. Thirteen states have chosen to allow jury trials for juveniles, but the U.S. Supreme Court has never ruled that jury trials must be awarded constitutionally.
The 14-page majority decision, written by Justice Jeffrey Victory, says that the juvenile system doesn't have to mirror the adult system because the juvenile courts offers separate and distinct advantages, such as less-punitive sentencing and a focus on rehabilitation. In his conclusion, Justice Victory quotes that court's 1998 decision, In Re C.B.: "While we recognize that the Louisiana juvenile justice system is far from perfect, we are 'not yet ready to spell the doom of the juvenile court system by requiring jury trials in juvenile adjudications." Justice Bernette Johnson disagreed, in a nine-page dissent outlining the significant changes seen by the juvenile system since 1971, when the U.S. Supreme Court held in the landmark case McKeiver vs. Pennsylvania that the Constitution does not guarantee a right to jury trial.
A jury would, however, have an enormous impact in another way, says Marsha Levick, an attorney for the Philadelphia-based Juvenile Law Center. "A jury enhances fact-finding," she says, noting that the U.S. Supreme Court found in a 1968 landmark case that a jury was "fundamental to the American scheme of [adult criminal] justice." At the time, jury trials were only allowed in this state when a sentence of hard labor or death was possible. But in Duncan vs. Louisiana, the U.S. Supreme Court found that Louisiana was denying its (adult) citizens a fundamental constitutional right. "Here we are in Louisiana again," says Levick. This time, she says, juveniles are the citizens being denied.
Notable Cases
2007
- Justice Victory concurred in the majority opinion of the Court, which concluded that a mother who exposed her children to her lesbian relationship was not entitled to keep custody of those children.
- Justice Victory concurred in the majority opinion of the Court, which concluded a white district attorney should have recused himself from the prosecution of "The Jana 6," six African-American highschool students who attacked a white student, because his past behavior indicated a bias towards vigorous prosecution of blacks, and insufficient prosecution of whites.
- Justice Victory concurred in the dissenting opinion of Justice Jeannette Theriot Knoll. In doing so, he dissented from the majority opinion, written by Justice Bernette J. Johnson, which found that a prosecutor consciously and impermissibly took race into account where he, in a death penalty case with a black defendant who was convicted of first degree murder, failed to select a black juror who had filed a discrimination lawsuit against the state for "institutional discrimination.
On Government Accounability
- Justice Victory concurred in majority opinion of Justice John L. Weimer, which imposed a 30 day suspension on Justice of the Peace Myrty Alfonso for her extreme abuse of power in having a neighbor against whom she harbored ill-will arrested and incarcerated for a night without probable cause.
On Personal Responsibility
- The majority opinion, written by Justice Jeffrey P. Victory, held, over the dissent of Justices Chet D. Traylor and Jeannette Theriot Knoll, that the State of Louisiana Department of Social Services was required to "make reasonable efforts to assist [a] parent in finding suitable housing before it may seek to terminate parental rights."
On Taxes
- Justice Victory concurred in the majority opinion of Justice Bernette J. Johnson, which held that a Government Agency Order requiring cell phone providers to pay into a fund for setting up rural phone service was a permissible "fee" rather than an unconstitutionally impermissible "tax," even though the eventual effect of these fees would be to pass on the costs to cell phone users rather than the general public.
On Tax Increment Financing (TIF)
- Justice Victory concurred in the majority opinion of Justice Catherine D. Kimball, which, over the strong dissenting opinion of Justice Chet D. Traylor, held that a Tax Increment Financing (TIF) plan (1) did not constitute a gratuitous handout, loan, or donation of public funds to a private entity where it used public funds to construct a retail development and accompanying infrastructure for Cabela's Retail Center; (2) could be funded through the issuance of municipal bonds pursuant to Louisiana's TIF statute; and (3) did not violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution where it handed out public funds to Cabela's, a private retailer, but not to already-existing, smaller local retailers.
- Justice Victory concurred in the majority opinion, written by Justice Jeannette Theriot Knoll, which held that (1) the government did not violate the due process rights, under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, of local citizens by notifying them of a $50 million Tax Increment Financing (TIF) plan for Bass Pro Shops only by mail, rather than by personal service, even though they were, as a group, easily identifiable; and (2)
On Term Limits
- Justice Victory concurred in the majority opinion of Justice Catherine D. Kimball, which, over the dissent of Bernette J. Johnson held that, under Louisiana's Term Limits law, Article 3, Section 4(E) of the Louisiana Constitution, Democrat state senator Cleo Fields was precluded from running for re-election where he had been elected to finish the term of a resigned predecessor in office, and then elected to two subsequent terms, since he had served long enough to constitute the maximum "two and one-half terms," under Louisiana's term limits laws. In reaching this conclusion, the court explicitly refused to apply a statute, passed by the legislature, intended to circumvent Article 3, Section 4(E) of the Louisiana Constitution and keep Mr. Fields in office.
On Tort Reform
- Over the strong dissenting opinion of Justice Jeannette Theriot Knoll, in which Justice Victory joined, the majority opinion, written by Justice Pascal Calogero, held (1) that limitations on the legal liability of Lousiana healthcare providers, as set forth in the Louisiana Medical Malpractice Act could be circumvented by an ordinary negligence cause of action; and (2) that such a cause of action was permissible where a New Orleans hospital lost power during Hurricane Katrina, resulting in the death of a patient on life support.
See Also
External Links
- State of Louisiana v. Patrick Kennedy
- Death penalty in child rape tested
- Louisiana Supreme Court Biography
