Source: Mayor Cantrell at the center of divorce filing of former security detail
Updated: 5:22 PM CST Jan 17, 2023
WDSU Digital Team
NEW ORLEANS —
A source tells WDSU divorce documents allege Mayor LaToya Cantrell was having an extra-marital affair with a member of her security detail, NOPD Officer Jeffrey Vappie.
The documents say the "petitioner desires a judgment of divorce from the defendant because of the defendant's continuous acts of adultery." The documents go on to allege Vappie's wife became aware of an inappropriate in November 2022. They go on to allege there was an "affair with a person identified as Mrs. L.C." It is alleged that "Vappie has been in an ongoing sexual relationship with Mrs. L.C. since approximately May 2021."
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An investigation was launched into Vappie's time on the clock with NOPD. Vappie was taken off Cantrell's security team and reassigned.
We reached out to Cantrell's office about these allegations. Their response was, "no comment."
ZURIK: NOPD investigating officer frequently inside Cantrell’s city-owned apartment
Surveillance video raises questions about how Mayor Cantrell is spending her time and taxpayer money outside the office.
www.fox8live.com
As FOX 8 looked into more of the surveillance video, we found the videos show Mayor Cantrell is also spending hours there with one member of her security team, leading to questions about what work is being done as the two collect taxpayer-funded paychecks.
During FOX 8′s review of the 45 days of video, on 35 of those days, Cantrell visited the apartment. Officer Vappie made 47 visits on 27 of those days, often stopping in more than once a day and spending more than 112 hours inside the apartment.
Of the four officers paid to protect Mayor Cantrell, Vappie is the only one who entered the apartment. The other NOPD officers, Louis Martinez, Robert Monlyn, and Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Deputy Charles Ellis never entered.
On Aug. 16, about an hour before Vappie clocked in for work, he arrived at the apartment.
Surveillance images show NOPD officer Jeffrey Vappie and Mayor Cantrell visiting a city-owned...
Surveillance images show NOPD officer Jeffrey Vappie and Mayor Cantrell visiting a city-owned apartment, often during the work day(French Market Corporation)
Twenty minutes before his NOPD shift started, he and the mayor left in workout clothes. They returned more than an hour later and stayed inside the apartment from 10 a.m. until after 2 p.m.
According to her city calendar, Mayor Cantrell was scheduled to make welcoming remarks at a Baptist foreign mission convention at 9:30 a.m. that day. However, she was at the apartment during that time. FOX 8 confirmed with the convention that she didn’t attend but sent someone else in her place.
During that time, the mayor also missed a 1:30 p.m. pop-in meeting with Sen. Bill Cassidy’s team.
At 2:16 p.m. Vappie left the Pontalba. He had changed from his workout clothes into a suit.
At 2:37 p.m., seven minutes after a Sewerage and Water Board preparation meeting was supposed to start in her office, Mayor Cantrell left the apartment dressed for work.
According to a response to a records request from FOX 8, Mayor Cantrell didn’t send one email or make one work phone call during the four and a half hours she and Vappie spent in the apartment.
NOPD timesheets from Aug. 9 show Vappie was paid from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. According to the mayor’s schedule, Vappie wasn’t assigned to her security detail that day, and the city would not tell FOX 8 about his assignment for the day.
However, at 7:55 a.m., the surveillance camera showed him entering the Upper Pontalba Apartments with a grocery bag and a case of bottled water. Mayor Cantrell arrived a short time later, at 8:42 a.m. Both Vappie and Cantrell remained at the apartment for most of the workday. Vappie left at 3:09 p.m.
Tulane law professor Emeritus Joel Friedman says the city should answer what Vappie’s assignments are when he’s not on the mayor’s security detail for the day.
“That tells me … we’re paying the police to have this guy work: if he’s assigned to do X, but he’s not doing X. He’s allegedly protecting the mayor in an apartment where she probably doesn’t need protection. Again, that’s not only the unseemly aspect of it, but it’s a misuse of his time,” Friedman said.
Later in the evening on Aug. 9, after he went off the clock, Vappie and Cantrell returned to the apartment a little after 8:30 p.m. Vappie left about four hours later, at 12:42 a.m. Cantrell left about 40 minutes later, at 1:26 a.m.
That night, city records show Cantrell didn’t send one email or make a single phone call for the city on her cell phones between 8 p.m. Aug. 9 and 2 a.m. Aug. 10. However, even off the clock, Vappie spent more than four hours at the Pontalba.
“They’re going there for long periods of time, where it appears she’s not doing any work during that time. No phone calls, no meetings, no emails. What is he doing there? Why is he, of all the officers on her detail, the only one that takes her into the apartment and stays there with her for hours? And if she needs protection inside this apartment, why is he the only one of her detail that ever goes in there? And why, sometimes, does he leave before she does... letting her walk out the door and walk to some other car blocks away, unprotected by him?” Friedman said.
FOX 8 found many other examples.
On Sept. 9, Vappie spent nearly seven hours inside the apartment. The mayor’s calendar shows he wasn’t scheduled as her security, however, he was paid for 12 hours of work that day.
Surveillance images show NOPD officer Jeffrey Vappie and Mayor Cantrell visiting a city-owned...
Surveillance images show NOPD officer Jeffrey Vappie and Mayor Cantrell visiting a city-owned apartment, often during the work day(French Market Corporation)
FOX 8 found Vappie entering the apartment many mornings and leaving late at night, often alone. He sometimes arrived before Cantrell.
Records show Vappie joined Cantrell’s security team in May 2021.
So far in 2022, he’s earned more money than the other NOPD officers on her team. With overtime, he’s already made more than $120,000 through September 2022.
Vappie has also accompanied Cantrell on some of her trips. After reviewing travel records, FOX 8 found Vappie is the only officer who flew first class with her. His ticket for that trip to San Francisco cost taxpayers $821.
Last March, Cantrell also appointed Vappie to the board of the Housing Authority of New Orleans. He doesn’t list any experience in public housing on his LinkedIn page, and Collins says having a public employee on a public board could become a conflict.
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