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(Editor’s Note: The charges listed here and the narratives that go with them are provided by the police agencies that made the arrests. Guilt or innocence has not been determined in court.)

Local authorities have been warning drivers to stay out of the left lane when they’re not trying to pass another vehicle, and a stop for that violation Wednesday resulted in an arrest for methamphetamine possession in Berwick, police reports say.
Two traffic stops near Amelia and Bayou L’Ourse led to more drug arrests in Assumption.

Berwick
Police Chief David Leonard reported these arrests:
—Lee Pierce , 37, 11th Street, Morgan City, was arrested at 11:26 p.m. Wednesday on charges of possession of methamphetamine and possession of drug paraphernalia, and on a St. Mary warrant for failure to appear.
—Cynthia Metrejean, 32, 11th Street, Morgan City, was arrested at 11:26 p.m. Wednesday on an Assumption Parish warrant for failure to appear.
At about 10:52 p.m. Wednesday, a vehicle was observed traveling on U.S. 90 East in the left lane and not actively passing vehicles. A traffic stop was conducted on the vehicle, and contact was made with Metrejean and Pierce. During the course of the stop, Pierce was found to be in possession of methamphetamine and items of drug paraphernalia.
A warrants check revealed that Metrejean had active warrants through the Assumption Parish Sheriff’s Office, and Pierce had active warrants through the St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s Office.
Both were placed under arrest and transported to the Berwick Police Department.. Metrejean was released to Assumption Parish and Pierce awaits a bond.
—George Frederick, 51, Juarez Street, New Iberia, was arrested at 9:22 a.m. Wednesday on charges of possession of marijuana, following too closely, no insurance, expired motor vehicle inspection and failure to register vehicle.
About 9:05 a.m. Wednesday, a traffic stop was conducted on a vehicle traveling on U.S. 90 for following too close to other vehicles. Officers made contact with the driver, Frederick, who was advised for the reason of the stop.
During the course of the stop, Frederick was found to be in possession of marijuana. It was also learned that the vehicle did not have an active insurance policy or registration, and the motor vehicle inspection was expired. Frederick was placed under arrest and transported to the Berwick Police Department, where he was booked.
Frederick later posted a $3,000 bond.

Assumption
Sheriff Leland Falcon reported these arrests:
—Shan Michael Perera, 46, La. 308, Napoleonville, was arrested on charges of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine, possession of drug parapheralia (second offense), illegal window tint and driving on roadway laned for traffic.
The arrest arose from a traffic stop near Bayou L’Ourse.
Narcotics agents on assignment observed a vehicle commit traffic violations and initiated an investigative stop of that vehicle. Agents made contact with the driver, identified as Perera, and engaged in dialogue with him as to the purpose of the stop. At some point, agents requested the presence of a K-9 unit to the scene.
The K-9 conducted an open-air sniff of the vehicle and alerted to the presence of illegal narcotics. A subsequent search of the vehicle as well as a protective pat down search yielded quantities of methamphetamine, assorted drug paraphernalia and a quantity of U.S. currency.
Perera was arrested and booked into the Assumption Parish Detention Center pending a bond hearing.
—Marvin T. Sullen, 39, Sauvage Road, Marrero, was arrested Tuesday night on charges of speeding 90 mph in a 70 mph zone and driving with a suspended driver’s license, and on a fugitive warrant from New Orleans.
—Raymond Bernard Harper, 32. Fourth Street, Marrero, was arrested Tuesday night on a charge of possession of marijuana (third offense, felony).
The charges arose from a traffic stop near Amelia.
A uniformed patrol officer observed a vehicle commit a traffic violation and initiated a traffic stop. As the stop was being conducted, the deputy noted the passenger to be tossing items out of the vehicle.
The deputy stopped the vehicle and made contact with the passenger, Harper, as well as the driver, Sullen.
During a computer check for warrants, it was determined that Sullen was wanted on a fugitive warrant from New Orleans.
While doing a walk around near the vehicle, deputies located suspected marijuana. Additional marijuana was located in the vehicle.
Sullen was booked into the Assumption Parish Detention Center and incarcerated without bond.
Harper was booked released on a $10,000 bond.
—Keith Caballero, 63, La. 308, Donaldsonville, was arrested late Tuesday on charges of possession of hydrocodone, driving under suspension and head lamps required.
—Edward Larkin Beeson, 61, La. 1, Belle Rose, was arrested on a charge of possession of oxycodone.
The arrests followed a traffic stop on La. 70 East.
A uniformed patrol officer observed a vehicle commit a traffic violation and proceeded to stop the vehicle.
The deputy made contact with the driver, identified as Caballero, and one passenger, identified as Beeson.
As a result of the stop and follow-up investigation, Caballero was found to be illegally in possession of hydrocodone. Beeson was found to be illegally in possession of oxycodone.
Caballero was arrested and booked into the Assumption Parish Detention Facility and released on a $25,000 bond.
Beeson was booked into the Assumption Parish Detention Facility with a bond set at $20,000.

