Editorial: Question of fairness lingers

Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2005 | 8:20 a.m.

It has been two years since the Nevada Legislature passed a law that requires district attorneys to report to the Supreme Court the race and gender of victims, defendants and jurors involved in voluntary manslaughter and murder cases.

But the Las Vegas Sun, citing a Nevada Supreme Court document that tracked the demographic data for such cases in 2003 and 2004, reported Monday that Clark County's prosecutors have not fully complied with the requirement.

Demographic information about defendants and those who sit in judgment of them is supposed to be gathered to provide empirical evidence to show whether those accused of serious crimes have their cases heard by juries that are representative of the community. Some of these defendants face death penalties if convicted.

It is especially important to track that data in Clark County, where 91 percent of the state's murder and voluntary manslaughter cases were filed last year and 78 percent of such cases were filed in 2003.

Clark County Assistant District Attorney Christopher Lalli, who has compiled a limited amount of the information and sent it to the Supreme Court, said prosecutors have filed incomplete data because they "aren't race recognition experts." The information that was sent to the court shows race was reported as "unknown" or "not provided" for 65 percent of jurors.

Lalli's explanation is "unacceptable," according to Gary Peck, Nevada American Civil Liberties Union executive director. "It's the kind of excuse that, at the very least, creates the appearance that the office can't be trusted to play by the rules when it seeks the imposition of society's ultimate penalty," Peck said Monday.

Lalli said responsibility for filing such statistics should rest with the jury commissioner, as it does in other jurisdictions. Clark County Jury Commissioner Judy Rowland told the Sun that the Legislature didn't order her office to track the data, but if lawmakers did so they would have to increase funding to add the staff to do it.

Lalli told the Sun that "the criminal justice system should be color blind," relying only on the evidence and jurors who are neutral -- regardless of race or gender.

Perhaps our criminal justice system is entirely fair and impartial for all defendants. But without the hard data on race and gender, we are missing critical factors in making such a determination.

It would be best for the Legislature to place the responsibility for collecting the data on those who administer the system, rather than on prosecutors who, by virtue of being advocates for one side of a case, may not appear to be neutral.

But until such changes are made, Clark County prosecutors should file the information completely and abide by the wishes of the Nevada Supreme Court, no matter how inconvenient it is.