This story was originally published by Verite News; For more Oct. 11 election results, click here
After nearly four years of tumult at the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office, culminating in a summer that included a jailbreak, a mistaken release and a ransomware attack, voters in New Orleans have canned Sheriff Susan Hutson after one term, electing former acting New Orleans police chief Michelle Woodfork to take her place.
Woodfork closed out the evening with 53% of the vote, according to the Secretary of State’s Office. With more than a majority, she was elected outright in the primary without the need to go to a runoff next month.
Just before 10 p.m., with Hutson in third place behind Woodfork and 2nd City Court Constable Edwin Shorty, the sheriff took to the stage at her election watch event at Twisted Waffles in the French Quarter to thank her supporters and OPSO staff.
“I’m not going to do what was done to me, which was not have a transition,” Hutson said of coming into the Sheriff’s Office nearly four years ago.
She said she left a message congratulating Woodfork and looks forward to discussing the transition next week.
Hutson thanked voters for helping her “break a barrier” as the first Black woman sheriff in the state of Louisiana.
Prior to becoming sheriff, Hutson had worked for more than a decade as the New Orleans Independent Police Monitor, a position created in 2008 in the wake of widespread abuse in the department following Hurricane Katrina. Elected in 2021 as the first woman to ever lead the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office, Hutson knocked 17-year incumbent Marlin Gusman out of the position with a campaign that promised to reform an agency that had been steeped in controversy for more than a decade.
Hutson inherited a jail that had backslid in reaching compliance with a yearslong federal consent decree — put in place to address longstanding constitutional violations — including on issues of pervasive violence, insufficient medical and mental health care and generally unsafe, and insecure, living conditions.
Throughout her tenure, Hutson has advocated for a larger budget for the Sheriff’s Office in order to increase pay for the deputies. SHe came under fire after reports from the Office of the Inspector General revealed the Sheriff’s Office spent $18,000 dollars of taxpayer money on unused hotel rooms for deputies during the 2023 Mardi Gras season. The IG also reported that Hutson overpaid deputies working parades that Carnival season. She also received scrutiny for granting high salaries for some OPSO administrative staff and consultants, including paying the city’s fired juvenile director Kyshun Webster $175-per-hour for work as an “acting chief of staff.”
Hutson received praise from criminal justice reformists for making good, in part, on some of her campaign promises. Hutson increased programming for jail residents. At the end of last year, she also secured a deal to provide one free 15-minute phone call per day and one 20-minute video call for jail residents – a step towards her campaign goal of jail calls at zero cost to residents and their loved ones.
‘I was prepared for the assignment’
Woodfork took the stage at her election night party after 10 pm to the joyous shouts of her supporters as a DJ blasted Celebration by Kool and the Gang. She said it was her dream to become sheriff of New Orleans then thanked her opponent Hutson for her service and for “running a campaign focused on issues people cared about.
“I promise to be a sheriff you can be proud of, a true community partner. As sheriff I will take my responsibility for the care, custody and control of the jail seriously.”
Sheriff-elect Woodfork spent more than 33 years at the New Orleans Police Department, first joining the agency in 1991. She worked her way up the ranks, earning the title of lieutenant in 2016 and captain five years later. In 2022, Woodfork made history when Mayor LaToya Cantrell appointed her as interim superintendent following the retirement of Shaun Ferguson. In becoming the first woman to ever lead the NOPD, Woodfork followed in the trailblazing path of her late uncle, Warren Woodfork, who was the department’s first black superintendent, serving in that position from 1985 to 1991.
Woodfork was ultimately passed over for the permanent title in September 2023 when Cantrell named Anne Kirkpatrick as her pick for the top spot. About five months later, Woodfork announced that she was retiring from the NOPD, saying she wanted to concentrate on spending time with her family.
In February 2025, following a short stint with the Orleans Parish District Attorney’s Office as the director of forensics and intelligence, Woodfork announced her run for sheriff at Dooky Chase Restaurant, promising to bring “integrity and leadership” to the position. She touted her time leading the NOPD, pointing to a reduction in violent crime and the successful recruitment of new officers under her watch.
“None of that happened by accident,” she said. “I was prepared for the assignment.”
On the campaign trail, Woodfork blasted Hutson for a lack of transparency in how she manages the sheriff’s finances, while touting her own experience as NOPD interim superintendent, overseeing the department’s $280 million budget. Following the May 16 escape of 10 inmates from the city jail, Woodfork accused Hutson of “poor leadership” and “incompetence.” A few days after the incident, Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams endorsed Woodfork for sheriff.
As Election Day approached, Woodfork built a commanding lead. In a September poll from the University of New Orleans, 43% of likely voters indicated they would pull the lever for Woodfork, compared to 13% for Hutson and 9% for Shorty.
Woodfork has attributed her growing popularity with the public losing “trust and confidence in the agency because of all of the things that have happened during Ms. Huston’s first term.”
On Saturday, Woodfork promised to operate a “safe and secure jail, a jail where the deputies and those housed there are safe, a jail where no one leaves until their release date.”
She said she will invest in programs and work with the people being housed in the jail “to ensure they are better people when they leave, not better criminals.”
She said she would release further details over the next six months.
