Nevada

Gun instructor killed after girl loses control of Uzi; shooting range operated legally, sheriff says

Updated and corrected: An Arizona sheriff has no plans to file charges against a shooting range where a 9-year-old girl lost control of an Uzi, accidentally killing her instructor. Mohave County Sheriff Jim McCabe says the Bullets and Burgers shooting range, located 26 miles from Las Vegas, is licensed and…

Aug 27, 2014 12:05 PM CDT

Nevada chief justice who served as jury foreman wouldn’t have put himself on the jury

Nevada Chief Justice Mark Gibbons says serving as jury foreman last week in a Carson City prosecution was a great experience, though he wouldn’t have put anyone with legal training on the jury if he had been a lawyer in the case. Gibbons and other jurors convicted David Paul Lane…

Aug 18, 2014 10:45 AM CDT

Nevada chief justice is chosen as juror in criminal case

Nevada Chief Justice Mark Gibbons will be serving the legal system in another capacity this week. Gibbons was chosen as a juror on Monday in the criminal trial of a man accused of waving a gun at employees of the Olive Garden in Carson City, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports.…

Aug 13, 2014 1:16 PM CDT

Government lawyer faces $12K in sanctions, plus possible jail time if he doesn’t pay up

The clock is ticking toward a payment deadline for a Nevada lawyer facing some $12,000 in sanctions for improper court filings. And if Robert Pool doesn’t pay up by Aug. 28, it’s possible he’ll be jailed for civil contempt, reports the Las Vegas Review-Journal. At a July 31 hearing in…

Aug 12, 2014 5:44 PM CDT

Police raid law office, wire client in ‘bizarre’ probe of claimed lawyer effort to aid client escape

Police in Las Vegas raided a criminal defense attorney’s law office on June 26 and seized his cellphone and client files and billing records for at least one defendant because that defendant claimed the attorney has been trying to help him leave the country. What the Las Vegas Review-Journal describes…

Jul 10, 2014 4:45 PM CDT

In first case of its kind, feds use RICO statute to pursue claimed Internet credit-theft ring

When federal anti-racketeering statutes were enacted, their intended targets were organized crime families largely based in the U.S. But today the Internet is where crime is rampant, and federal authorities are now using the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act as a weapon against claimed international criminal confederates working in…

Jul 9, 2014 10:25 PM CDT

Should insurance cover suit against law firm after staffer allegedly engineered a false arrest?

A law firm could face a double whammy if its insurer is successful in a declaratory judgment action filed in federal court in Las Vegas. Already, a former legal assistant at Lipson, Neilson, Cole, Seltzer & Garin is serving time for stalking, after allegedly setting up an opposing party for…

Jul 7, 2014 3:17 PM CDT

Defense lawyer who continued to practice after felony plea is temporarily suspended

A Las Vegas criminal defense lawyer pleaded guilty to felony charges in December concerning his participation, between 2008 and 2010, in a scheme to provide fictitious certificates of completion for court-ordered counseling and community service. But sentencing for Brian Bloomfield was postponed, so that his cooperation in an ongoing investigation…

Jun 26, 2014 9:00 PM CDT

Man who killed wife, shot at divorce judge through courthouse window calls counsel ineffective

Updated: A Nevada businessman who unsuccessfully sought to withdraw from a plea deal after he stabbed his wife to death and shot at a Reno divorce judge sniper-style through a courthouse window during a single day in 2006 is now claiming his defense lawyers were ineffective. In a continuing effort…

Jun 25, 2014 9:04 PM CDT

Federal court clerk, 2 techs create e-billing system to speed payment to defense lawyers nationwide

A new computerized billing system expected to speed payment to indigent defense lawyers is being adopted at federal courthouses throughout the country thanks to a chief deputy clerk and two technicians at the federal courthouse in Las Vegas. Thinking there had to be a better way than the cumbersome manual…

Jun 24, 2014 3:25 PM CDT

New OJ Simpson appeal is nearly 6,000 words over the limit

Lawyers seeking to overturn O.J. Simpson’s 2007 armed robbery conviction filed an appeal with the Nevada Supreme Court last week that was nearly 6,000 words over the limit. The word limit is 14,000 words and the appeal is 19,993 words, according to a motion (PDF) seeking permission to file the…

May 26, 2014 10:44 AM CDT

4 new pleas in record Las Vegas corruption case; defense lawyers for others OK secret evidence pact

Four more defendants have taken pleas in a high-profile Nevada federal corruption case involving bid-rigging and election fraud at homeowner associations in the Las Vegas area. When Ricky Anderson, Maria Limon, and brothers Jose Luis Alvarez and Rudolfo Alvarez-Rodriguez enter their guilty pleas next week, that will bring the total…

May 14, 2014 4:25 PM CDT

Public defender is picked for grand jury; judge put PD’s name in the hopper

Prosecutors in Clark County, Nevada, have asked a judge to excuse a newly appointed grand juror for an unusual reason: She is a deputy public defender. Lauren Diefenbach was selected for the grand jury with the help of Judge Jessie Walsh, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports. Judges in the county…

May 13, 2014 1:38 PM CDT

Judge sanctions insurer $50K because its lawyer couldn’t settle dog-bite case for $750K

A Nevada judge imposed a $50,000 contempt sanction on an insurer because the company sent a representative to a settlement conference who lacked authority to settle a dog-bite case for $750,000. The plaintiff in the case, landscaper James Moberly, fell backward after being bitten several times by a German shorthaired…

May 12, 2014 7:00 PM CDT

Jury convicts woman, 66, in shooting of son; his father was killed with the same gun decades earlier

The son of a 66-year-old Nevada woman told a jury it was his own fault that a gun went off during a violent argument with his mother three years ago, leaving him paralyzed. But the jury didn’t buy Kevin Cooney’s story, reports the Las Vegas Review-Journal. They found Linda Cooney…

Apr 23, 2014 12:00 PM CDT