Death penalty reforms cleared by panels

Erin Neff

Wednesday, April 11, 2001 | 11:14 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- With questions mounting about whether the death penalty is applied equally or is cruel punishment, two proposed reforms have cleared legislative committees.

The two historic votes Tuesday -- in both the Senate and Assembly Judiciary committees -- pave the way for a potential moratorium on the death penalty and a prohibition on the sentence's application to mentally retarded defendants.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Mark James, R-Las Vegas, proposed an amendment to Sen. Joe Neal's repeal of the death penalty by offering a two-year moratorium to study complex issues.

"I think there are some serious problems," James said.

Neal, D-Las Vegas, said the amended version that passed committee Tuesday is acceptable.

"It's a first step, and I'm very pleased that they would go in that direction," Neal said.

On the Assembly side, the Judiciary Committee amended and passed Sheila Leslie's bill prohibiting a death sentence for someone who is mentally retarded.

Leslie, D-Reno, sponsored the bill to provide a sentence of life without the possibility of parole for those with an IQ of 70 or less, who are also classified as mentally retarded. The state uses an IQ of 70 to classify mental retardation for other programs.

This morning the state Pardons Board was to consider the case of Thomas Nevius, a 44-year-old man sentenced to death for the 1980 murder of a Las Vegas man during a burglary.

Attorneys for Nevius are seeking clemency because their client has scored below 70 on three separate IQ tests in recent years.

Gov. Kenny Guinn said he has not decided whether to commute the death penalty in the Nevius case. "I'm not rushing to judgment because of an artificial time line," he said.

Guinn made the statement shortly before the state Pardons Board, of which he is chairman, met to decide whether to commute Nevius' sentence to life in prison with the possibility of parole.

Guinn said the two bills in the Legislature "certainly can" affect his judgment.

"I don't know what we will do today," Guinn said. "I want to hear it, and there are strong points on both sides of the issue."

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to consider a North Carolina case that calls into question the constitutionality of sentencing a mentally-retarded defendant to death.

Although three of the five Republicans on the Assembly Judiciary Committee voted against Leslie's bill Tuesday, Leslie said she is confident she can win support of the measure on the Assembly floor -- and likely on the Senate side.

John Carpenter, R-Elko, voted for Leslie's bill. Sharron Angle, Don Gustavson and Greg Brower, all R-Reno, voted against it. Dennis Nolan, R-Las Vegas, was absent for the vote.

"If the system works properly, the defendants' mental retardation is a mitigating factor in court," Brower said.

Brower also said if a mentally retarded person cannot understand his actions and accept responsibility, life without parole is an equally-flawed sentence.

Senate Bill 254 faces even more scrutiny on the Senate floor.

But James said allegations of socioeconomic and racial biases raised during a lengthy hearing on Neal's bill led him to also question whether juries understand instructions and how to apply aggravating circumstances in determining a death sentence.

"All of these call into question the fairness of the penalty, and I can't in good faith recommend to the Senate they turn a blind eye to those issues," James said.