Mutual Combat in Washoe County: Chris Hicks vs Scott Pierson

Mutual combat is a common law that allows two individuals to engage in a consensual fight as long as no deadly weapons are used. Picon thinks that applies to the ‘email’ war between Washoe County District Attorney Chris Hicks and Reno Justice Court Chief Judge Scott Pierson, no weapons, just a war of words, numbers and ultimately money. The question that needs to be asked, ‘are the citizens/taxpayers being better served,” based on Judge Pierson’s assessment.

The way you can find out tons of intel is to hang out in bars where lawyers enjoy a libation or two. While enjoying a Picon Punch we overheard three lawyers discussing the ‘war of words’ between Hicks and Pierson over a departing Justice Court Judge due to a couple of Washoe County Commissioners asking questions about filling the vacant bench seat.

A justice court judge resigned on January 6, 2023, Judge Derek Drieling, Department 1. The Washoe County Commission would/should appoint to the bench to fill the term until the election in 2024, but former Washoe County Commissioner Vaughn Hartung was against appointing because, as he informed the residents of Washoe County, he had spoken to Judge Pierson and been assured the rest of the justice court judges could pick up the slack and therefore save Washoe County money. Isn’t that nice, all of the judges will pick up extra work to save taxpayers a judicial salary. It would seem the only commissioners who smelt a rat in that scenario was District 5 Commissioner Jeanne Herman and District 2 Commissioner Mike Clark. This was, January 2023, when Hartung was the commission chair. Hartung was so upset by Clark’s questioning he reached out to a couple of ‘politically connected’ individuals they mutually knew, and Clark reports, “I had to have a couple of breakfast meetings to be encouraged to get along with Vaughn on this topic.” Why we pondered, so we asked for public records.

Getting the public records took months, we were first told there were thousands of records based on our request, so we narrowed our scope. Then we were advised some of what we were asking for would fall under ‘attorney-client privilege’ because of the individuals included, and hence we would not be able to receive the emails. Eventually, while working with District Attorney Mary Kandaras, a very fair and knowledgeable attorney, and overseer of public records at Washoe County, we simply fessed up to what we were looking for and outlined what we had heard in the bar and scaled our search way back. While we don’t think we got all the emails we would have liked to have received, because of one thing or another, nothing nefarious just the overall limitations of the NRS code (which needs to be updated at the legislature) we got enough to show that what we had overhead was factual.

What we have learned along the way is the taxpayers are saving nothing, and it would appear Judge Pierson and former Commissioner Hartung omitted that the Reno Justice Court judges who are ‘picking up the slack’ of Department 1 being vacant, are getting additional pay. It is as if they are splitting the salary between the remaining five judges. Not a bad gig. Picon doesn’t even know if we are against the practice, it would have just been nice to have made the practice of paying the judges extra money much more public. Pierson should have made this much more transparent, since the rumor on the street is he wants to move over to the ‘high court’ Washoe District Count in 2026. We have been told he is eying Judge Connie Steinheimer, Department 4, who has been there so long you have to knock the dust off of her.

The most interesting part of our delving into this ‘bar gossip’ was reading in the email string the “quotation mark” war the judge descended into. District Attorney Chris Hicks and Justice Court Judge Scott Pierson seem a bit a odds with one another. Just read the emails and we need to compliment Hicks and Pierson that they have provided some of the most interesting records about crime, and the courts, being handled in Washoe County, too bad it takes a war of words to get such clean statistics, which is something that should be shared with Washoe County residents.

We found Pierson’s paragraph interesting: “The legislature sets the number of justices for a justice court by the population of the townships. The legislature recognized this may result in a waste of county taxpayer resources if the caseloads did not justify filling a seat by including the option to not fill a position if the judges “determine that the caseload does not warrant an additional justice of the peace”. NRS 4.020”

Washoe County Commissioners are now at the mercy of the Justice Court Judges decision if a bench seat is filled after retirement to serve out a term. Now the judges can tell the commissioners what to do? Who trumps who? The reason we ask this question, remembering Washoe County Commissioners can be recalled by the will of the voters (just pay for a recall, gain enough signatures, have them verified by the Registrar of Voters, and the recall is a go), judges cannot be recalled by us mere mortals, the voters. That right was removed from voters in 2017 when then Nevada Supreme Court Chief Justice James Hardesty muddied the water during a judicial recall attempt in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The heart of the matter lies in the exclusive authority granted to the Judicial Discipline Commission (which we truly wonder if voters realized this was happening). This body has been entrusted with the power to remove judges from office, with the exception of impeachment, which falls under legislative domain. By emphasizing this exclusive authority, the court dismisses any alternative means, such as recall, for removing judges from their positions.

The Las Vegas Review Journal reported: “The decision was handed down in the case of former North Las Vegas Municipal Judge Catherine Ramsey, who had appealed a District Court ruling that allowed a recall effort to move forward with an attempt to remove her. “Even if judges originally could be recalled, Ramsey argues that the creation of the commission in 1976 superseded any such recall authority over judges,” Hardesty wrote. “We agree.” Chief Justice Michel Cherry, along with Justices Mark Gibbons and Ron Parraguirre, concurred.

The Las Vegas Review Journal provides former Justice Hardesty’s opinion: “Even if the recall of public officers provision is interpreted to include judges, we conclude that the voters’ subsequent approval of the system for judicial discipline, which plainly grants the Commission the exclusive authority to remove a judge from office with only one exception, the legislative power of impeachment, supersedes any provision that would allow for judges to be recalled by other means.”

Reading the email string you can draw your own conclusions that Hicks and Pierson are not on each other’s Christmas Card lists. The moral of this story is, ‘be cautious who you elect to the bench in Nevada because you can’t get rid of them, no matter how bad the job they are doing, for six years.