Wednesday, Nov. 1, 2006 | 7:20 a.m.
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Las Vegas attorney Don Campbell represents Republican gubernatorial candidate Jim Gibbons. Campbell's firm also represents Sheriff Bill Young.
This week, when Campbell filed court papers against Young on behalf of Gibbons, the case was heard by District Judge Douglas Herndon, who owes his seat on the bench in part to Sig Rogich, Gibbons' top campaign adviser.
Those entangled relationships and others, many with only one degree of separation between them, have added a layer of murkiness to the mystery over what happened Oct. 13 between Gibbons and Chrissy Mazzeo, the 32-year-old single mother who alleges she was assaulted by the congressman.
In so doing, they also have heightened skepticism over the authenticity of just-discovered surveillance videos of the parking garage where the incident occurred - and about the veracity of much else in the conflicting public accounts that have emerged.
If nothing else, the close ties among many principals in the Gibbons-Mazzeo case underline the incestuousness of Las Vegas' political and legal communities.
The Republican-connected Campbell was hired several days after the Oct. 13 incident to help Gibbons defend himself against the allegations.
Campbell has refused to say who's paying his expenses. But longtime private detective David Groover, who has worked closely with Campbell over the years, has publicly said that Rogich is paying for his investigative work on the congressman's behalf.
Groover and another private investigator, Tom Dillard, dug up some derogatory information from Mazzeo's past that was leaked this week to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, another of Campbell's clients.
Another of Campbell's clients is Young, whom Campbell is defending in a federal defamation lawsuit filed by sheriff candidate Jerry Airola.
This week, however, Young - who telephoned Gibbons the day after the Oct. 13 incident to arrange for his detectives to interview him about Mazzeo's allegations - was on the other side of the courtroom from Campbell.
The attorney filed a writ in District Court seeking to force Young and the Metro police department to turn over copies of recordings from surveillance cameras in the Hughes Center parking garage the evening of Oct. 13.
Campbell contends that the tapes do not show Gibbons or Mazzeo in the parking structure that night and absolve Gibbons of wrongdoing. Police, however, have not yet drawn the same conclusion.
The media reported last weekend that the tapes had abruptly surfaced two weeks after police on the night of the incident were told by a security officer working for Crescent Real Estate Equities, the Texas-based firm that owns and manages the Hughes Center, that there were no recordings.
The Sun reported Tuesday that Rogich, whose company, Rogich Communications Group, leases offices from Crescent at the Hughes Center business development, has lobbied for Crescent in the past.
Campbell said in his court papers that he learned about the tapes from a Crescent representative last Saturday, before knowledge of the tapes had become public. A lawyer for the Hughes Center law firm of Jones Vargas, which represents Crescent, had turned over the tapes to police last Wednesday.
Joe Brown, one of the firm's partners, is the state's Republican national committeeman with longtime political ties to Rogich, a GOP strategist. Brown sat behind Gibbons and Campbell at an Oct. 19 news conference in which Gibbons strongly denied Mazzeo's claims .
Jones Vargas, however, no longer represents Crescent, the Sun has learned.
Patrick Byrne, a lawyer with Snell & Wilmer, confirmed Tuesday that his law firm has replaced Jones Vargas.
Byrne said the switch occurred after allegations had been made in the media about the close connections and potential conflicts of interest among Jones Vargas, Crescent and Gibbons and his advisers.
Kirk Lenhard, the Jones Vargas attorney who had represented Crescent, could not be reached for comment.
In the court papers, Campbell said he telephoned Young last Sunday to request copies of the Oct. 13 tapes, but that Young informed him that he was advised by legal counsel not to release them.
Campbell then went to court, where his case was assigned to Herndon, a Republican and former chief deputy district attorney. Before ordering the tapes released Tuesday, Herndon acknowledged in court that he had received a $250 campaign contribution from Rogich.
What Herndon did not reveal in court is that Rogich lobbied one of Gov. Kenny Guinn's top aides for Herndon's appointment to the bench in January 2005. That was before Rogich, at the time Guinn's top political adviser, had a falling out with the governor over Rogich's support of Gibbons.
Guinn said Tuesday that Rogich never personally lobbied him, adding that he chose Herndon because he was the most qualified candidate.
"Doug Herndon just really stood out," Guinn said.
Guinn's chief of staff, Keith Munro, said Rogich phoned him in January 2005 to recommend Herndon for the position.
But Munro, who was Guinn's legal adviser at the time and a participant in the appointment process, said Rogich's call "was not a factor" in the governor's decision.
Herndon did not respond to an inquiry for comment. Rogich also did not return a call.
The latest disclosures further highlight the powerful political resources being aimed at Mazzeo, who this week asked police to reopen the criminal investigation into the alleged assault that followed an evening of drinking at McCormick & Schmick's restaurant.
Mazzeo, a student and cocktail waitress who has had financial problems in the past, decided against pursuing the case the day after the incident, saying she did not want to take on a powerful public figure like Gibbons.
But after Gibbons publicly denied her allegations, she held a news conference standing by her story and further alleging she felt threatened and harassed by the Gibbons camp into dropping the charges. The Gibbons camp has strongly denied pressuring Mazzeo.
Mazzeo and her attorney, Richard Wright, a Democrat, also have been highly critical of how the investigation has been handled by Metro Police - in particular, by Young.
The Gibbons camp has obtained statements from the three other women who were drinking with Gibbons and Rogich at McCormick & Schmick's - all of which dispute Mazzeo's contention that Gibbons had been flirtatious at the restaurant's bar.
Two of those women work at the law firm of Bullivant Houser Bailey PC, which shares a suite with Rogich Communications at the Hughes Center. The firm also has performed legal work for Rogich over the years.
Despite the Gibbons camp's efforts to call her story and her background into question, Mazzeo has pressed ahead this week.
Late Monday, she returned with police to the scene of the alleged assault at the parking garage, and on Tuesday she was re-interviewed at length by detectives.
Still, many are wary of whether the police will be able to conduct an independent investigation.
"The way that this has been handled has been terribly unfortunate," said Gary Peck, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada.
"Because of what's been said and done from the outset, there are many people who fairly or unfairly are questioning the ability of the police department to objectively investigate this."
The ACLU has said the public would be best served if the Nevada attorney general's office or another independent state or federal agency conducts the investigation.
Attorney General George Chanos, who has been in Washington, D.C., for the past 10 days preparing to argue a Nevada case before the U.S. Supreme Court today, said he has not been following the incident in great detail. He was unaware that Mazzeo had decided to press charges.
"There are a number of things on my desk I'll have to catch up on when I get back," Chanos told the Sun. "Reading up on the account of this event will be one of those things."
But Chanos expressed confidence in both Young and District Attorney David Roger.
"I'm not going to second-guess them," he said. "They're both dedicated professionals who don't like crime. If they feel a true crime has been committed, they will go after it."
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