Appeal filed by Williams’ attorneys

Kim Smith

Wednesday, June 13, 2001 | 10:34 a.m.

Attorneys for a young woman convicted in February of causing the deaths of six teenagers picking up trash along Interstate 15 have filed her appeal with the Nevada Supreme Court.

The "fast track appeal" filed by John Watkins and Ellen Bezian claims the prohibited substance law under which Jessica Williams, 21, was convicted is unconstitutional.

Prosecutors tried to convince jurors that marijuana and Ecstasy found in William's blood caused her to drift off Interstate 15 on March 19, 2000, and strike the six teens at 75 miles per hour.

Jurors could have convicted Williams of driving under the influence of a prohibited substance, driving while impaired or both. However, they found her guilty only of the first charge and two misdemeanor charges that carry mandatory probation sentences.

If Watkins is successful in convincing the Supreme Court that the prohibited substance law is unconstitutional, Williams will likely be freed, because the state can not try her again under the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment.

She is currently serving an 18- to 48-year prison sentence.

The prohibited substance law is unconstitutional, because it punishes people with low levels of marijuana in their system despite the fact that scientific studies have shown no correlation between the drug and bad driving, Watkins wrote in the appeal.

"The prohibitive substance statute violates equal protection, because the class of persons it singles out for punishment poses no threat to traffic safety," Watkins wrote.

Clark County District Attorney Stewart Bell has said he believes the prohibited substance law will be upheld, as it has in at least six other states.

If they wanted to, legislators could pass zero-tolerance laws on both drugs and alcohol, Bell said. If they chose to, they could declare any amount of a drug or alcohol in the blood illegal, he said.

In addition to the constitutionality issue, Watkins claimed District Judge Mark Gibbons made several errors during the trial.

Gibbons' first error was in not allowing him to argue that Clark County was responsible for the children's deaths, Watkins said. The teenagers were picking up trash as part of a community service program.

The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined the county after it concluded the county was negligent in placing the teens on the freeway. Gibbons and the prosecutors, Gary Booker, Bruce Nelson and James Hartsell were aware of that, Watkins said.

In addition, Watkins points out that prosecutors failed to make sure that Williams' blood was refrigerated after their experts tested it. Gibbons said that because he couldn't prove the defense's experts would have come up with a better result for Williams, the state's blood results could still be used at trial, Watkins said.

Watkins argues that Gibbons misinterpreted the law and therefore the blood tests performed by the state's experts should not have been admissible.

Finally, Watkins said the jurors were prejudiced, because Gibbons allowed prosecutors to use photographs of the six victims taken at the accident scene or the hospital after they had died.

"(They) served no purpose other than to prejudice and inflame the emotions of the jurors," Watkins wrote.

A lawsuit filed by the victims' families against Clark County and Republic Services of Nevada, which had contracted with the county for the trash pickup, is pending.