Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore III is running to take a fourth term on November 3. This race, however, is his first time running opposed since first being elected 18 years ago.
Moore’s tenure as district attorney has made him a prolific figure in the parish. He’s running on the back of his record, saying that’s what he considers his true opposition rather than his opponent, public defender and civil rights attorney Ryan Thompson.
WRKF Report for America corps member Alex Cox interviewed Moore ahead of the election to discuss his views on justice and more.
The following conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
ALEX COX, BYLINE: As a warm-up, I wanted to start a little philosophical here — what does justice mean to you?
HILLAR MOORE III: First, that everyone is treated fairly and that those who have been violated by someone criminally get their fair share as a victim in court, and that the defendant gets treated fairly as well.
Recognizing that not all cases should be handled the same. For the overwhelming part, the victims and defendants know each other through some type of relationship, good or bad, family or not.
That means that in a lot of those cases, you can resolve them through other resolutions other than a criminal commitment or jail time, because they know each other and they kinda care for each other, but something went wrong.
There are those more rare occasions where the two do not know each other, or if they do know each other, a really terrible thing happened, like a shooting, murder. Those are in a whole different category.
COX: Do you have the adequate levers to pull or tools to use to give people second chances?
MOORE: I was a defense lawyer for 16 years, defending people charged with crimes.
Being a criminal defense lawyer, you hear from a defendant himself saying why they did what they did or what the facts were compared to what the police or the DA said. And now, being the DA, I have that experience, so I do understand that things are not always black and white. There is a lot of gray, and you have to listen, if you get the opportunity, to the other side and understand why they did what they did
And in the system we have now, that's not built for slowing down. So that slowing down and getting to really learn the other side is hard.
And that's what the role of the criminal defendant lawyer is: to give you that experience, give you that information and get their input as to what an outcome should be.
COX: The two of you have kinda sparred back and forth and had your fair share of political ads. I feel like one of the most common topics brought up from you is criticizing Thompson for his record, the type of clients he takes and getting people let off their charges. To me, that doesn't necessarily square with the conversation we just had. Can you give me some insight into that?
MOORE: No, the idea is that he has no experience whatsoever as good as a prosecutor.
It's very obvious from him and what he's said and what he's done. He does not like the police. He's anti-police. And he is picking certain cases.
And the truth is never gonna be there. It's gonna take what his side is, of what it is. And my position is that he's saying that I let everyone go. I don't let everybody go. What I do is a measured approach, and I use whatever facts are in front of me, and I base it on what the facts are, not what someone thinks.
COX: Why another run? You've been at this for a while. What makes you want to stay?
MOORE: I mean, I love the job that I have. I think I am the most experienced candidate in the race. I am running against myself.
I am not running against anyone that's opposed to me in this election. So I don't even consider him. I'm running against myself and my office, the office personnel, the office record. It speaks for itself.
I’ve been fighting for years to get the office fully funded, properly funded, along with helping assist the public defender have their office fully funded as it should be. We have not been for a long time.
COX: I know this is going to be a little tricky to talk about, but your office is currently suing the city parish. How much do you think your interpersonal relationships with city parish leaders and your kind of status made this whole thing go a little smoother?
MOORE: Well, before filing the lawsuit, we've been in discussions on this for years. We write letters at the end of the year financially with our budget to say, "This is where we are. We're letting you know we're down to this reserve." So we've been doing that for 17, 18 years now, and kept telling them every year — year after year after year, "Here we are, eventually we're gonna hit a pole, and we're gonna stop."
We told them this past time, "We have hit it, and we've stopped. We can't go any further." Before filing the lawsuit, I personally called every one of the city councilmen and then met with the mayor to say, "Look, I'm getting ready to file this suit. Here it is. I just wanna give you a heads-up."
But we're at the point where the city parish eventually has to say, "All right, we're gonna have to restructure the way we finance our constitutional offices, and they're gonna have to come first," 'cause that's what the law says.
COX: Let's move to the public defender. It takes two to tango — can you articulate to what degree you think it's the responsibility of a DA to support the public defender in the political world?
MOORE: Yes. So, I think my position, which sees me with Kyla [Blanchard-Romanach] or her predecessor, Mike [Michael A. Mitchell], who was the chief public defender, is unusual. Louisiana is different in funding DAs and public defenders than any other state.
It's just completely different. So I feel a commitment, a need and an obligation to make sure that the person that I'm going against — the public defender — is adequately funded. Because if I have a conviction against someone who has inadequate, inappropriate, unrepresented, for the most part, counsel, that is not a valid conviction, and I need to make sure that we have valid convictions and that a defendant is adequately represented.