The video Gusman sent appears to have been posted by Zeton on Facebook on May 30. Author: By David Hammer / Eyewitness Investigator Published: 8:07 PM CDT July 16, 2021 Updated: 11:21 PM CDT July 16, 2021
NEW ORLEANS As he begins his re-election campaign, Sheriff Marlin Gusman wants to correct the record from a WWL-TV report on June 3. A video he sent to the TV station shows he never said anything in support of convicted felon Irvin Mayfield.
The story was about Mayor LaToya Cantrell, who was caught on video May 29, urging a crowd at the Magnolia Mansion to support Mayfield, even as Mayfield and his longtime partner owe more than $1 million in restitution for money they transferred from the city’s public library charity to their jazz orchestra, to lavish trips for Mayfield and into their own pockets.
Mayor Cantrell calls Irvin Mayfield a true son of the city as musician awaits sentencing in library fraud case
Mayfield and partner now seek to pay $1.1 million in restitution into a court account, in accordance with their plea agreement, prior to their sentencing. Author: By David Hammer / Eyewitness Investigator Published: 6:40 PM CDT June 3, 2021 Updated: 6:56 PM CDT June 3, 2021
NEW ORLEANS Even as they prepare to pay $1.1 million in restitution for illegally transferring money from the city’s public library charity to their jazz orchestra, musicians Irvin Mayfield and Ronald Markham are getting support from top local officials.
Mayor LaToya Cantrell, whose administration runs the library system, and Sheriff Marlin Gusman, the top elected law enforcement official in the city, both stood in front of a crowd at the Magnolia Mansion during a sold-out Mayfield performance Saturday and extolled the Grammy winner.
According to the factual basis, Mayfield and Markham admitted they “fraudulently edited” records “with the intent to impede, obstruct and influence the investigation
On Saturday, May 1, at 7 p.m., guests will enjoy a screening of Dan Pritzker’s film
Bolden on the grounds of the New Orleans Jazz Museum following a performance by Calvin Johnson and a Q&A session about the movie. Admission is $50 and includes an open bar by Seven Three Distilling Co and catering by Bywater Bakery.
Filmed in 2019, Bolden is based on the life of cornetist Buddy Bolden (1877–1931). One of the seminal figures in jazz history, Bolden left no surviving recordings, having been committed in 1907 at age 30 to the Louisiana State Insane Asylum, where he spent the rest of his life after a diagnosis of acute alcoholic psychosis.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Dall Kammer and his team will have until March 2 to present their own list of potential witnesses to testify at sentencing, at a date that’s not yet been set.
The U.S. Probation Office has already filed a draft sentencing report. Sentencing guidelines depend on several factors, including the amount of money involved. It’s not unusual for people to write letters to judges vouching for defendants’ character before they are sentenced, but hearing testimony from both sides before sentencing is less common.
Mayfield “will probably want to bring forth people to say he was of good character and maybe this was just a simple mistake,” said WWL-TV Legal Analyst Keva Landrum, a former state criminal court judge and district attorney. “And then the prosecution may want to bring people who they thought would have been their witnesses in the trial to say otherwise.”