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Louisiana Senate pushes back measure regarding juveniles being tried as adults, expected to be taken up Thursday
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BATON ROUGE — The Louisiana Senate pushed back two measures that were planned to be taken up Wednesday. These bills come in the middle of a special session focused on tax reform.
One of the bills is a proposed constitutional amendment, detailing at what age children can be treated as adults in criminal court. It's called Senate Bill 2. It would change the wording of Article Five, section 19 of the Constitution of Louisiana.
Currently, 15 and 16-year-olds, and in some cases 14-year-olds, can already face trial and sentencing as adults in some murder, rape, armed robbery and kidnapping cases.
The constitutional amendment, proposed by state Sen. Heather Cloud (R-Turkey Creek), would allow juveniles to be charged like an adult for any crime, as long as lawmakers would pass new laws to do so.
Cloud authored the bill along with state Sen. Jay Morris (R-West Monroe) and state representative Debbie Villio (R-Kenner).
However, the Senate didn't take up the measure Wednesday.
"It seemed like we had a light house. We did have enough to actually pass both measures, but it's my understanding that both of the authors requested to have the bills moved till tomorrow," Senate President Pro-Tempore Regina Barrow said.
WBRZ reached out to the authors of the bill, who were not able to comment.
Senator Barrow said she was surprised that the bill was moved back.
"I mean I came prepared today to discuss the two matters, well to discuss the matter regarding juveniles for sure because I'm very concerned about what that measure would attempt to do," Barrow said.
The bill is scheduled for the Senate in their chamber at 1:00 p.m. Thursday.
"I'm assuming that if they decide to not do it tomorrow, then it may not be heard this session," Barrow said.
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