The Great State of Nevada

This may be a little late, but I was looking into the legal news of the sate of Nevada, and this one ignited a little smile for me.

Many of you who read this may not know of the seedy details of the Nevada Justice System, but I promise you that it is typically filled with stories that would be front page material at the Weekly World News. Well, one of the more recent pieces of news, was that in the spring of 2007, Judge Kathy Hardcastle, who is the Chief Judge of the 9th Judicial District, for the County of Clark, State of Nevada (i.e. the Las Vegas District Court) prohibited newly elected judge Halverson from the courthouse. In fact, Judge Hardcastle issued an order saying as much. Chief Judge Hardcastle was concerned about the fact that Judge Halverson had brought two separate bodyguards into the courthouse, and the fact that she had also brought a weapon into the courthouse, citing her safety as the precipitating factor.

Well, the Nevada Supreme Court has issued a decision on Judge Halverson’s petition for a writ of quo waranto, indicating that the “ousting” of Judge Halverson was improper.

You can read the decision from the Nevada Supreme Court Here.

You can also find the current events and the briefs in this matter on the blog-o-sphere, including the oral arguments here.

You may also be somewhat interested to know that the above link is from a former colleague of mine’s blog. An excellent blog entitled Appealing in Nevada. The blog is udated and kept by a wonderful appellate attorney at Kummer Kaempfer in Las Vegas, named Tami Cowden. Tami is a wonderful author having penned several books, and authoring a number of briefs that have been successful in persuading the Nevada Supreme Court that her reasoning and stand is the one that they should adopt. If you get a chance, go check out Appealing in Nevada, it will definitely keep you up to date on the issues of Nevada Appellate Law.