SAINTS AT SEAHAWKS • 3:05 P.M. • CBS 1C LATE FIELD GOAL PUSHES EASTERN MICHIGAN OVER UL 1C THE
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S u n d ay, S e p t e m b e r 21, 2025
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SINKING
Long legal career preceded Haynes’ conviction
INTO THE GULF
Thousands of old oil wells, many unplugged and leaking, pock state’s disappearing coast
Former assistant district attorney found guilty in kickback scheme BY CLAIRE TAYLOR | Staff writer Gary Haynes grew up on Azalea Street in Lafayette, a neighbor of Don Landry, who wrote a letter of recommendation for Haynes to get into law school and repaid Haynes for helping with his successful 2020 campaign to become district attorney with a job in his office. Haynes was convicted Thursday by a 12-person jury in federal court on six charges in connection with a kickback scheme in Landry’s pretrial intervention office. He faces a sentence of 65 years in prison, five years of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000, or both. Haynes Three other people — Dusty Guidry, Leonard Franques and Joe Prejean — entered plea deals with federal officials, admitting to some extent their roles in the kickback scheme. Haynes refused plea deal offers and chose to stand trial instead. Haynes, who was on administrative leave without pay, has been dismissed in the wake of Thursday’s conviction, Landry said. Haynes, 67, who attended an earlier version of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, became an engineer and worked in the oil field before earning his law degree. In an audio recording from the FBI investigation, he said he maintained a general practice, focused on personal injury cases. He also conducted business transactions for oilfield companies, he said, and handled litigation for some oilfield companies. At some point, Landry and Haynes “practiced a little civil law together,” Landry said on Sept. 8, the first day of testimony in Haynes’ federal trial. In the recording, Haynes said he bought a nice house on University Avenue in Lafayette where his private office is today. “It took me 10 years, and then, all I had was a down payment on it,” he said. “I had to get a mortgage.”
ä See HAYNES, page 7A
STAFF PHOTO By SOPHIA GERMER
Damaged equipment sticks out of the water near oil wells and platforms south of Venice on June 5. Thousands of old oil wells drilled on land now sit in open water off Louisiana, threatening boats, leaking oil and leaving taxpayers with the cleanup bill. BY ALEX LUBBEN Staff writer
Mikeal Berthelot Jr. was navigating the mouth of the Mississippi River in his shrimp boat, a stretch of water he’d traversed many times before. The water was calm. The sun beat down. His deckhand was making a peanut butter sandwich. Then the boat slammed into something they couldn’t see. The crash threw Berthelot forward. As he grasped for support, his hand shattered a glass pane in front of the steering wheel. “My boat is stuck on some-
thing,” he told his father over the phone. “It went through the bottom of the hull.” Within minutes, the engine room filled with water. Within an hour, the boat had sunk. Berthelot didn’t know it at the time, but he had struck an old oil well, drilled more than a half-century ago. Back then, the site was surrounded by marsh. Today, it’s in navigable open water. There are thousands more like it. An analysis by The Times-Picayune and The Advocate, independently reviewed by researchers
ä See SINKING, page 6A
3,413
STATUS OF SUBMERGED WELLS Thousands are permanently plugged, but could still leak. Hundreds are unplugged or inactive. Only 12 wells are still producing
241 Permanently plugged
Unplugged
97
12
Temporarily plugged
Active
Sources: Department of Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Geological Survey
Staff graphic
COWBOY CHURCHES ROPE IN WORSHIPPERS
As religious services evolve, pastor leans into rodeo roots BY JENNA ROSS | Staff writer
STAFF PHOTO By CHRIS GRANGER
Randy Smith, pastor of the Crossbrand Cowboy Church, right, leads a moment of prayer and reflection recently in the corral as bull riders get ready to ride before worship services in Loranger.
WEATHER HIGH 90 LOW 71 PAGE 6B
LORANGER — Before he stands at a pulpit, before he wears a microphone, before he delivers a sermon, Pastor Randy Smith of the Crossbrand Cowboy Church leads a prayer behind the rodeo arena. Just after 2 p.m. Sunday, a hush comes over the arena as Smith prays that God protect the men and boys about to ride. That God watch over them. That God lead them into church at 4 p.m. “Amen,” the men murmur. This is how services start at Crossbrand — with the creak of a gate, the clang of a bell and a warning: “Fire in the hole!” Then a bull bursts out of a pen, kicking up
dust, a rider atop its back for five seconds. For the next hour, Smith will be out there with them, penning bulls, straddling gates and hoping that a few of these men who have never before attended church might find their way to the back pew. It’s the hope of hundreds of cowboy churches across the South. Since they began popping up in Louisiana’s rural reaches a decade or more ago, the churches have ushered folks into their barnlike buildings, adorned with hay bales and horseshoes, with a “come as you are” message. The lack of a dress code, steeple or formal denomination hints at how Christianity is
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ä See CHURCH, page 7A
101ST yEAR, NO. 83