Regents’ meeting subject of probe

Wednesday, Sept. 13, 2000 | 11:55 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- The state attorney general's office confirmed today it plans an inquiry into whether Nevada's open meeting law was violated last week when a committee of the university Board of Regents discussed a report critical of UNLV Police.

Norman Azevedo, chief deputy attorney general, said the office has not received the written complaint but the case has been assigned to Deputy Attorney General Tina Leiss. The issue is whether notice on the agenda was posted that the report would be discussed.

Once the written complaint is filed and the office receives tape recordings of the meeting, a decision could be made in two to three weeks whether a violation occurred, said Azevedo, who heads the office's civil division.

He said Leiss would look at the agenda to see what issues were posted, then listen to the tape recordings. In some cases, he said, tapes are not complete, so additional investigation might be needed.

UNLV Police Officer Ron Cuzze made a telephone complaint to the attorney general's office about the discussion during a meeting of the Campus Environment Committee of the regents last week.

The regents talked about a report by the Nevada Division of Investigation that was critical of a March 9 campus dormitory drug raid. The actions of the UNLV Police officers were sharply criticized by Regent Doug Hill of Reno.

Hill compared the UNLV Police to Keystone Kops and proposed taking guns from most officers at the campus.

During the meeting, Tom Ray, the general counsel for the university system, cautioned Hill he was discussing confidential personnel matters that were contained in the report, which had not been made public.