Clark County Commissioner William McCurdy II, shown in this 2017 photo, and Commission Chair Marilyn Kirkpatrick will host the North Las Vegas Bench Warrant Quashing & Resource Fair from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, June 26, 2021, at the North Las Vegas Justice Center.
Friday, June 25, 2021 | 2 a.m.
Today, thousands of Las Vegas Valley motorists are one traffic stop away from being handcuffed and taken to jail for unpaid tickets. A recently passed state law set to decriminalize such infractions and offer motorists a reprieve doesn’t kick in until Jan. 1, 2023.
For many, it’s not a matter of wanting to pay their debts but of having the means to do so, said Clark County Commissioner William McCurdy II, noting that the pandemic has only exacerbated people’s struggles.
McCurdy and Commission Chair Marilyn Kirkpatrick will host a four-hour “North Las Vegas Bench Warrant Quashing & Resource Fair,” which kicks off at 10 a.m. Saturday at the North Las Vegas Justice Center, 2428 N. Martin Luther King Blvd. Residents with outstanding bench warrants in North Las Vegas Justice Court or North Las Vegas Municipal Court may be able to have their warrants resolved during the event, and anyone with issues in other local courts will be able to get free legal advice on their case.
McCurdy said Wednesday that there were about 4,700 active bench warrants out of North Las Vegas courts, noting that would-be arrestees attending the event will be able to file a motion with the court requesting a hearing with a judge. Attendees with legal issues outside North Las Vegas will be connected to attorneys for free legal advice.
Information about sealing eviction records, sealing criminal records and job training also will be made available at the event.
“The goal is to get as many people help that’s possible as we continue to get folks back to work,” McCurdy said. “As we continue to help folks improve their own quality of life, the first step in doing so is to take care of any legal issues an individual will have.”
“Sometimes relatively minor legal troubles significantly impact a person’s ability to get a job or a place to live,” Kirkpatrick said. “We want to help people take care of their legal issues and get their lives back on track.”
North Las Vegas Township Justice of the Peace Belinda Harris was instrumental in helping to bring about the event, McCurdy said.
“It is an honor and a blessing to be able to collaborate in this way to help people who are obviously going through some very difficult things in their life,” McCurdy said.
Staff from the Clark County Public Defender’s Office, Mi Familia Vota, the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada, Nevada Legal Services, Workforce Connections and Mass Liberation Project will be on hand Saturday.
North Las Vegas was selected for the fair because of the high number of open warrants in that jurisdiction, McCurdy said.
Earlier this month, Leslie Turner, an organizer with the Mass Liberation Project, retold the story of her arrest for unpaid traffic tickets after Metro Police pulled her over in 2015.
Turner, who was getting back into the workforce after giving birth to a premature baby boy, said she was waiting for her first paycheck at her new job to quash the warrant.
Instead, she landed in jail for nearly a week before she bailed out. Her 4-month-old son was left at home without her breast milk, Turner said.
Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford, who also spoke at the event, lauded her efforts during the latest Nevada legislative session, which saw Assembly Bill 116 pass.
Beginning Jan. 1, 2023, the law will decriminalize most traffic violations in Nevada, converting them from misdemeanors to traffic infractions.
Meanwhile, there are still motorists out there who risk jail time, some of whom had bench warrants issued against them during the pandemic, McCurdy said.
“We recognize the detrimental effects that traffic warrants and bench warrants have on civilians,” said Athar Haseebullah, ACLU of Nevada executive director. “It precludes those individuals in many instances from being able to work, being able to drive, being able to function as a normal individual would without that type of warrant ... hovering over their head, which subjects them to the threat of immediate arrest.”
He said he was hopeful that other jurisdictions in the valley would collaborate on similar events to assist those with unpaid tickets before the new law takes effect.
Meanwhile, Haseebullah said the passing of AB116 was “significant for our community.”
While decriminalizing traffic tickets isn’t a “big-ticket or splashy” issue, he said, it has a “very real impact on average people just trying to get by on a day-to-day basis.”
“Something like this has the ability to be transformative in an individual’s life and the lives of their families,” he added.
People wishing to attend the event Saturday don’t need to register beforehand. For more information, call 702-455-1360.
