About the Beauregard Parish Clerk of Court
Brian S. Lestage has been Beauregard Parish Clerk of Court since July 1, 2008, according to the Meet Your Clerk page on the office's website. That page says he practiced civil and real estate law for twenty years before taking office, served as President of the Louisiana Clerks of Court Association for 2019 to 2020, and has overseen the imaging of more than a million documents. Like every Louisiana clerk, the office is elected parish-wide to a four-year term.
The constitution assigns the clerk several roles at once: clerk of the district court, ex officio notary public, and parish recorder of conveyances, mortgages, and other acts. State election law adds the title of chief election officer, and the Beauregard clerk's home page carries links for election commissioners and the jury pool alongside the records pages.
Beauregard's records have a clean starting line. The clerk's historical sketch places the parish among the last three of Louisiana's 64, created out of Calcasieu on June 12, 1912, the same day as Allen and Jefferson Davis. Its government opened for business on January 1, 1913, and the clerk's home page explains that this is why the online records begin on that date. The same sketch names Sugartown, settled around 1825, as the first permanent settlement in what became the parish, and Wikipedia records that voters picked DeRidder over Singer as the parish seat on October 15, 1912. The parish takes its name from Confederate general P.G.T. Beauregard.
At roughly 1,158 square miles of land, Beauregard ranks seventh among Louisiana's 64 parishes by land area in Census figures. Its population rose slightly between the 2020 Census base (36,556) and the July 2024 estimate (36,695). The state's other clerks are listed in the Louisiana Clerks of Court directory.
Court records in Beauregard Parish
The Civil Records department takes suits and advance deposits and keeps the civil minutes. As of October 2026, its page lists a 10-year individual civil name search at $15.00 per name, copies at $1.00 per page, and $5.00 to certify. The Criminal Records department handles filings and minutes and posts expungement forms with a list of frequently asked questions. A separate fax line is listed for criminal records.
Online case access runs through the clerk's eSearch subscription on cotthosting.com. The home page table, viewed in October 2026, shows civil suits indexed from January 1, 1983 with images from January 1, 2000, and criminal suits indexed and imaged from January 1, 2009. Succession and probate records go all the way back to January 1, 1913. The eSearch login page lists access at $20.00 for one day, $100.00 for one month, or $1,200.00 for one year. The clerk also cautions that online records are not official records; a certified copy still comes from the office.
The clerk's Online Records Search page gives slightly different imaging dates than the home page table (for example, civil documents imaged from June 2009 and criminal index and images from March 2009). If a start date matters to your search, ask the office which one is current.
E-filing is offered through eClerks LA, the portal of the Louisiana Clerks' Remote Access Authority, and the clerk posts an instruction PDF for it. Louisiana's Public Records Law gives anyone the right to copies of public records not covered by an exception. Juvenile court records are among the exceptions, and an expunged case is removed from public view even though the record still exists. Read more in the guides to court records, civil records, and criminal records.
Land, mortgage, and property records
Conveyances, mortgages, and cancellations are recorded by the land records staff, who also post standard mortgage and conveyance forms. Here is how the eSearch date table (October 2026) lays out the land side:
| Record series | Index from | Images from |
|---|---|---|
| Conveyances | January 1, 1913 | January 1, 1913 |
| Mortgages | January 1, 1978 | March 10, 1980 |
| Marriages | January 1, 1913 | January 1, 1913 |
The Online Records Search page adds that a second imaging phase covering mortgages from 1978 to 2009 is under way, and it lists mortgage images from March 17, 2008, so coverage in that window may still be filling in.
For electronic recording, the clerk accepts submissions from two vendors, Corporation Service Company (erecording.com) and the eRecording Partners Network (GOePN.com). The land records page also points users to the Louisiana Tax Commission's free statewide tax roll database for assessment information.
Where a document gets recorded depends on where the land is. Louisiana's Civil Code puts mortgages in the mortgage records of the parish where the immovable is located and other acts in that parish's conveyance records. For tracts near Beauregard's edges, the Calcasieu Parish Clerk of Court in Lake Charles, the Vernon Parish Clerk of Court in Leesville, and the Allen and Jefferson Davis clerks may each hold part of the chain. The parish also borders Newton County, Texas, which sits outside Louisiana's recording system entirely. Land now in Beauregard lay in Calcasieu Parish before 1913, so title work reaching back past that year may lead to the Calcasieu clerk; ask both offices what they hold for those years. The Louisiana property records guide explains the statewide framework.
