Justia Nevada Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

In 2002, Mandalay Corporation entered into a contract with petitioner Rolf Jensen & Associates, Inc., whereby Rolf Jensen would provide consulting services regarding construction of an expansion to the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino (the Resort) in Las Vegas in compliance with the ADA. After the Resort expansion was constructed, the Department of Justice (DOJ) began an investigation of numerous violations of the ADA arising from a lack of handicap accessibility at the Resort. Thereafter, Mandalay entered into a comprehensive settlement agreement with the DOJ that required Mandalay to bring the Resort into compliance with the ADA. Mandalay subsequently sued Rolf Jensen in district court, seeking to recover the costs to retrofit the Resort. In its petition to the Supreme Court, Rolf Jensen sought a writ of mandamus to direct the district court to grant its motion for summary judgment to dismiss all of Mandalay's claims as preempted by the ADA. After examining the purpose and intended effects of the ADA, the Court concluded that Mandalay's claims posed an obstacle to the objectives of the ADA and therefore were preempted. Accordingly, the Court granted Rolf Jensen's petition. View "Rolf Jensen & Associates v. Dist. Ct." on Justia Law

Respondent Arthur E. Mallory was Churchill County's district attorney. Appellant John O'Connor is an elector and registered voter within Churchill County. In this appeal, the issue before the Supreme Court was the narrow question of whether the office of district attorney is a state office for the purpose of determining whether district attorneys are subject to term limits under the "state office" portion of Article 15, Section 3(2) of the Nevada Constitution. Reviewing the Constitution as a whole, the Supreme Court's resolution of this inquiry was controlled by Article 4, Section 32 of the Constitution, which plainly declares district attorneys to be "county officers." Because Article 4, Section 32 identifies district attorneys as county officers, it follows that the office of district attorney cannot be considered a "state office" for term-limits purposes, and thus, district attorneys are not subject to term limits under the "state office" portion of Article 15, Section 3(2). Accordingly, the Court affirmed the district court's order denying appellant's petition to set aside respondent's election to a consecutive term as the Churchill County District Attorney. View "In re Contested Election of Mallory" on Justia Law

In this appeal, the Supreme Court reviewed a district court order granting a preliminary injunction prohibiting appellants State of Nevada Department of Business and Industry, the Financial Institutions Division, and its Commissioner George Burns (collectively, the Department), from enforcing its declaratory order and advisory opinion regarding the appropriate amount of homeowners' association lien fees respondents Nevada Association Services, Inc.; RMI Management, LLC; and Angius & Terry Collections, Inc. (collectively, NAS) can collect. Because the district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that the Department did not have jurisdiction to issue an advisory opinion regarding NRS Chapter 116 and that NAS would suffer irreparable harm if the Department enforced its opinion, the Supreme Court affirmed the district court’s order granting NAS's request for injunctive relief. View "State, Bus. & Indus. v. Nev. Ass'n Servs." on Justia Law

In this appeal, the issue before the Supreme Court was the relationship between two statutory provisions, enacted in 2009, that govern the extent of the juvenile court’s jurisdiction: NRS 62B.330(3)(e)(1) and NRS 62B.335. Both provisions address a person who has been charged with committing an offense when the person was between 16 and 18 years of age that would be a category A or B felony if committed by an adult. In those circumstances, NRS 62B.330(3)(e)(1) provides that the act is not a "delinquent act" and divests the juvenile court of jurisdiction if the person is identified and charged between the ages of 20 years, 3 months and 21 years. Pursuant to NRS 62B.335, if a person charged with a delinquent act that would have been a category A or B felony if committed by an adult is identified before reaching 21 years of age but is not apprehended until after reaching 21 years of age, then the juvenile court retains jurisdiction to conduct a hearing. The matter came before the Court in the case of "George J." who was seventeen years old when he allegedly committed: (1) home invasion, (2) burglary, (3) grand larceny, (4) grand larceny of an automobile, and (5) burglary of an automobile. Reading the statutes together, the Supreme Court concluded that NRS 62B.335 only applied to delinquent acts and therefore does not apply to acts that are "deemed not to be a delinquent act" under NRS 62B.330(3). "Thus, if the case is excluded from the juvenile court’s jurisdiction under NRS 62B.330(3), then the juvenile court does not obtain jurisdiction by virtue of NRS 62B.335." Here, the juvenile court lacked jurisdiction under NRS 62B.330(3)(e)(1). The Court nonetheless affirmed because the juvenile court reached the correct result by transferring the case to the district court for adult criminal proceedings. View "In re George J." on Justia Law

