BOBBY ARDOIN Editor/Consulting Writer
The Opelousas Police Department hosted the first of several projected community meetings Monday night, as Chief Graig LeBlanc indicated that his officers plan to maintain their visibility and continue a proactive approach for solving crime.
A large crowd of nearly 100 packed into the City Hall meeting room as LeBlanc touted the reduction of violent crime during his first year as police chief during a two-hour presentation.
LeBlanc also answered questions from those in attendance about city police tactics, procedure and response times for handling criminal complaints.
“We want to tell you about where we are now in the department and where we are going,” LeBlanc told the audience, which included several elected municipal officials.
Compared to 2022, city officers according to a chart provided by LeBlanc, have been able to increase total arrests by 14 percent, while cutting the number of shootings and burglaries nearly in half.
There were three fewer homicides (eight) in Opelousas during 2023 than there were the previous year. Six of those eight murders were solved, the chart also showed.
In 2011 six of 11 homicides were solved, the chart showed.
In addition to introducing several of the 38 officers now working in the department, LeBlanc, 45, said he plans to update the public later in 2024 during similar quarterly meetings which he calls community conversations.
Technology And Improvements
While increasing the salaries of starting officers by $2, LeBlanc said the department is utilizing several new policing tools that include protective vests now worn by all officers, an increased number of surveillance cameras in known crime areas, participating in active shooting training sessions and increasing the number of police on night patrol.
Each of the new vests cost $1,800 and were purchased from grant money and what LeBlanc called “other funding.”
Expressed Concerns
One female told LeBlanc that she and other elderly residents in one section of the city are worried about what she described as “trails,” that let prospective juveniles and other perpetrators escape detection.
LeBlanc said most of his officers are aware of the escape routes which are tucked away from street view.
Departmental responses to juvenile crime and guns in the possession of youths are also problems, another person said.
This past weekend, LeBlanc said he managed to take two guns away from juveniles on Railroad and Pine avenues..
Each of the weapons seized, LeBlanc acknowledged, had 30-round magazines.
Not Everyone Was Happy
LeBlanc confronted an unidentified man who criticized LeBlanc for canceling an event scheduled to be held at the Yambilee Building in December.
The man said he was angry that shutting down the event cost him several thousand dollars although he had obtained a liquor license.
LeBlanc said he derailed the event after he discovered that several people involved with hosting the event had allegedly been involved previously in gun violence.
Additionally LeBlanc said that he also remains opposed to a bar in Opelousas that has been allowed to remain open due to a written error contained in an ordinance formerly approved by the Board of Aldermen.
“I will always take a stand on anything that will bring harm to the citizens in the city. People are coming and bringing in trouble from the outside,” said LeBlanc.
Another man who didn’t identify himself complained that he was disrespected by city officers in July.
The incident, according to the man who did not identify himself, said that he was treated by officers as if he had committed a crime during the matter which was being investigated.
