Tough-on-crime legislators in Louisiana passed a law in 2024 allowing those convicted of a sex offense with a minor under 15 to be sentenced not merely to mandatory chemical castration, but even to surgical castration. However, the first defendant to receive such a sentence doesn’t need to worry about it anytime soon, as the state’s Department of Corrections says it has no one on staff or under contract qualified to carry out either type of castration. This type of punitive medicine, resembling sentences mandated in Shari’a law, runs counter to AMA policy and the Hippocratic Oath, so it is unsurprising they are having trouble finding anyone. The force of such laws is as a performative expression of public disgust; even the legislators who proposed this law admit that it will never be carried out.
Louisiana Can’t Find a Surgeon to Castrate Sex Offender
