Louisiana AG Liz Murrill Indicted, Then Cleared, After Threatening New Orleans Officials
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill was indicted on 16 criminal counts on July 2, 2026, then had all charges dropped on July 22, 2026, after the officials she was accused of threatening asked the special prosecutor to walk away.
16 criminal counts, including 8 counts of public intimidation and 8 counts of malfeasance in office, filed against a sitting Louisiana attorney general before being dropped in three weeks.
The indictment grew from a letter Murrill sent to New Orleans Mayor Helena Moreno, Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams, and city council members in May 2026. In that letter, Murrill warned that Governor Jeff Landry had authority to remove them from their elected seats. She also threatened to jail interim court clerk Calvin Johnson if he performed any official duties. The dispute concerned a new state law consolidating Orleans Parish’s two clerk of court offices, which Republicans passed in the spring after the original election winner, Calvin Duncan, was blocked from taking office by that same legislation. Duncan is a formerly incarcerated man who was exonerated and became an attorney.
The Louisiana Supreme Court ultimately ruled in Murrill’s favor on the clerk consolidation question. Still, an Orleans Parish grand jury handed up the indictment. Neither Moreno nor Williams has said publicly who initiated the grand jury investigation, and Williams recused himself and his office from the matter after the indictment.
On July 21, 2026, Moreno, Williams, and five city council members sent letters to special prosecutor Laurie White asking her to dismiss the case. “We were not intimidated,” they wrote, adding that Murrill’s threatening language could not “lawfully or practically be carried out.” Johnson, the interim clerk Murrill had threatened to jail, also wrote to White asking for dismissal.
White confirmed by text message on July 22, 2026 that she had declined to prosecute all 16 counts. Murrill responded: “This case should have NEVER been started because there was NO crime.”
The sequence exposes a pattern worth watching. Republican state lawmakers passed a law that blocked an elected Democratic official from taking office. The attorney general then threatened city leaders who tried to hold a new election.
The entire mechanism of the state was turned toward preventing New Orleans from exercising local authority over a local office. Governor Landry publicly rebuked the city, saying “New Orleans thinks they’re so special,” as he pressed the court consolidation forward.
The grand jury indictment, while independently initiated, became a liability for city officials trying to maintain a working relationship with state government. The result: charges filed, then withdrawn, with the underlying power imbalance fully intact.
What You Can Do Now
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Call your Louisiana state legislators at the Louisiana Legislature switchboard at (225) 342-6945 and ask them to hold a hearing on the clerk consolidation law that blocked Calvin Duncan from taking the office he won. Ask specifically: why was a duly elected official barred from serving?
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Contact the Louisiana Judiciary Committee. The state Supreme Court ruled on the clerk dispute, but the legislature wrote the law that created it. Ask your state senator and representative to review whether the consolidation statute complied with the state’s own election law by calling (225) 342-6945.
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Demand transparency on grand jury proceedings. It remains publicly unknown who initiated the investigation that led to Murrill’s indictment. Contact the Orleans Parish Clerk of Court at (504) 407-0000 and ask what public records are available under Louisiana’s open-records law (La. R.S. 44:1) regarding the grand jury referral.
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Track Calvin Duncan’s legal status. Duncan won an election and was barred from office by legislation passed after his victory. Contact the Louisiana Secretary of State’s office at (225) 922-2880 to ask whether a new election has been scheduled and when.
Sources
Louisiana Illuminator: New Orleans Leaders Ask Special Prosecutor to Drop Murrill Charges Louisiana Illuminator: Special Prosecutor Drops All 16 Charges Against AG Murrill