AG Del Papa faces non-lawyer primary foe

Brendan Riley

Monday, Aug. 10, 1998 | 10:27 a.m.

CARSON CITY - Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa is looking ahead to a general election battle against GOP challenger Scott Scherer - facing only token opposition in the Sept. 1 Democratic primary.

Del Papa, planning to spend $250,000 in her bid for a third term, says that in her campaign stops around the state she has yet to run into her primary election foe, non-lawyer Marilyn O'Connor of Fallon.

O'Connor, 50, filed for attorney general at the last minute, after being told by officials taking her filing papers that her non-lawyer status blocked her from running for the state Supreme Court.

A recent poll bears out Del Papa's description of O'Connor as an unseen candidate: The incumbent had 81 percent of the expected primary vote compared with just 10 percent for O'Connor, 50.

The Mason-Dixon Political/Media Research poll was based on phone interviews of 808 registered voters across the state June 8-10.

A follow-up survey this month by the same firm also showed Del Papa, 48, with a nearly 2-to-1 margin over Scherer in the general election. But Scherer says he still has time to close the gap.

Both surveys were done for the Las Vegas Review-Journal and KTNV-TV, Channel 13, Las Vegas, and have error margins of 3.5 percentage points.

Besides Scherer, others in the general election race include Libertarian Kent Cromwell and Independent American Joel Hansen.

Del Papa had hoped to run for governor this year but opted for re-election after finding she couldn't match the kind of campaign money that GOP gubernatorial frontrunner Kenny Guinn was raising.

Del Papa says she has accomplished a lot during her two terms as attorney general, but adds that more remains to be done in areas such as high-tech crime prevention, juvenile justice and insurance fraud prevention.

Del Papa also said her office has made strides in consumer protection, reducing frivolous lawsuits from prison inmates, and trying to cut down appeals in capital cases.

But she said the wide range of issues doesn't mean a "cradle-to-grave" approach that goes too far - one of Scherer's criticisms. She added that the office has expanded responsibilities that warrant more enforcement efforts.

Besides her two terms as state attorney general, Del Papa also served a four-year term as Nevada's secretary of state, and as a regent of Nevada's university and community college system. Born in Hawthorne, she was raised in Tonopah and Las Vegas.

O'Connor says she may not be a lawyer but knows a lot about the law - and that's good enough for attorney general. There's no legal or constitutional requirement in Nevada that a candidate for the job be a lawyer.

O'Connor avoided any filing fee by claiming indigent status in filing for attorney general. She said the IRS seized her home, she gets food stamps and doesn't work, and divides her time between her son's home in Fallon and mother's home in Sparks.

She also said her hassles with government agencies have left her angry and "slinging an ax."

O'Connor knew what to expect when she tried at first to file for the high court. She attempted the same thing six years ago and was told that state law requires a candidate for the Supreme Court to be an attorney.

But O'Connor, who took her 1992 case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, said the Nevada Constitution doesn't have the law degree requirement, and she still thinks the statutory requirement doesn't hold water.