WEEK IN REVIEW: CARSON CITY

Sunday, April 8, 2007 | 7:27 a.m.

Your week in Carson City, dear reader: A challenge to the system for investigating police shootings, a dispute with Roe v. Wade echoes, and a call for ethics education of newly elected public officials and lobbyists.

In the United States, no other system is quite like a Clark County coroner's inquest, the name given to the fact-finding hearing held after someone dies at the hands of a police officer.

In 159 inquests over the 31 years the Clark County system has been in place, just one officer has been found "criminally negligent" in the killing of a suspect.

Under the county's system, a seven-member jury hears testimony at an inquest. Police officers can volunteer, but are not forced, to testify.

A county prosecutor does the questioning, but nothing like a cross-examination takes place. Jurors and members of the victim's family can submit questions in writing, but the prosecutor is not required to put those questions to a witness.

The process often adds to the tension, with relatives of victims crying foul because of the perceived unfairness.

Assembly Bill 436 would give family members of the deceased a chance to testify at inquests, regardless of whether they witnessed the death.

As expected, police lobbyists spoke against the legislation. And in a sign that the bill has virtually no chance of passing, Gary Peck, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, agreed with police. Peck said that letting a family member "simply make statements ... is highly inappropriate."

Peck conceded the current system is flawed, so much so that he would rather have no inquest than continue with the current procedures. But he said reforms are coming from within, noting he has been working with Metro for six months on revisions.

No action was taken on the bill.

One of the largest audiences of the legislative session assembled for a bill authored by Sen. Warren Hardy, R-Las Vegas. Hardy, a physician, wants legislation that says if a woman is carrying a fetus at any stage of development and the fetus is killed by anything other than a legal medical procedure, the fetus is considered a "separate and distinct victim."

That definition conflicts with the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade, which included the finding that a fetus is not a viable human being until it is capable of surviving outside the womb - usually late in the second or early in the third trimester.

Abortion rights advocates expressed concern that Hardy's legislation is not consistent with the high court's interpretation. Lawmakers made no decision and asked parties opposed to the bill to return next week with proposed revisions.

By comparison, the bill calling for ethics education of new lawmakers had an easy time.

It breezed through the Assembly Committee on Elections, Procedures, Ethics and Constitutional Amendment.

Of course, a bill extolling the virtues of ethics in government is not the sort of thing any lawmaker is going to protest - especially in a state that saw former Clark County commissioners sentenced to prison last year for accepting bribes.