NEW ORLEANS — Mayor LaToya Cantrell was indicted by a federal grand jury on Friday.

Cantrell is the first New Orleans mayor to be charged with a federal crime while still in office. 

Details of the charges against the first woman mayor in the city’s history weren’t immediately available after the indictment was handed up to Magistrate Judge Eva Dossier by the grand jury foreman. 

The indictment charges Cantrell and her former bodyguard, Jerry Paul Vappie II, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to obstruct justice, obstruction of justice, false statements and false declarations before a grand jury. 

The indictment alleges that Cantrell and Vappie, a member of her Executive Protection Unit, developed a personal relationship in October 2021. To conceal their relationship and maximize their time together, they allegedly created a scheme to defraud the City of New Orleans by engaging in personal activities while Vappie was on duty and being paid for providing protection.

Cantrell also allegedly had Vappie accompany her on at least 14 out-of-state trips, falsely claiming she needed protection for safety concerns. These trips allegedly cost the city of New Orleans over $70,000, not including Cantrell's travel expenses. The station added that the indictment alleges that Vappie and Cantrell used a city-owned apartment in the Pontalba Building for personal use, with Vappie frequently spending time there while on duty.

They allegedly took several actions to impede inquiries and a federal grand jury investigation into their relationship and scheme. These include using encrypted messaging platform WhatsApp, deleting electronic evidence, making false statements to federal law enforcement agents and a federal grand jury and lying to colleagues and making false public statements.

The entire indictment, which contains receipts for several payments and instances of the pair's communication, can be read here.

"It's irrelevant that it's romance or that it's female. What is relevant is that it is an incredible breach of the public trust. It's an incredible betrayal of people's confidence in their own government, and it's a violation of innumerable federal criminal laws," Acting U.S. Attorney for Louisiana's Eastern District Michael Simpson said Friday.

Attorney General Liz Murrill said she will be "monitoring this matter closely."

“New Orleans deserves leadership that is honest, accountable, and dedicated to serving the public and making the City safe, clean, and economically sustainable," she said. "These are serious charges."

Cantrell's indictment caps off a federal investigation in 2022. A grand jury just started hearing evidence from prosecutors in February 2024 and returned an indictment last September against building inspector Randy Farrell, charging him with conspiring to bribe Cantrell with about $9,000 in gifts in 2019. These gifts included NFC Championship Game tickets, a lunch at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse and a cell phone, all in exchange for causing the firing of a city official who had been investigating Farrell for alleged fraud, WWL reported.

Former Mayor Ray Nagin was under federal investigation during his 2002 to 2010 time in office, but he was not indicted on corruption charges until 2013. He was convicted in 2014 and sentenced to 10 years in prison.

According to the Associated Press, Cantrell and her remaining allies allege that she’s been unfairly targeted as a Black woman and held to a different standard than male officials, her executive powers sabotaged. Earlier this year, Cantrell said she’s faced “very disrespectful, insulting, in some cases kind of unimaginable” treatment.