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Toledo Bend Reservoir 49
TEX.
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55 20
MISS. Baton Rouge
10 Lafayette
Gulf of Mexico
New Orleans
BATON ROUGE, LOUISIANA
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S at u r d ay, S e p t e m b e r 27, 2025
$2.00X
SHOWDOWN
Staff map
Study of Toledo Bend water sales planned
Hazing victim’s family files suit Southern fraternity, members accused of wrongful death
BY QUINN COFFMAN Staff writer
Community expresses concerns about possible Texas deal BY DAVID J. MITCHELL Staff writer
For nearly 15 years, the state agency in charge of Louisiana’s half of Toledo Bend Reservoir has periodically considered selling water to investors seeking to supply Texas — a move that has gained new traction with recent interest from a Dallas company. But people who live around the lake and businesses that count on recreation there have opposed the idea, fearing a sale could lower water levels too much, leaving homeowners’ docks high and dry and harming the fishing Toledo Bend is famous for. Seeking to address those concerns, the Sabine River Authority of Louisiana has agreed to hire a firm to analyze how such water sales could affect the lake, which straddles the Louisiana-Texas border. The authority plans to spend about $50,000 for computer models measuring the impact of withdrawing anywhere from 200,000 to 800,000 acre-feet of water per year. Gary Moore, an authority board member who leads a committee studying the idea, said the analysis will take through the end of year and that no decision on sales would be made until 2026. Authority officials have contended their own analysis of decades of water management show that what the Texas company, Aqueduct Partners LP, is seeking could be managed in a way that keeps the lake at current levels. But Moore acknowledged those opposed to the plan don’t trust what the authority has been saying, necessitating the third-party analysis. “So, we don’t have much choice but to do this,” said Moore, Sabine
Blake Baker leads a resurgent LSU defense.
President Donald Trump shakes hands with James Comey, then director of the FBI, in the White House in 2017.
BLOOMBERG FILE PHOTO By ANDREW HARRER
Trump celebrates Comey charges, but critics say he’s targeting rivals BY JILL COLVIN Associated Press
NEW YORK — President Donald Trump’s unprecedented retribution campaign against his perceived political enemies reached new heights as his Justice Department brought criminal charges against a longtime foe and he expanded his efforts to classify certain liberal groups as “domestic terrorist organizations.” Days after Trump publicly demanded action from his attorney general and tapped his former personal lawyer to serve as the top federal prosecutor in Virginia, former FBI Director James Comey, a longtime target of Trump’s ire, was indicted by a grand jury for allegedly lying to Congress during testimony in 2020. Hours earlier Thursday, Trump signed a memorandum directing his Republican administration to target backers of what they dubbed “left-wing terrorism” as he alleged without evidence a vast conspiracy by Democrat-aligned nonprofit groups and activists to
finance violent protests. The developments marked a dramatic escalation of the president’s extraordinary use of the levers of presidential power to target his political rivals and his efforts to pressure the Justice Department to pursue investigations — and now prosecutions — of those he disdains. It’s a campaign that began soon after Trump returned to office and one that critics see as an abuse of power that puts every American who dares to criticize the president at risk of retaliation. “Donald Trump has made clear that he intends to turn our justice system into a weapon for punishing and silencing his critics,” said Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee. The Comey indictment came less than a week after Trump installed a former White House aide and confidant to the role of U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia. The president had forced the ouster of his previous pick
ä See SHOWDOWN, page 5A
ä See WATER, page 6A
A wrongful-death lawsuit was filed Friday in the 19th Judicial Court by the family of Caleb Wilson, the Southern University fraternity pledge who died during a hazing ritual earlier this year. The lawsuit targets a collection of “No parents institutions and in- should have dividuals, includto bury ing the national their child chapter of Omega because of Psi Phi fraternity, senseless the Beta Sigma chapter of the fraand ternity on South- preventable ern’s campus, the actions.” state of Louisiana as represented URANIA by the Board of BROWN Southern Univer- WILSON AND sity, and the fra- COREy WILSON ternity members SR., in a joint accused of orchesstatement trating the ritual that led to Wilson’s death. Wilson, a 20-year-old trumpet player for Southern University’s famed Human Jukebox marching band, died after he was punched in the chest four times while pledging for Omega Psi Phi inside a warehouse at 3412 Woodcrest Drive. Three Omega Psi Phi fraternity brothers are accused of punching the lined-up pledges, with one specifically accused of punching Wilson with a pair of black boxing gloves immediately before his death. The brothers then allegedly changed Wilson’s clothes, drove
ä See HAZING, page 7A
PROVIDED PHOTO
Caleb Wilson played trumpet with Southern University’s Human Jukebox.
Special judicial elections top ballot as early voting begins BY ELLYN COUVILLION Staff writer
Early voting for the Oct. 11 election begins Saturday, with East Baton Rouge Parish voters choosing two new judges in special elections for both City Court and state court. The early voting will continue on Monday and go through Oct. 4,
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from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Voters in East Baton Rouge Parish will also be deciding the outcome of three funding propositions: two for neighborhood crime prevention districts and one for the Downtown Development District. Four Democrats are facing off for the seat that became vacant
The candidates running to be one of the 15 judges on the 19th Judicial District bench, which serves East Baton Rouge Parish, are Dele ä What’s on the ballot. PAGE 2B Adebamiji, Elzie Alford Jr., Vicky Jones and Vernon Thomas. For Baton Rouge’s City Court, on the 19th Judicial District Court after Judge Wilson Fields resigned two Republicans are running to to move to the state’s 1st Circuit replace Judge Carson Marcantel, who resigned in February. CanCourt of Appeal in March.
ELECTION 2025
Business ......................5B Deaths .........................4B Nation-World................2A Classified .....................7D Living............................1D Opinion ........................6B Comics-Puzzles .....4D-6D Metro ...........................1B Sports ..........................1C
didates Brenden Craig and Calli Boudreaux are running to serve on the five-judge City Court bench. In addition to candidate races, three propositions are on the ballot: n The Downtown Development District is seeking the renewal
ä See VOTING, page 7A
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