Morgan City
Police Chief James F. Blair reported that over the last 24-hour period the Morgan City Police Department responded to 44 calls for service. The following people were arrested beginning Wednesday:
—Conley T. Jones, 71, Joseph Street, Morgan City, was arrested at 10:49 a.m. Wednesday on charges of driving with a suspended driver’s license, obstruction of justice, possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.
A patrol officer observed a traffic violation in the area of Marguerite Street and La. 70 in Morgan City. The officer identified the driver as Jones.
He was found in possession of suspected marijuana and drug paraphernalia. During the traffic stop, Jones attempted to destroy some of the illegal narcotics. He was placed under arrest and transported to the Morgan City Police Department.
—Gerald T. Andrew, 30, Arenz Street, Morgan City, was arrested at 1:11 p.m. Wednesday on charges of view outward or inward through windshield and resisting an officer by flight.
An officer observed a traffic violation in the area of Levee Road and Sixth Street.
The driver failed to stop until he reached Federal Avenue and Belanger Street before pulling over. 
He was placed under arrest and transported to the Morgan City Police Department for booking and incarceration.
—Jerry Richard Forbes, 20, Terrebonne Street, Morgan City, was arrested at 7:50 p.m. Wednesday on a warrant for six counts of failure to appear to pay fines in 6th Ward Court.
—Cole Zephren Fruge, 29, Saturn Road, Bayou Vista, was arrested at 9:29 p.m. Wednesday on charges of domestic abuse battery (strangulation) aggravated battery, possession of marijuana and introduction of contraband into a penal institution.
Officers responded to a domestic disturbance call on Railroad Avenue.
They learned Fruge had assaulted his domestic partner and committed an aggravated battery against another individual at the residence.
He was placed under arrest and transported to the Morgan City Police Department.
During the booking intake process, officers located suspected marijuana concealed on his person. He was additionally charged and booked into the Morgan City Police Department.

St. Mary
Parish Sheriff Blaise Smith advised that over the last 24-hour reporting period, the Sheriff’s Office responded to 35 complaints and made these arrests:
—Brent Michael Savoie, 25, Franklin, was arrested at 8:03 a.m. Wednesday on a charge of reckless operation no accident. Savoie was released on a summons to appear June 28.
—Keisha Lombas, 24, Patterson, was arrested at 10:53 a.m. Wednesday on a charge of violation of protective orders. Lombas was released on a $1,500 personal surety bond.

St. Martin
Sheriff Becket Breaux reported these arrests:
—Dustin Degetaire, 43, Adelle Street, Breaux Bridge, was arrested Wednesday on a warrant for failure to appear.
—Trevor Hillger, 21, Mitchell Boyer Road, Breaux Bridge, was arrested Wednesday by the Henderson Police Department on charges of simple burglary of a movable or immovable and theft valued at $1,000-$4,999.
—Keeira Leon, 24, Leon Street, Broussard, was arrested Wednesday on a charge of failure to appear.
—Micah Manning, 43, Witney Drive, St. Martinville, was arrested Wednesday on charges of possession of Schedule II narcotics and possession of drug paraphernalia.
—Cole Tumminello, 25, Point Aux Chenes, Lafayette, was arrested for failure to appear.

