Juneau Cab Company

A 51-year-old Ronnie Blake, a taxi driver for the town, was charged with a felony in the bureau and submitting fake official notes. Cornbread " Donald Juneau, 64, VP of United's Executive Committee, was charged with submitting or keeping erroneous government record. Juneau was free on his own approval at the happening Tuesday, time Blake was free on $25,000 commitment.

Judicial files show Blake was apprehended for attempt on second-degree homicide in 1998. The New Orleans Constabulary reports that Juneau was repeatedly detained, especially in the early eighties, on criminal charges that included rape, bodily harm, batteries, burglary, and illegally carried weapons. According to a recent constabulary statement, the cab inspection began in June 2009.

Former policeman Sidney Bournes, who supervised taxis for much of Mayor Ray Nagin's term in office, resolved to open an investigation after he heard unbridled rumours of staff corrupt practices. Bournes' second-in-command, Michael Lentz, also a former policeman, recruited an agent, Travis Trahan, to become "undercover" in the cab business, the story goes.

Soon Trahan was instructed by other United riders to join Juneau in order to receive a new test badge. According to the Act, taxis picking up fare in New Orleans must be checked twice a year. Investigations are carried out by municipal staff at a railway terminal on Old Gentilly Road.

However, instead of going into the downtown area, Trahan Juneau found himself at United's head office on Euterpe Street, where Juneau took off his old test badge and substituted it with a new one. According to the reports, the label was attributed to Blake. Yet another UC agent working for Lentz, former New Orleans policeman Joie Cutrer, filmed United's courtyard security videos "from a hidden location" and videoed Juneau as he applied new service labels to many taxis, the paper says.

Every sticker was tracked back to Blake. According to the account, witness declarations were subscribed in which Juneau said he "needed and got monetary tips" for the labels he provided. Wellsprings near the case said that Blake took Juneau dollars from Juneau in return for the sticker, but it is not clear whether the agencies have proof of it.

Kabbies are paying $50 per inspectorate, and the municipality got their cash for all illegally obtained labels, a resource with expertise of the case said. Furthermore, the taxi drivers were able to prevent the discomfort of going to the city's east New Orleans service area. Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Ann Duplessis, whose responsibilities included taxis, said that the Ground Transportation Bureau, formerly known as the Taxicab Bureau, had "a very poor reputation" when Mayor Mitch Landrieu took up his post last May and that it had been subject to particular review as a consequence.

"We' ve done a fortune-telling investigation of everything in this office," she said, and the officers are in the middle of reshaping the division. Several dozen cabmen and several municipal staff have been detained as part of a so-called programme to resell licences to cabmen. Furthermore, some urban operatives were charged with taking a bribe or "tips" to give signs to cars that should not have been inspected.

However, most of the cases of the first crackdowns - involving the detention of Lilliam Regan, who then supervised the Taxiicab Bureau - broke up before the state courts. Later Nagin called in a Black Gibbon group to develop advice on the reform of the taxi cab sector in New Orleans.