AG candidates engage in TV battle

Erin Neff

Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2002 | 11:05 a.m.

Brian Sandoval

Jonathan Hansen

The television ads from the two major candidates for attorney general each paint the opponent as a guy you shouldn't elect.

The 30-second attacks complain about campaign contributions, botched representation or defense of bad clients as lawyers.

But each time Democrat John Hunt looks to the sky for his late father, Francis', approval or scribbles notes for a speech on the back of a business card, you see someone new to politics trying to do his best.

"I think my Dad would be proud, because I've stood up to run," Hunt said.

And each time Republican Brian Sandoval discusses the adoptions he's helped along or glances at the red string his daughter adorned around his right wrist for luck, you see a family man stuck in Las Vegas for five days a week with a wife and two children in Reno.

Neither is the scourge the ads would like to show. And they take very different approaches to what polls and political consultants believe is the state's closest race.

Hunt, who as a kid growing up poor was taught that "as you climb, lift," thinks aspiring to the top law enforcement job in the state would prove that education and desire can overcome poverty.

"My Dad taught me the riddle of life," Hunt said. "You're not better than anyone and no one's better than you."

Sandoval, groomed for the position from a young age, has big plans to turn the office into the Nevada Department of Justice.

"For me to be the attorney general is the opportunity of a lifetime to bring everything together," Sandoval said. "Everything I learned as a legislator, all of my experience as a gaming commissioner and as a private attorney makes me feel as though I can step in running with that office."

Sandoval envisions a make-over in the attorney general's office to include a public integrity unit handling white collar crime, ethics cases and state campaign laws.

He would also focus on elder abuse by starting a hotline, and crimes against children by creating a website where parents could type in their address and find out if there were any sex offenders registered nearby.

Hunt speaks in wide-ranging terms about his ability to lead the office based on running his law practice.

He does not have any specific plans for the office, instead saying: "I think it's unfair to discuss all of these changes without first going in there and listening."

Both candidates are opposed to Yucca Mountain and plan to personally litigate Nevada's cases in the federal courts. Both are confident Nevada will win in the courts.

Sandoval would refocus the department on public safety, and he would like to have the office assist rural district attorneys with prosecution of crimes.

Hunt said he thinks Del Papa, who has endorsed him, has done a fine job and that the room for improvement he sees is in training for deputies and keeping the office's high turnover in check.

Sandoval's service

Sandoval was born in Reading, Calif., but spent his childhood in Sparks ranching sheep with his older brother for school projects and using money earned from his lambs to travel to Washington, D.C., with his mother and to buy his first car, an orange 1971 Volkswagen Beetle.

His mother's job as a clerk for a federal district court judge led him to meet then-law clerk Frankie Sue Del Papa and piqued his interest in a law career.

Sandoval got an English literature degree from the University of Nevada, Reno, then went to Ohio State University's law school. During law school he interned for the Ohio Supreme Court, then returned to Nevada in 1989 to begin practicing.

He worked for then-attorney Larry Hicks and later with Robison, Belaustegui, Robb and Sharp handling environmental cases.

Public service came calling in 1994, when then-Assemblyman Jim Gibbons ran for Nevada governor and asked Sandoval to run for his Assembly seat.

Sandoval won election to the Legislature in 1994 and 1996. His law practice shifted primarily to civil work, such as adoptions and incorporating limited liability companies, and he left to work for Gamboa, Sandoval and Stovall.

Another politician came calling -- then-Gov. Bob Miller asked Sandoval to serve on the Nevada Gaming Commission. That's when all litigation stopped.

"Gaming took all of my time," Sandoval said.

Sandoval said his entire legal career makes him better rounded than Hunt, because he has civil litigation, transactional law and knowledge of gaming issues.

"I think I'm a better lawyer for the way things happened," Sandoval said.

Gov. Kenny Guinn named Sandoval chairman of the Gaming Commission in 1999, a position that led him to testify before Congress, the Legislature and several gaming conferences in the United States and Canada.

He resigned the post in August 2001 to run for attorney general.

Before this campaign, Sandoval would run anywhere from 10 to 22 miles a day as part of his training to run marathons.

Now he's just running back and forth to airports, to his home in Reno and his one-bedroom apartment in Las Vegas, refusing to remove the thin string given to him by 5-year-old Madeline, even when it becomes the subject of questions during tough endorsement interviews with organized labor.

He'll take it off on Election Day, win or lose, and then head off with Madeline, his wife Kathleen, and 7-year-old son James for a trip to Molokai.

"No phones. No television. No campaign," he said.

Hunt's passion

Now that Hunt has emerged from private practice as a candidate, his stories make some wonder why he hadn't run before.

"I'd just been waiting for the call," Hunt said, making a refence to an OK from Sen. Harry Reid to run for attorney general.

Born in Brookton, Mass., and raised in Manchester, N.H., Hunt remembers watching the Nixon-Kennedy debates on a linoleum floor in a small kitchen with his parents and his four of his five siblings.

A few years later, when Lyndon B. Johnson was campaigning in his mill town, Hunt adorned a cowboy hat and painted a sign to say "All the way with LBJ." It caught the notice of the tall figure emerging from the dark car.

"The car stopped in front of me and he picked me and pulled me out of the crowd because of my sign," Hunt said. He's been hooked on politics ever since.

After graduating from high school, Hunt enlisted in the Air Force, thankful that he could type well enough to land him administrative air duty at the Air War College in Montgomery, Ala., during the Vietnam War.

"I grew up poor, and it was just an honor for me to even sit at that desk," Hunt said.

Hunt attended night school at both Troy State University and the University of New Hampshire while serving in the Air Force.

After leaving the Air Force, Hunt enrolled at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where he was elected president of the United Students University of Nevada System, representing all college students in the state to the Legislature.

A photo of long-haired Hunt hoisting a campaign sign over his head shares space in his downtown law office with a New England Patriots helmet autographed by Drew Bledsoe and a certificate admitting him to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court.

While at the University of San Diego School of Law, Hunt interned for then-U.S. Sen. Howard Cannon. He also worked as an agent in the Nevada Gaming Control Board audit division for two years.

After graduating from law school in 1983, he returned to Las Vegas to work for Morton Galane, whom Hunt consistently refers to as "the greatest trial lawyer in Nevada history."

In 1988 Hunt and some UNLV buddies launched the Raleigh, Hunt, McGarry and Drizin law firm. He has also served as the prosecutor for the Nevada State Dental Board.

Hunt has been married to Lisa Hunt for 12 years and is the step-father of 20-year-old William, 10-year-old Parker and 8-year-old Lauren.

"If I win this, great," Hunt said. "If I don't win, at least I stood up."