On December 19, 2019, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana held a naturalization ceremony in which 53 candidates were naturalized as United States citizens.  The Honorable Dana M. Douglas, U.S. Magistrate Judge for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, presided over the ceremony.  Candidates originated from 31 different countries, exemplifying the truly diverse character of the American people.   Attorney Brandon Davis served as the keynote speaker.  In his speech, Attorney Davis called on candidates to “move on to the hard work of active citizenship” and described America as “a place where we can be a part of something bigger, a place where we can contribute our talents and fulfill our ambitions and secure new opportunity for ourselves and for others, a place where we can retain pride in our heritage but where we can recognize that we have a common creed, a loyalty to these documents, a loyalty to our democracy, where we can criticize our government but understand that we love it, where we agree to live together even when we don’t agree with each other, where we work through the democratic process and not through violence or sectarianism to resolve disputes, where we live side by side as neighbors, and where our children know themselves to be a part of this nation, no longer strangers, but the bedrock of this nation, the essence of this nation.” Following Attorney Davis’s moving and heartfelt speech, the candidates announced their names and countries of origin and swore allegiance to the United States, thereby becoming United States citizens.  After the ceremony, the New Orleans Chapter of the League of Women Voters provided new citizens with voter registration applications, encouraging them to take advantage of their newly minted right to vote.   Ceremony photographs may be accessed by selecting this link.(Part A, Part B)

On October 25, 2019, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana held its 2nd Biennial Bench and Bar Conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Downtown New Orleans.  Approximately 500 members of the Eastern District’s bench and bar were in attendance.     Chief U.S. District Judge Nannette Jolivette Brown opened the conference.  U.S. District Judge Eldon Fallon followed the opening with a dedication to retired U.S. District Judge Helen “Ginger” Berrigan.  U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey honored U.S. District Judge Peter Beer, and U.S. Magistrate Judge Karen Wells Roby followed by honoring retired U.S. Magistrate Judge Daniel Knowles and retiring U.S. Magistrate Judge Joseph Wilkinson.  Afterwards, Chief Judge Brown acknowledged the contributions which various bar presidents made in planning the conference.  These bar presidents included Cory Vidal, former president of the Greater New Orleans Louis A. Martinet Legal Society, Jason Waguespack, president of the New Orleans Bar Association, and W. Raley Alford, III, former president of the New Orleans Chapter of the Federal Bar Association. In addition, both U.S. 5th Circuit Judge Carl Stewart and U.S. District Judge Sarah Vance were honored - Judge Stewart for his service as Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Judge Vance for her service as Chair of the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation.     After the conference opening, attendees received instruction on a variety of civil and criminal law topics, including A Primer on Attorney Discipline in the Eastern District (Eva Dossier and Darren Patin), A View from the New Kids on the Bench (U.S. District Judges Barry Ashe, Greg Guidry, and Wendy Vitter and U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Meredith Grabill), an Introduction and Conversation with Priscilla Owen, Chief Judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (Chief U.S. District Judge Nannette Jolivette Brown and Chief U.S. 5th Circuit Judge Priscilla Owen), Criminal Advocacy and Sentencing (U.S. District Judge Lance Africk, Federal Public Defender Claude Kelly, U.S.S.C. Deputy Director Alan Dorhoffer, and U.S.A.O. Chief of Trials Bill McSherry), U.S. Supreme Court and Fifth Circuit Updates (W. Raley Alford, III, Jason Waguespack, Southern Law School Vice Chancellor Shawn Vance, Tulane Law School Professor Stephen Griffin, and LSU Law School Professor Maggie Thomas), Settlement Conferences (U.S. Magistrate Judges Janis van Meerveld, Michael North, and Karen Wells Roby), The Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 (U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Meredith Grabill, Mark Mintz, Leo Congeni, Cherie Nobles, and Timothy Kirkpatrick), Procedural Aspects of Disability & Medicare Appeals (Jason Waguespack, DHH Associate Chief Administrative Law Judge Tamia Gordon, SSA Administrative Law Judge Jeffery Morgan, and Wiebke Breuer), and ABC’s of Multidistrict Litigation (U.S. District Judges Carl Barbier, Eldon Fallon, and Jane Triche Milazzo, U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael North, Kim Moore, and Gerald Meunier).     In addition, attendees were treated to a riveting and thought-provoking lunchtime presentation on Evidence-Based Sentencing given by retired U.S. District Judge and Harvard Law Professor Nancy Gertner.       

On October 17, 2019, 35 individuals were naturalized as new United States citizens at the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana. The Honorable Greg G. Guidry, District Judge for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, presided over the ceremony. The naturalization candidates originated from countries around the world, including Vietnam, Ecuador, Russia, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Philippines, Honduras, Ukraine, Colombia, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Yemen, Lebanon, Haiti, and Canada. After the candidates individually announced their names and countries of origin, they took the Oath of Allegiance to the United States. The new citizens then received certificates of naturalization and posed for pictures with Judge Guidry. Following the ceremony, citizens were invited to complete voter registration applications by the New Orleans Chapter of the League of Women Voters. Please select this link to access ceremony photographs.

The BIENNIAL FEDERAL BENCH AND BAR CONFERENCE is fast approaching.  The Conference will be held on Friday, October 25, 2019, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in New Orleans.  The final agenda has been posted on the FBBC website http://fbbc.laed.uscourts.gov.  Please use the conference password previously provided via email to access the website. For questions about the conference, please call 504-589-3345 or send an email to fbbc@laed.uscourts.gov