District Court Department 14

Thursday, Aug. 15, 2002 | 9:18 a.m.

Eight seats are contested in District Court election, with several candidates competing for the open seats created by two new departments.

Valoria J. Vega, Ron D. Parraguirre, Joseph Bonaventure, Lee Gates, Jennifer Togliatti, Michael Douglas, Michelle Leavitt, Mark Ralph Denton, Sally Loehrer, John S. McGroarty, Michael A. Cherry, Nancy M. Saitta and Allan R. Earl are all running unopposed for re-election.

Department 14

Two candidates, John Curtas and Kenneth Pollock, are running against incumbent District Judge Donald M. Mosley for Department 14.

Curtas has tried more than 200 bench and jury trials in both state and federal courts in his 21 years as a lawyer in Nevada. The civil and criminal attorney has also served as an alternate judge for Las Vegas Municipal Court for 12 years and as an adjunct professor for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Community College of Southern Nevada and Western Connecticut State University.

Pollock has served as an arbitrator for District Court and for California's Superior Court in addition to nonprofit work with a housing corporation for college students and a community-based catastrophe redevelopment organization.

He said he plans to improve electronic access to records and the jury system if elected.

Mosley was censured in March by the Nevada Commission on Judicial Discipline after they found the incumbent had violated seven judicial canons. Mosley, who has been on the bench since 1983, was ordered to attend an ethics course at the National Judicial College in Reno and pay a $5,000 fine to the Clark County Law Library.

If re-elected, Mosley said he plans on reducing meritless appeals, increasing access to the court by young people so they understand the legal process and establishing a work program where inmates can lessen their prison time by performing useful services.