This appeal involved the interpretation of a claims-made professional liability insurance policy that Appellant Physicians Insurance Company of Wisconsin, Inc., d.b.a. PIC Wisconsin (PIC), issued to nonparty dentist Hamid Ahmadi, D.D.S. The policy covered dental malpractice claims made against Dr. Ahmadi and reported to PIC during the policy period. On cross-motions for summary judgment, the district court determined that PIC received constructive notice of Respondent Glenn Williams’s malpractice claim against Dr. Ahmadi while the policy was in force and held that this was enough to trigger coverage. Upon review, the Supreme Court reversed, finding that a "report" of a potential demand for damages to qualify as a "claim" required sufficient specificity to alert the insurer’s claim department to the existence of a potential demand for damages arising out of an identifiable incident, involving an identified or identifiable claimant or claimants, with actual or anticipated injuries. The Court did not find an ambiguity that would permit the PIC policy to have been triggered by the report of a default judgment against the doctor filed in public records. As such, the Court remanded the case with instructions to enter summary judgment in favor of PIC. View "Physicians Insurance Co. v. Williams" on Justia Law

The issue before the Supreme Court was whether proof of California workers’ compensation payments could be admitted into evidence in a personal injury action in Nevada. Because Nevada, the forum state, and California, the state in which the payments were made, both have statutes that permit proof of workers' compensation payments to be allowed into evidence in personal injury actions, the Court concluded that Nevada law governed. Applying Nevada law, the Court held that evidence of the actual amount of workers' compensation benefits paid should have been admitted and that a clarifying jury instruction provided by statute should have been given. The Court therefore reversed the judgment of the lower court and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Tri-County Equipment & Leasing v. Klinke" on Justia Law

In this opinion, the issue before the Supreme Court centered on the applicability of NRS 62B.330(3)(e)(2), a statutory provision that divests a juvenile court of jurisdiction over a person who commits a class A or B felony between 16 and 18 years of age but is not identified until after reaching 21 years of age. Defendant Gregory Barren was seventeen years old when he allegedly kidnapped and secually assaulted a woman in 2005. Police identified Defendant from DNA evidence left from bodily fluids at the scene. Defendant was twenty-one when police made the DNA match. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that this statutory provision governs jurisdiction over any proceedings initiated after the provision went into effect on October 1, 2009, regardless of when the offense was committed. Because NRS 62B.330(3)(e)(2) was in effect when the State initiated proceedings against Defendant, the Court concluded that the district court, not the juvenile court, had jurisdiction over his criminal case. View "Nevada v. Barren" on Justia Law

Petitioner Jonathon Whitehead pleaded guilty to DUI causing death and DUI causing substantial bodily harm and subsequently filed a post-conviction petition for writ of habeas corpus. A panel of the Supreme Court affirmed the district court's dismissal of Whitehead's petition as untimely. Whitehead filed a petition for rehearing, which the panel denied. Whitehead subsequently petitioned for en banc reconsideration. The Supreme Court reversed, concluding that reconsideration was warranted, holding (1) a judgment of conviction that imposes restitution but does not set an amount of restitution, in violation of Nevada statutes, is not final and therefore does not trigger the one-year time limit for filing a post-conviction petition for a writ of habeas corpus; and (2) Whitehead's post-conviction petition was timely under this analysis. View "Whitehead v. State" on Justia Law

Charles Huebler was convicted, pursuant to a guilty plea, of lewdness with a child under fourteen years of age. Huebler subsequently filed an untimely post-conviction petition for writ of habeas corpus, alleging that he had good cause for his delay in filing the petition because the State improperly withheld surveillance videotapes that were exculpatory, which rendered his guilty plea involuntary. The district court granted relief to Huebler. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) the State is required under Brady v. Maryland to disclose material exculpatory evidence within its possession to the defense before the entry of a guilty plea; (2) a defendant may challenge the validity of the guilty on the basis of the State's failure to make the required disclosure, but to succeed, the defendant must demonstrate the three components of a Brady violation in the context of a guilty plea; (3) as to the materiality component, the test is whether there is a reasonable probability that but for the State's failure to disclose the evidence the defendant would have refused to plead guilty and would have gone to trial; and (4) Huebler failed to demonstrate that the evidence was material under the materiality component. View "State v. Huebler" on Justia Law

After a seven-day jury trial, Kevin Rodriguez was found guilty of multiple criminal counts. Rodriquez appealed, arguing that the district court erred (1) in overruling his objection to the admission of twelve text messages because the State failed to authenticate the messages and the messages constituted inadmissible hearsay, and (2) in overruling his objection to the admission of DNA nonexclusion evidence because the evidence was irrelevant without supporting statistical data. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court (1) abused its discretion in admitting ten of the twelve text messages because the State failed to present sufficient evidence corroborating Appellant's identity as the person who sent the ten messages, but the error was harmless; and (2) did not abuse its discretion by admitting the relevant DNA nonexclusion evidence because, so long as it is relevant, DNA nonexclusion evidence is admissible because any danger of unfair prejudice or of misleading the jury is substantially outweighed by the defendant's ability to cross-examine or offer expert witness evidence as to probative value. View "Rodriguez v. State" on Justia Law