NEW ORLEANS – An investigation is underway at the Orleans Parish Criminal District Courthouse after a door to an evidence room was pried open.
Clerk of Court Arthur Morrell said he was notified of the break in around 7 p.m. on November 8.
“We did see the hasp on the door was pried back to allow someone to get in,” Morrell said.
Morrell said staffers immediately did a cursory survey of the evidence room and could not find anything missing.
There are no security cameras in the area of the break in, and the area is very secluded and only able to be accessed by a limited number of people, Morrell said.
NOPD detectives oversaw a more thorough inventory, Morrell said.
“Right now, we don’t see anything, we can’t visualize something being missing, but we are taking an inventory to see if something is missing,” he said. “But the evidence up there is not for any case that is ongoing or active. It’s old evidence or evidence that we have to keep forever.”
No open cases have been jeopardized by the break in, Morrell said.
The working theory is that someone was just curious about what was on the other side of the door.
“We don’t have any money up there, that’s kept in a different place,” he said. “There’s no drugs up there. No evidence concerning rape situations. Those are put in a different area altogether. Any value up there would be in tires, or some weapons up there that are in the boxes. No box had been disturbed.”
