Las Vegas judge sues Nevada discipline panel

A Las Vegas judge facing ethics charges has turned the tables against the state’s judicial oversight board, lodging a federal lawsuit that alleges conspiracy, a continued bias against her and violations of her constitutional rights.

In a 68-page complaint, filed Friday, lawyers for Justice of the Peace Melanie Tobiasson accuse the Nevada Commission on Judicial Discipline of flouting its own regulations and procedures in an effort to disparage the judge.

“Their actions are Constitutionally violative and were deliberately undertaken to suppress the free speech of a duly elected judge and infringe on her due process rights through contrived, retaliatory means that abused the process against Plaintiff’s rights as an individual, parent and judicial officer,” the lawsuit states. “Defendants’ actions are unconstitutional and directly restrain Plaintiff’s Constitutional rights.

Reached Monday, the commission’s executive director, Paul Deyhle, declined to comment.

The filing from attorneys Marc Cook and Thomas Sheets alleges defamation, constitutional violations, gender bias, conspiracy and intentional infliction of emotional distress. It mirrors an appeal Tobiasson made with the Nevada Supreme Court last year. She had asked the high court to throw out charges from the commission that alleged she interfered in a murder investigation.

That request was denied, after the Supreme Court decided that the commission should be allowed to pursue charges. Late last year, however, the commission postponed a hearing on eight charges against the judge laid out in 16 separate allegations.

Earlier this year, Deyhle told the Legislature’s Interim Finance Committee that the commission needed $69,000 to continue its operations through the remaining fiscal year. He said, “One case in particular depleted about 75 percent of our operating budget, which leaves us very little funds.”

Deyhle did not specify the case, but a memo from Gov. Steve Sisolak’s budget division stated that the commission had spent more than $103,000 of a budgeted roughly $138,000 on investigations.

The judicial panel has alleged that Tobiasson urged Metropolitan Police Department detectives to investigate a clothing store where her daughter worked. Tobiasson believed the store was a front for an unlicensed club where teens drank, used drugs and engaged in prostitution.

Her lawyers wrote that the complaint against Tobiasson was “filled with fictionalized theory” and “bereft of factual specifics.”

“The conduct of the NCJD in this matter has demonstrated a denial of even minimal due process from an adjudicatory body, including notice and meaningful opportunity to be heard,” her federal lawsuit alleges. “The loss of office of the Justice of the Peace for any period of time would constitute a grievous loss to the Plaintiff that can never be recouped.”

In a phone interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Monday, Cook said that he hoped the federal complaint would lead in part to a change in how the commission operates.

“There’s no oversight to the commission,” he said. “And I don’t know how you get a fair hearing in front of a body like this.”

Contact David Ferrara at dferrara@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-1039. Follow @randompoker on Twitter.