You have probably never heard of G. W. R. Bailey, but his thinking and influence were crucial to the decision of where lots of people in south Louisiana live. As the chief civil engineer for Morgan’s Louisiana and Texas Railroad, he decided where the tracks would go, and that dictated where new towns would be built.
The New Orleans, Opelousas and Great Western railroad had reached from Algiers, across the river from New Orleans, to Brashear City (as Morgan City was then called) in 1857, but the line went no farther. Its builders ran out of money, and the Civil War erupted before they could raise enough to lay more track.
For several years the company kept alive its hopes to run the rails across southwest Louisiana and link at the Sabine River with a line running from Houston. But the war dealt a fatal blow to the plan and the railroad company itself.
After the war, shipping magnate Charles Morgan bought the ruins of the railroad from a bankruptcy court. His idea was to run trains from New Orleans to Berwick Bay, which was deep enough for his steamships that traded with Galveston and other ports in Texas and Mexico. By using Berwick Bay as a terminal, he could avoid the long trip up and down the Mississippi River to New Orleans, as well as the city’s expensive wharfage fees, and also the interruptions caused by regular yellow fever quarantines blocking goods and people from the city.
When Bailey became Morgan’s chief engineer his first job was to get trains and steamboats connected at Berwick Bay, but then he began to look again at the old scheme to take the rails to Texas — without bankrupting the company again.
He had several options to consider. One was to extend the rails up Bayou Teche to New Iberia and to turn west from there. Another was to continue north to Vermilionville (Lafayette), then head for the Sabine. The third was to go farther north to Opelousas before turning west.
In March 1868, Bailey estimated that it would cost about $1 million to build the line to Vermilionville and that it would cost another two million to take it from there to Niblett’s Bluff on the Sabine just west of the present town of Vinton. He said it would cost at least another million above that to get to Texas if the line continued north to Opelousas before turning toward Thompson’s Bluff, which was north of Niblett’s Bluff.
As Bailey saw it, the company needed to connect New Orleans “at the least cost and in the shortest time,” with Houston, “the railway center of Texas.”
As for the New Iberia plan, Bailey said a line across the flat prairies “from a point near Vermilionville, via Lake Charles, or near it, to the Sabine River ,” would “run through a better section of country,” and that it would “avoid all sea marsh, need only two drawbridges, and be but 100 miles instead of 118 miles.” He said it would be “folly” to take on the increased cost, “with no corresponding advantages.”
In July 1878, George Pandelly, superintendent of the railroad, promised that 3,000 tons of steel rails would be delivered in Algiers by September and that the line was “ready to commence building the road beyond Morgan City.” By the following March, the Morgan company had laid 75 miles of steel rails up the Teche to Vermilionville, and had coordinated the route west with another line, the Louisiana Western, that was starting at the Sabine and building east. Linking the two would provide an uninterrupted 350-mile line from New Orleans to Houston.
The plan came together on Aug. 30, 1880, when the first through train ran from Houston to New Orleans. Connecting the two commercial centers was a great, and profitable, step but the railroad managers saw that they were leaving money on the table.
The trains were doing good business on the run up the Teche, where there were already communities built around old steamboat stops, but they were running mostly across unpopulated prairie between the Vermilion and the Sabine. That meant no stops for (and no money from) picking up passengers and freight along the way.
Their solution was to aggressively promote new settlement on the prairie, especially at or near places where railroad stops were needed to fuel the trains and maintain the tracks. Their plan worked, largely because Midwestern wheat farmers found that they could grow rice here without investing in new equipment and without having to put up with cold Northern winters.
That is why anyone following the tracks alongside old U.S. 90 will pass through a town almost exactly every five miles — Lafayette, Scott, Duson, Rayne, Crowley, Estherwood, Midland, Mermentau, Jennings, Roanoke, Welsh, Lacassine, Iowa, Chloe, Lake Charles, Westlake, Sulphur, Vinton and Toomey.
Their railroad heritage is kept alive in part because Jennings, Crowley, and Rayne were named for railroad men and several of the other towns were named by them. But there is no Bailey or Baileyville on the route he chose across the prairie, and his name and role are all but forgotten.
A collection of Jim Bradshaw’s columns, "Cajuns and Other Characters," is now available from Pelican Publishing. You can contact him at jimbradshaw4321@gmail.com or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.

The American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living, representing more than 14,000 nursing homes and long-term care facilities across the country that provide care to approximately 5 million people each year, released a report showing nursing homes in the U.S. have seen the lowest number of new COVID cases since the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services started tracking back in May 2020, suggesting that the vaccines are working.
Recent CMS data shows that nursing homes have seen an 82% decline in new COVID cases among residents since the peak during the week of Dec. 20 of last year when there were more than 30,000 new resident cases. In the same period of time, community cases in the general population dropped by 46%, showcasing that vaccines are having an impact in protecting the elderly population in nursing homes.
“We still have a long road ahead, but these numbers are incredibly encouraging and a major morale booster for frontline caregivers who have been working tirelessly every day for a year to protect our residents,” said Mark Parkinson, president and CEO of AHCA/NCAL. “This new data showcases just how important it is for nursing homes residents and staff, as well as the general public, to get the vaccine because it is clearly working.”
The report also shows cases have dropped to the lowest level since CMS started tracking weekly COVID cases in nursing homes last May.

Douglas and Deanna Daigle of Gibson welcome great-great-grandson Rhett Borne, front row, as the fifth generation of their family. Completing the five generations are the Daigles’ daughter Angela Daigle Percle, great-granddaughter Katelyn Percle, and grandson Jason Percle, all of Morgan City.