New Orleans mayor indicted over allegations of trying to hide
relationship with bodyguard
[August 16, 2025]
By JIM MUSTIAN, JACK BROOK and HEATHER HOLLINGSWORTH
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell was indicted Friday
in what prosecutors called a yearslong scheme to hide a romantic
relationship with her bodyguard, who is accused of being paid as if he
was working even when they met alone in apartments and traveled to
vineyards for wine tasting.
Cantrell faces charges of conspiracy, fraud and obstruction, less than
five months before she leaves office due to term limits. The first
female mayor in New Orleans' 300-year history was elected twice but now
becomes the city's first mayor to be charged while in office.
“Public corruption has crippled us for years and years,” Acting U.S.
Attorney Michael Simpson said, referring to Louisiana's notorious
history. “And this is extremely significant.”
Cantrell's bodyguard, Jeffrey Vappie, was already facing charges of wire
fraud and making false statements. He has pleaded not guilty. A grand
jury returned an 18-count indictment Friday that added Cantrell to the
case.
They are accused of exchanging encrypted messages through WhatsApp to
avoid detection and then deleting the conversations. The mayor and
Vappie have said their relationship was strictly professional, but the
indictment portrayed it as “personal and intimate.”
App captured dreamy chats
The City of New Orleans said in a statement that it was aware of the
indictment and that the mayor's attorney is reviewing it.
"Until his review is complete, the City will not comment further on this
matter,” the statement said.
Cantrell hasn’t sent out a message on her official social media feed on
X since July 15, when she said the city was experiencing historic
declines in crime.
In a WhatsApp exchange, the indictment says, Vappie reminisced about
accompanying Cantrell to Scotland in October 2021, saying that was
“where it all started.”
Cantrell and Vappie used WhatsApp for more than 15,000 messages,
including efforts to harass a citizen, delete evidence, make false
statements to FBI agents, “and ultimately to commit perjury before a
federal grand jury,” Simpson said.
They met in an apartment while Vappie claimed to be on duty, and she
arranged for him to attend 14 trips, Simpson said. The trips, he added,
were described by her as times “when they were truly alone."
New Orleans taxpayers paid more than $70,000 for Vappie’s travel, the
prosecutor said.
Together on an island
Authorities cited a September 2022 rendezvous on Martha’s Vineyard, a
trip Cantrell took instead of attending a conference in Miami. Vappie’s
travel to the island was covered by the city to attend a separate
conference. “The times when we are truly (traveling) is what spoils me
the most,” the mayor wrote to him that month.
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Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicholas Moses leaves the Hale Boggs Federal
Building-Courthouse after the indictment of Mayor LaToya Cantrell in
New Orleans, Friday, Aug. 15, 2025. (Sophia Germer /The
Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate via AP)
Simpson said Cantrell lied in an affidavit that she activated a
function on her phone that automatically deleted messages in 2021
when she really didn’t activate that feature until December 2022, a
month after the media began speculating on the pair’s conduct.
When a private citizen took photos of them dining together and
drinking wine, Cantrell filed a police report and sought a
restraining order, Simpson said.
Vappie retired from the police department in 2024.
Mayor has her defenders
Cantrell and her remaining allies have said that she has been
unfairly targeted as a Black woman and held to a different standard
than male officials, her executive powers at City Hall sabotaged.
Simpson, however, shook off claims that any of it played a role in
the investigation.
“It’s irrelevant that it’s romance or that it’s female,” he told
reporters, adding that the allegations were “an incredible betrayal
of people’s confidence in their own government.”
Cantrell, a Democrat, has clashed with City Council members during a
turbulent second term and survived a recall effort in 2022.
“This is a sad day for the people of New Orleans,” Monet Brignac, a
spokesperson for City Council President JP Morrell, said as news of
the indictment spread.
In 2014, former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was sentenced to 10
years in prison for bribery, money laundering, fraud and tax crimes.
The charges stemmed from his two terms as mayor from 2002 to 2010.
He was granted supervised release from prison in 2020 during the
COVID-19 pandemic.
As she heads into her final months in office, Cantrell has alienated
former confidants and supporters, and her civic profile has receded.
Her early achievements were eclipsed by self-inflicted wounds and
bitter feuds with a hostile city council, political observers say.
The mayor’s role has weakened following voter-approved changes to
the city’s charter meant to curb her authority.
Earlier this year, Cantrell said she has faced “very disrespectful,
insulting, in some cases kind of unimaginable” treatment. Her
husband, attorney Jason Cantrell, died in 2023.
—-
Hollingsworth reported from Mission, Kansas. Associated Press writer
Ed White in Detroit contributed to this story.
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