High court catches up on backlog

Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2002 | 11:13 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- The Nevada Supreme Court handed down fewer decisions this past fiscal year but Chief Justice Bill Maupin said the justices handled more complex cases, a number of which involved election disputes.

The state Administrative Office of the Courts reported Monday that the court disposed of 1,906 cases in fiscal 2002, which ended June 30. That's down from 2,008 the previous fiscal year.

There were also 1,752 appeals submitted to the court, eight fewer than the prior year.

Maupin said that despite the numbers, "it was a very good year production-wise." The ballot issues took a great deal of time, he said.

The court's year was marked by challenges to Clark County's advisory question ballot issues regarding the proposed takeover of Nevada Power; a decision on a train trench ballot decision in Reno; a park issue in Carson City; and growth measure in Douglas County.

In addition, Maupin said, there were more requests from losing parties to rehear cases. He said the court made an internal change to resolve the rehearing petitions instead of deciding new cases.

Those rehearing petitions and decisions do not show on the productivity scale, he said.

The number of appeals to the Nevada Supreme Court has been flat for the last several years. As a result the backlog of cases at the end of the year was 1,474 compared to 1,628 at the end of fiscal 2001.

Appeals from criminal cases also have flattened out, Maupin said. That's due largely to the specialization of judges in Clark County, which streamlined the handling of criminal cases. He said there are more negotiations in criminal cases, cutting down the number of appeals.

In Las Vegas and Reno, a system of alternative dispute resolutions in civil cases has also reduced the appeals. The cases are resolved before going to trial.

"I think a lot of case filings are down because of the quality of the bench statewide," Maupin said.

For instance, the appeals from Clark County to the Nevada Supreme Court totaled 861 in the 2002 fiscal year, down 10 from the prior fiscal year and 180 fewer than 1999-2000.

The administrative office of the court reported that despite flat filings, the Nevada Supreme Court Justices are among the busiest in the nation and ranked second in filings per justice with 258, behind West Virginia with 606. The office said that in West Virginia all the cases filed may not be heard while Nevada must consider all cases filed.

While appeals to the Supreme Court declined slightly, the caseloads in Nevada trial courts rose 6 percent to 350,576 this year. For the first time, filing topped 100,000 in the district court, reaching 107,805. That compares with 99,992 during the prior year.

Justice courts statewide recorded 177,829 civil and criminal cases and 399,949 traffic violations.

The Las Vegas Justice Court was the busiest in the state with 12,691 per judge. Second was Reno Justice Court with 5,432 per judge.

Cases in municipal courts rose to 70,367, up from 65,367 of the prior fiscal year. North Las Vegas Municipal Court was the busiest with 6,812 cases filed per judge. Las Vegas Municipal court was second with 6,723 cases per judge.