Louisiana’s top lawyer vindicated Sheriff Jack Strain this month after the 12-year sheriff was twice cited for placing his name on the side of sheriff cruisers, a move that critics said amounted to illegal and free campaigning with public property.

In an opinion issued April 10, Louisiana Attorney James “Buddy” Caldwell” rebuffed the notion Strain’s action were illegal.

He claimed all Louisiana sheriffs are exempt from the little known Louisiana statue that prohibits any “public official” to “affix his or her name … on any publicly owned motor vehicle.” Caldwell argued that a sheriff “although a public official, is himself a public entity” and therefore “as a consequence, the sheriff’s name should appear on decals used to identify the entity owning the vehicles and equipment.”

Strain could not be reached for comment.

The opinion sought by the Louisiana Sheriff’s Association Executive Director Hal Turner comes on the heels of a story published March 24 by the St. Tammany News. The story outlined a 2007 legislative audit that cited Strain for violating revised statute 43:31 for the second time during his 12-year tenure as sheriff.

That statute “states no public official of any branch, department, agency or other entity of state or local government shall affix his or her name on any publicly owned motor vehicle,” according to the legislative audit.

At the center of the controversy was a roughly 1/2-inch tall by 1-inch long emblem of the sheriff’s name tucked in the middle of the agency’s crest on the side of his cruisers.

The name was barely visible to the average passerby.

Earlier in his career, Strain was cited in another legislative audit for the same supposed violation.

Those names were later removed using an undisclosed amount of taxpayer money, and Strain said recently he was unaware at the time any more violations existed on his office’s 150 to 200 vehicles.

But during the most recent audit, the then-violation appeared, and auditors agreed it was a simple mistake.

“It was an oversight on (the sheriff’s office) part, not realizing the decal was on (the cruiser),” said Bryan Huval, audit director for Metairie-based audit firm Laporte, Sehrt, Romig and Hand, who performed the audit. “It is so small, we just happened upon it really.”

But now, according to Caldwell, it was all for naught.

“We are of the opinion that the sheriff, as a public official and independent constitutional officer of limited duration, is not a public official of a public entity or branch of state or local government as contemplated in LA R.S. 43:31,” Caldwell wrote in the opinion. “He/she is the entity.”

“Moreover,” Caldwell continued, “the correct name of the entity would be the sheriff’s name as ‘Sheriff of his or her parish.’ Therefore we conclude that a sheriff may include his or her name on the officials insignia of this office and may affix or attach said insignia to the motor vehicles and other equipment that are utilized by the sheriff.”

It was unclear Thursday if Strain intended to put his name back on the side of cruisers pending Caldwell’s opinion.