Editing Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana (section)

===Law enforcement===
The Terrebonne Parish Sheriff's Office is headquartered at the courthouse annex in [[Houma, Louisiana|Houma]]. It has about three hundred employees.<ref>{{cite web |title=About TPSO |url=http://tpso.net/About.aspx |publisher=Terrebonne Parish Sheriff's Office |accessdate=September 27, 2019}}</ref> The office is organized into a number of divisions including: Administration, criminal, civil, communications, corrections, and water Patrol.<ref>{{cite web |title=Water Patrol |url=http://tpso.net/Waterpatrol.aspx |publisher=Terrebonne Parish Sheriff's Office |accessdate=September 27, 2019}}</ref>

Timothy Soignet, the current sheriff, took office on July 1, 2020. Jerry Larpenter, who became sheriff for the first time in 1987, stepped down briefly in 2008, and was re-elected in 2012. He announced he would not seek re-election in October 2019.<ref>{{cite web |title=Welcome! |url=http://tpso.net/ |publisher=Terrebonne Parish Sheriff's Office |accessdate=September 27, 2019}}</ref>

In 2017, the parish and the sheriff's office settled a civil case brought against them by a local couple in 2016. The couple operated a web site dedicated to exposing corruption. An individual named on the site filed a criminal defamation complaint with the Sheriff's Office. As a result, a search warrant issued by a parish judge was executed by deputies at the home of the couple, whose computer equipment was seized. No criminal charges were ultimately brought against them. In total the couple received $200,000 in settlements from several parish entities including the Sheriff's Office.<ref>{{cite news |title=Terrebonne's Top 10 Stories of 2017 |url=https://www.houmatoday.com/news/20180103/terrebonnes-top-10-stories-of-2017 |accessdate=September 27, 2019 |publisher=Houma Today |date=January 3, 2018}}</ref>