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Critics are trying to reform Louisiana’s eviction process and stop justices of the peace, which handle such cases, from collecting thousands in fees each year, Louisiana Illuminator reports.
State law allows justices of the peace to charge defendants $120 for each eviction case they handle plus another $20 for each additional defendant. To execute the eviction, their courts receive $60 per case and another $20 per defendant.
Critics allege that some judges are scheduling multiple evictions by the same landlord to be decided in rapid succession.
The organizations suing Steven Sanders, an East Baton Rouge Parish justice of the peace, say he handles 300 to 400 evictions a week. The seemingly expedited eviction process is at the heart of the lawsuit against Sanders, whose caseload generated nearly $2.7 million in court fee revenue from 2019 to 2023 based on figures from the Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s office.
Sanders’ total court expenses averaged less than $20,000 annually over that same period, leaving revenue for him to tap into to augment his base salary of around $5,000 a year that the state allocates.
Sanders’ take-home pay from 2019 to 2023 averaged $232,419 a year, making him the highest-paid justice of the peace in East Baton Rouge Parish, according to reports filed with the office. That places him well ahead of the average salaries for state district court judges ($173,788) and Louisiana Supreme Court justices ($193,227).
“It’s a very, very lucrative business,” says Hannah Adams, a plaintiff’s attorney with the National Housing Law Project.
The State Attorney General’s office, which represents local justices of the peace in legal matters, declined to comment on the lawsuit. Reached by phone Monday, Sanders said he could not discuss the pending litigation under advisement from the attorney general.
