Man fears citations will put him back on streets

Friday, March 4, 2005 | 10:58 a.m.

The case of Franklin Holt shows how run-ins with the law that often accompany life on the streets can threaten to make a man homeless again.

Holt, who has had an apartment for nearly a month, was in court Wednesday to deal with a Jan. 31 citation for urinating on a wall near Wilson Avenue and F Street, the area where homeless camps have been built up and dispersed by authorities in recent months.

Holt lived under a bridge at that location for a month beginning in mid-December, along with about 200 other men and women.

Holt said he was ticketed by police because he "didn't have any place to use the restroom."

The lack of a public restroom in the Wilson and F Street area has been a point of contention in recent months. The Clark County Health District notified the city and area private concerns about the health hazard created by feces and urine on public property.

That eventually prompted a weeklong Las Vegas-led "outreach effort" in mid-January that failed to find Holt shelter.

Weeks later, a private nonprofit group called Straight from the Streets got him into an apartment and walked the partially blind, arthritic 48-year-old through the state and federal offices that could help him put his life together.

Holt is currently awaiting a March 10 appointment for vocational rehabilitation with a state office, and is also expecting word on a Feb. 18 Social Security disability application. Future plans include applying for medical benefits to deal with his disabilities.

But the vestiges of homelessness remain. In addition to the charge of urinating in public, Holt also has at least one outstanding bench warrant for trespassing and possibly another one for misuse of a bus bench from that period -- court records weren't clear on the issue.

As Holt headed into court without a lawyer Wednesday, he knew that a jail sentence or a high fine could easily put him back on the streets.

Joseph T. Nold, a lawyer who was in the courtroom awaiting another case, overheard a prosecutor talking to Holt about his options, and Nold volunteered to represent Holt pro bono.

After he argued on Holt's behalf, Judge Toy Gregory agreed Wednesday to postpone the case until March 24, so that the charge of urinating in public and the bench warrants from other municipal court departments can be grouped together.

Nold said he will try to get all the charges dismissed.

"I just want to get this taken care of," Holt said, "so I can get on with my life."

He left the court worried he might run afoul of the police again while walking down the street, "and then I'll have to go to jail and lose my place."

The issue of police arresting the homeless for misdemeanor charges such as urinating in public and jaywalking, as well as a push by Las Vegas City Attorney Brad Jerbic to increase sentences for people repeatedly arrested for such crimes, has been controversial in recent months.

Calls to Metro Police and Jerbic seeking comment Wednesday and Thursday were not returned.

Dozens of homeless people have been locked up for misdemeanors in recent months, including Holt, who was in jail in May for misuse of a bus bench.

"Is that the way our society wants to deal with this social problem -- to lock these people up?" Nold said after Wednesday's court session.

After Holt's courtroom appearance Wednesday, he sat in the courtyard at City Hall and described nearly eight years in Las Vegas.

Those years have included an 18-month job at a gift shop on the Strip that ended when the shop closed, a six-month construction job that also ran out, a girlfriend addicted to heroin and cocaine who died in October of an overdose, and a Clark County Social Service housing voucher program that he said ended when he missed job interviews because he was trying to get his girlfriend to kick her habit.

Holt described his new life in a boarding house near Bonanza Road and First Street as "kinda strange -- I'm so used to sleeping with all my clothes on and now I got a bed to lay on and can take a shower, and it's all in private."