BATON ROUGE — Many of the laws passed in the most recent legislative session go into effect Saturday, August 1st, including laws named for two young people who died tragically.
The Caleb Wilson Hazing Prevention Act honors Wilson, a 20-year-old Southern University student who died in an Omega Psi Phi ritual in February 2025.
The law, which Gov. Jeff Landry signed in May, expands training for students and advisors on anti-hazing rules and adds new reporting requirements for violations. It requires an organization’s permanent banishment if hazing results in a death.
Another law in honor of someone is Jody’s Law, which honors Denham Springs resident Jody Mann, 20. Mann was hit by a car while walking home. The driver fled the scene. Mann later died from her injuries.
The law requires law enforcement to notify other area agencies of vehicle descriptions and other information on hit-and-run crashes. It also requires a hearing before bond can be set in such cases when an arrest is made.
Another new law honors law enforcement officers in East Baton Rouge and St. Tammany parishes who were killed in the line of duty.
It names part of Airline Highway near the B-Quick store where several law enforcement officers were killed in an ambush in 2016 after those men. The Jackson, Gerald, Garafola, Tullier Memorial Highway honors Baton Rouge police officers Montrell Jackson and Matthew Gerald and deputies Brad Garafola and Nick Tullier.
It also names part of Interstate 10 in St. Tammany Parish after Sheriff’s Sgt. Grant Candies, who was hit by a car and killed in 2025 when he tried to deploy spike strips on I-10 near the Oak Harbor exit to stop a fleeing vehicle.
Other laws going into effect Saturday govern how people mourn, how they gamble and how they pay for goods and services.
Balloon releases, a popular ritual for mourning or celebrating the life of someone who has died, are now considered intentional littering. The law also applies to anyone who organizes a balloon release at which 12 or more balloons are released.
People who bet on elections are also committing a crime, according to the law now. Gamblers could be fined $1,000 and jailed for up to a year. Repeated violations trigger higher penalties, up to 5 years in jail.
Businesses can no longer add a surcharge to purchases paid for with debit cards. Civil penalties can be assessed against businesses that do. The law also includes a protocol for people who are overcharged to report incidents to state authorities.
People accused of crimes who opt for bench trials – trials in which a judge and not a jury decide guilt – will get a new judge assigned to their case. Proponents said the law will prevent “judge shopping,” or choosing a bench trial when the accused person believes the assigned judge may be sympathetic to their position. The law permits the prosecutor to waive the reassignment.
Another new law forbids using an image of a child under 17 to train AI models to produce child sexual abuse materials. The law specifically includes images that are not pictures of real children. Possession of those images is also a crime under a related law passed in the last session.
A new law creates the crime of child “grooming.” It says that if the child is under 17 and the offender is at least four years older than the child, “seduction, emotional manipulation, threats, promises, coercion, enticement, isolation or extortion with the specific intent to commit a sex offense” against the child is guilty of indecent behavior with a juvenile.
A full list of laws passed in the last legislative session as available at the state legislature’s web site.
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