Sunday, May 20, 2007 | 6:55 a.m.
Metro Police have quietly taken on a series of public corruption cases in the past 18 months, devoting unprecedented resources to rooting out malfeasance in Southern Nevada.
A loosely assembled team of detectives in Metro's intelligence unit has launched at least four high-profile corruption investigations. Police officials say they are responding to a sharp rise in the number of tips from the public about corruption, which they ascribe, in part, to publicity surrounding the federal prosecution last summer of former Clark County Commissioners Dario Herrera and Mary Kincaid-Chauncey. Those cases demonstrated that illicit behavior by public officials should not be tolerated, Metro says.
Detectives began with a seemingly easy target last year: Clark County Recorder Fran Deane. Since then, Metro has opened investigations of former County Commissioner Yvonne Atkinson Gates, University Medical Center Chief Executive Lacy Thomas and, in a separate case, managers in the public hospital's facilities department. Deane awaits trial. None of the other targets has been charged.
Metro officials spoke about the new emphasis only reluctantly. Indeed, they downplayed any notion that Metro has assembled a team to go in search of misbehavior by public officials.
That's because the new territory is so politically delicate that many local law enforcement agencies across the country avoid it altogether, leaving it to federal authorities, as had traditionally been the case in Nevada.
In turning that old model on its head, Metro is taking a considerable risk, but also one that could pay dividends. Law enforcement experts describe Metro's increased interest in public corruption as a positive development. Federal authorities have limited resources and can't devote as much time to public corruption as is probably needed.
A large federal case such as the G-Sting probe, which netted four former county commissioners who took bribes from a strip club owner, might send a signal to political criminals. Without continued pressure, those signals could fade over time.
Yet it's difficult for that pressure to come from local, rather than federal authorities. Local agencies must investigate within the same system in which they operate. Local authorities risk being perceived as a tool of politics, rather than its guardian.
"You are talking about enormous discretion about who becomes a target," said Franklin Zimring, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley , who has studied public corruption cases. "It can become a part of the political process."
To get a sense of just how sensitive the issue can be, listen to Metro's Deputy Chief Bob Chinn, and imagine him talking this way about any other type of crime: "I really want to make it clear - we have not chosen to go seek out political corruption."
Chinn, who oversees the department's anti-corruption efforts, emphasized that Metro does not have an official public corruption squad. An influx of information, fueled by the success of the G-sting case, is responsible for the shift in resources, he said.
However, that's not the whole story, according to former Sheriff Bill Young, who was Chinn's boss until stepping down in January.
Several of the current investigations began under the former sheriff. "It's a combination," said Young, who is Station Casinos' vice president of security. "There is a heightened awareness because of issues with the County Commission. I think it is also policy and direction statement. When I was sheriff, there was no tolerance from me. The right thing to do is pursue it and let the chips fall where they may."
Still, it wasn't until near the end of Young's term that he signed off on an investigation of then-Commissioner Atkinson Gates. Police are looking into what happened to the $356,000 in campaign funds that she paid to her 21-year-old son, his future wife and the couple's company during her virtually uncontested reelection in 2004.
"Taking on county commissioners and other elected officials when they control your budget can be tricky," Young said.
The small-town nature of Las Vegas politics complicates matters. Atkinson Gates' husband is District Judge Lee Gates. Her business partner is County Recorder Debbie Conway, whose office handles records related to Atkinson Gates' homebuilding business. The directors of Clark County Credit Union, which has records of loans used to finance Atkinson Gates' projects, include Conway and Eric Jorgenson, a prosecutor in the district attorney's office.
Young says he understands the delicate nature of Metro participation in cases involving public officials, but decided to act anyway. "Instead of discouraging (public corruption cases), which may have been done in the past to some extent at Metro because of political reasons that did not happen under my watch," Young said. He added that his predecessor, former Sheriff Jerry Keller, and successor, Sheriff Doug Gillespie, are of the same mind-set.
The potential for conflict erupted into public view in October when a woman accused then Rep. Jim Gibbons, who was running for governor, of sexually assaulting her. Gibbons and Young knew each other. They shared the same political adviser, Sig Rogich, Young had endorsed Gibbons in the gubernatorial race , and the law firm that represented Gibbons in the case had also represented Young.
The day after the alleged assault, Young called Gibbons to tell him about the investigation before police interviewed him. Young says he did nothing improper, but he acknowledges that "because I endorsed him for governor and because I gave the guy a courtesy call, I was seen as covering for him."
That case vividly demonstrated the trade offs for Metro. Federal authorities had no interest in pursuing the allegations against Gibbons. They have limited resources to devote to local public corruption cases, even if they have stronger investigative powers, such as wiretapping.
Metro's choice in such situations comes down to ignoring the case, or trying to maneuver through a minefield of potential conflicts. Each comes with a price, but one is potentially of enormous value for the community, Zimring said.
"You really don't want to miss the target," Zimring said. "If you don't eat the bear, the bear eats you."
archive
