No place to sit, take notes

By Jeff German

Tuesday, Oct. 7, 2008 | 2 a.m.

Jails holding members of the white supremacist prison gang the Aryan Warriors are having a hard time balancing security concerns and constitutional rights.

As reported in the Sun last month, the North Las Vegas jail has had trouble walking that tightrope. And it turns out that after the jail shipped the reputed leader of the violent Aryan Warriors to a San Bernardino lockup, lawyers had similar complaints about their treatment in California.

Michael Kennedy, first assistant federal public defender, and Indianapolis death penalty specialist Richard Kammen traveled to the jail for a six-hour meeting with Ronald “Joey” Sellers in July as part of their efforts to save his life.

Federal prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against the 40-year-old Sellers in a sweeping racketeering case. Sellers was already serving a life sentence for murder. The racketeering indictment charges him with more bloodshed — the 2006 slaying of a Nevada prison inmate and the 2007 stabbing of a fellow gang member at the North Las Vegas jail.

Given Sellers’ record, his guards in California could argue they were just trying to make sure his attorneys didn’t become his next victims. But in court papers Kennedy and Kammen complained that a “heavy steel mesh screen” separated them from Sellers. He was handcuffed the entire time and sitting in an unlighted area, giving his attorneys a “distorted view” of their client.

On their side of the steel barrier, the attorneys said, was a lone, immovable stool. One lawyer had to stand or sit on the floor during the lengthy meeting. There was no desk or other flat surface for the lawyers to use to take notes.

The setup made it harder for them to do their jobs. So much so, they argued, that it infringed on Sellers’ constitutional right to defend himself against the criminal charges filed by the government that has him locked up.

As Gary Peck, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, puts it: The need for safety and security in jails “does not give jailers carte blanche to violate people’s constitutional rights and to treat them in a manner that makes it impossible for them to defend whatever charges they face.”

Even federal prosecutors acknowledged that the setting encountered by Sellers’ attorneys was not ideal for someone trying to prepare for a complex criminal case that could result in his execution.

A federal magistrate agrees. In a Sept. 23 ruling, U.S. Magistrate Peggy Leen took the unusual step of ordering Sellers’ California jailers to show more respect for the defendant’s rights.

She gave the attorneys permission to bring a computer with them the next time they visit Sellers. And she ordered jail officials to provide each member of the defense team with “a chair and an adequate surface upon which to write.”

It sounds almost comical that attorneys would need a court order in the 21st century to ensure such treatment — until you realize that what’s going on behind bars at some jails in this country is not a joke.

Since its Sept. 19 story on the North Las Vegas jail, the Sun has received numerous calls and e-mails from inmates and family members of inmates citing additional examples of alleged mistreatment — much of it worse than what the newspaper reported.

Leen isn’t ready to let the jail off the hook just yet, either. She has promised a ruling soon on the reported harsh conditions there.

Jeff German is the Sun’s senior investigative reporter.