Louisiana judge files criminal complaint against TV station

New Orleans station WWL-TV was the target of a criminal complaint filed by a Louisiana judge on Sept. 11, 2026, after it reported on a property transfer involving the judge’s former fiance.

A judicial administrator for the Orleans Parish Criminal Court first sent the station a letter Sept. 10 demanding it remove information published about Criminal Court Judge Kimya Holmes, who is seeking reelection, the outlet reported. The letter cited provisions of state law that had been repealed weeks earlier.

The station had reported in August that Holmes’ ex-fiance, Arthur Allen, was negotiating a guilty plea with federal prosecutors for stealing COVID-19 relief money and knew he would have to pay back more than $712,000 when he transferred one of his homes to Holmes.

The station’s video report showed a small but readable image of the public document recording the property transfer, including the home’s address. The report also showed the license plate of Allen’s leased Corvette, which he had transferred to the judge, after a source had photographed the car in a courthouse garage.

The court official’s letter cited a statute that, when it was in effect, had given third parties, including news organizations, 72 hours to remove certain personal information about judges from the internet. The letter sought to remove Holmes’ home address and the license plate number from its coverage and demanded that the station identify the person who photographed the Corvette.

WWL-TV took the videos offline within a day of receiving the letter and later reposted them with the address and license plate information blurred. The station refused to identify its source.

However, Holmes did not wait for the TV station to comply. She filed a criminal complaint against WWL-TV with the New Orleans Police Department, accusing it of “revealing her home address and vehicle information,” the station reported.

When the outlet reached out to the judge’s campaign spokesperson about the legal basis for the criminal complaint, the spokesperson cited the same outdated law, which had since been amended to remove any criminal penalty. The new statute only requires the removal of personal information of “protected individuals.”

Scott Sternberg, general counsel for the Louisiana Press Association, told WWL-TV that the amended law did not provide a basis for Holmes’ demands and that the letter had no effect.

“That’s probably why NOPD isn’t coming down here to arrest you,” Sternberg said. “Because there hasn’t been a crime.”

WWL-TV said its attorney Mary Ellen Roy wrote to the New Orleans police detective investigating Holmes’ complaint to make sure he knows the law “no longer applies to WWL-TV or its reporters at all, and, moreover, no longer contains any criminal penalties.”

Roy added, “We expect this investigation to be closed, forthwith.”

The New Orleans Police Department told the news outlet on Sept. 29 that it was still investigating the complaint.