The commission said last week it had subpoenaed at least three magazines maintained by former Louisiana State Police Superintendent Colonel Kevin Reeves, but he did not comply with the warrant, according to Representative Denise Marcelle, who sits on the commission of inquiry.
“They can’t be above the law,” Marcelle told DailyExpertNews on Tuesday evening. “Our chairman sat down and asked for very specific things and this committee has been honest. They continue to cloud this situation they are in. The further we investigate, the worse it gets.”
Videos of the incident were released two years later. They showed Greene being tasered, kicked and beaten by members of the Louisiana State Police before dying in their custody.
Lewis Unglesby, an attorney representing Reeves, met with Rep. Tanner Magee, the committee’s chairman, gave him between nine and 11 pages of entries from his client’s diaries, but not the diaries in their entirety, Unglesby told DailyExpertNews.
Magee left the meeting without taking the documents, Unglesby told DailyExpertNews. He also said that he had sent the documents to the committee by email, fax and letter.
“They don’t have the magazines, that’s true,” Unglesby told DailyExpertNews in a phone call. ‘But do you have the data pertaining to Greene? Yes,” he said, adding, “The rest of the magazines are none of their business.”
Reeves retired from his position as chief of state police in October 2020, amid controversy surrounding his handling of Greene’s death.
In March, Reeves testified before the special committee about his knowledge of the incident and, in a sometimes heated exchange with lawmakers, denied allegations of a cover-up of Greene’s death.
But Marcelle, after hearing testimonies from current and former state police officers, said it is clear to her that a cover-up has taken place. “The question becomes how high the cover-up is and when are we going to hold people accountable,” she said.
Governor accused of silence
Edwards denied the allegations at the time, saying he welcomed “any legislative oversight” of the matter. He called the actions of the troopers involved “criminal” and said he was informed by Reeves in May 2019 that Greene died after a chase and a “violent, prolonged battle” with state police.
The whistleblower in the case, Carl Cavalier, a former Louisiana state agent, was fired after he charged colleagues involved in Greene’s death with murder and an alleged internal cover-up. Since Greene’s death, multiple troopers have come forward to testify that a cover-up has taken place within the highest ranks of the department, which Reeves denies.
DailyExpertNews’s Jade Gordon and Alta Spells contributed to this report.