Marriage licenses and family records
The Beauregard clerk issues marriage licenses. According to its Marriage Licenses page (October 2026), the license costs $32.50, payable in cash or by local check. Licenses are issued from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., Monday through Friday, and not after 4:00 p.m. except in special circumstances.
Both applicants bring a valid state ID and an original birth certificate, with a translation for a foreign birth certificate. Anyone married before gives the month, day, and year the prior marriage ended by divorce or death, and a divorce that became final within the last 30 days requires the divorce papers. The page posts a questionnaire that must be completed and an officiant registration form. Applicants are told to apply in person at 201 West First Street in DeRidder.
The page also states the 24-hour waiting period and says the marriage must take place within 30 days. Both match state law: an officiant cannot perform the ceremony until 24 hours after issuance unless a judge or authorized justice of the peace waives it, and a license expires after 30 days. Marriage records in eSearch are indexed and imaged back to January 1, 1913.
After the wedding, the officiant files the certificate with the issuing clerk within ten days. Certified copies of a Beauregard marriage come from this office, because the Louisiana Department of Health keeps marriage records only for Orleans Parish licenses. Divorce decrees work the same way: the department does not issue them, and certified copies come from the clerk where the divorce was granted. See marriage records and divorce records for the statewide picture.
The clerk also issues birth and death certificates, but its page says those requests are not processed after 3:30 p.m.
Courts that serve Beauregard Parish
Beauregard Parish is the whole of the 36th Judicial District Court, whose website lists Division A and Division B along with jury duty information and litigant resources. The court's History page traces how the district came to be. Beauregard sat in the 15th District until 1921 and then the 14th. In 1956 the legislature created the 30th District for Beauregard and Vernon together, and in 1979 Beauregard became its own 36th District. A second judge was added in 1997.
So between 1956 and 1979, Beauregard cases came before a district court shared with Vernon Parish, which today makes up the 30th Judicial District by itself.
No city court operates in Beauregard Parish according to the sources reviewed for this page, so the district court is the main trial court for the parish, including for juvenile matters.
A judgment of the 36th Judicial District Court is appealed to the Court of Appeal, Third Circuit, which sits in Lake Charles.
Visiting the Beauregard Parish courthouse
The clerk's office is at 200 West Second Street in DeRidder, while the marriage license page sends applicants to 201 West First Street, which is the address the National Register of Historic Places uses for the Beauregard Parish Courthouse. Call ahead if you are not sure which entrance to use.
Wikipedia says the courthouse was completed around 1915 together with the Beauregard Parish Jail and was added to the National Register on September 22, 1983; the 36th Judicial District Court's history dates the original courthouse to 1914. The court's history page says a renovated courthouse with a new annex reopened on September 5, 2017, after voters approved a sales tax for the work, and that the restoration uncovered a stained glass dome in the main courtroom that had been covered for decades.
The DeRidder office opens at 8:00 a.m. and closes at 4:30 p.m. on weekdays, per its office hours page. Keep the earlier cutoffs in mind: marriage licenses stop at 4:00 p.m., and birth and death certificates at 3:30 p.m. The office's mailing address is a post office box in DeRidder.
Other Beauregard Parish offices
Mark Herford is sheriff, according to the Louisiana Sheriffs' Association, which lists the office on South Stewart Street in DeRidder and online at beauregardparishsheriff.org. The sheriff runs the parish jail and collects property taxes. For how these duties work statewide, see sheriff's offices, and to find someone in custody, the inmate search guide.
The Louisiana Assessors' Association lists Brent Rutherford as assessor, with an office on West 2nd Street and a website at bpassessor.com. The assessors guide explains how property is valued.
The Beauregard Parish Police Jury is the parish governing authority. Its website could not be verified for this page, so look for current contact details through the 36th Judicial District Court's local links or the parish government guide.