In the early morning hours of July 2, 1977, Louisiana State Trooper Donald Charles Cleveland, a 25-year-old male, was shot and killed during a traffic stop on Louisiana 94, situated between Lafayette and Breaux Bridge. Trooper Cleveland, who had been with the Louisiana State Police for just over a year, initiated the stop of a vehicle for a lighting violation after it departed from a local nightclub's parking lot.
Inside the vehicle were several individuals, including 17-year-old Dalton Prejean and his brother.
As Trooper Cleveland was conducting the stop, the occupants of the car switched drivers. While the new driver was speaking with the trooper, Prejean exited the vehicle. Feeling that the trooper was treating his brother unfairly, Prejean approached Trooper Cleveland with a concealed. 38 caliber handgun and fired multiple shots without warning, striking him in the jaw and chest. Trooper Cleveland collapsed in a ditch beside the road with his own revolver unfired in his hand. He was survived by his wife and two children.
Following the shooting, the suspects fled the scene but were apprehended several hours later. Two individuals were arrested in connection with the murder. Dalton Prejean was charged with first-degree murder, while another individual was charged with being an accessory after the fact. Prejean's trial was moved from Lafayette Parish to Ouachita Parish due to extensive pretrial publicity. On May 1, 1978, a jury found him guilty as charged and recommended the death penalty.
At the time of Trooper Cleveland's murder, Prejean had been released from a juvenile facility only months earlier after serving time for the murder of a taxi driver when he was 14 years old. After years of appeals, Dalton Prejean was executed by the electric chair on May 18, 1990. He was the last prisoner to be executed by electrocution in Louisiana.
