Chelsey Napoleon sues mayor, city council, ratcheting up battle over Orleans clerk post

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A day after the New Orleans City Council appointed an interim clerk for the Orleans Parish courts and called a special election to fill the seat, the person the state Legislature installed in the post last week lodged a lawsuit to stop the moves.

The suit filed Tuesday in Baton Rouge by Chelsey Napoleon, the longtime Civil District Court Clerk who took over the duties of the criminal clerk earlier this month, names New Orleans city leaders as defendants and claims they lacked the authority to undercut her lawful claim to a unified clerk’s office.

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Under the new law, Napoleon becomes the lone district court clerk for the parish. Duncan has sued Landry and Secretary of State Nancy Landry in federal court, while another challenge to the new state law is pending in Baton Rouge, filed by a candidate for U.S. Senate, Gary Crockett.

Attorney General Liz Murrill’s office has secured stays of injunctions in both courts, as the fate of a position overseeing court records and elections in New Orleans remained in flux, even as Napoleon said she continued to be in charge of the combined office.

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In her lawsuit, Napoleon described the council’s decision to remove her, appoint former criminal court judge Calvin Johnson as interim clerk and call a Nov. 3 election as an “unlawful attempt” to install a “competing” clerk in the seat she occupied lawfully.

It threatens to throw the clerk’s office into further chaos, Napoleon claims. She asked Smith, the Baton Rouge judge, for an emergency injunction to force New Orleans officials to call off the special election and remove the interim pick.

“The Council’s actions exceed its constitutional and statutory authority and threaten immediate and irreparable harm to the orderly administration of justice, judicial records, criminal filings, election records, and public confidence in the judicial system,” wrote Napoleon’s attorney, Geri Broussard.

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Before the council vote on Monday, Morrell cited a state law that mandates that local governing bodies appoint a qualified clerk in the absence of a clerk or chief deputy clerk to take the reins.

Napoleon, however, claims the clerk’s office is governed by the Louisiana constitution and state laws, leaving New Orleans’ City Council with no authority to handpick its leader or call a vote.

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