Grand Jury petition legalization will be timely

A grand jury petition filed Monday in Carson City District Court may be a long way from seeing the inside of a courtroom.

The petition, filed by resident Ron Weddell, is awaiting signature verification by Clerk-Recorder Alan Glover. Glover said with the busy election season and another petition under review, the process could take several weeks.

"The teachers filed a petition today and that takes precedence because there are statutory deadlines" to verify the signatures, he said. "We have four days to count up the names."

Glover was unable to predict when he would be done with Weddell's petition. With early voting this week and primary elections on Tuesday, the best the office can do is assign one person to work on the petitions each day.

Additionally, some legal questions have arisen around Weddell's petition.

Glover said several people have come into his office asking to have their names taken off. "They thought they were lied to," by signature gatherers, he said.

He said he referred those cases to the district court, where the petition was filed. Glover said the Nevada statute that addresses a grand jury petition containing signatures does not provide clear answers for those problems.

Glover sent a letter to the district attorney's office asking if the laws that apply to other types of petitions apply to Weddell's petition. He also asked if all the signatures need to be turned in with the original petition.

He said lawyer Day Williams, who is named as a witness on the petition, turned in two separate batches of signatures. He wants to know if the second batch of signatures can legally be included in the count.

Weddell, through contracted company National Voter Outreach, claims that 5,422 signatures of registered Carson City voters were gathered in support of the petition. Twenty-five percent, or 4,205 signatures, need to be verified for the petition to be considered legal.

Once the signatures are found to be legal, the petition will be forwarded to District Judge Bill Maddox. If Maddox takes no action on the petitions in five days, the matter can be taken up with the Nevada Supreme Court.

The petition is related to an incident were Weddell says several Carson City officials thwarted a 1997 citizen's arrest and prosecution of two men he believes kidnapped his daughter in an attempt to extort drug money.

Named for prosecution are:

- District Attorney Noel Waters, accused of removing a criminal complaint from the justice court.

- Chief Deputy District Attorney Anne Langer, accused of coaching witnesses.

- Justice of the Peace Robey Willis, also accused of removing a criminal complaint.

- Deputy sheriffs Steve Johnson, Ken Sandage, Bill Callahan, Fred Schoenfeldt and Rod King, accused of obstructing prosecution of the case.

- James and John Bustamonte, accused of drug trafficking, kidnapping and assault.

A grand jury, after reviewing evidence in the case, would decide whether to bring criminal indictments against the officials and the brothers.

Waters passed Glover's inquiry to the attorney general's office because of a conflict, said Chief Deputy Attorney General David Sarnowski. The legal issues were sent to a deputy in the Las Vegas office and no response has been drafted.

Weddell is named on this year's election ballot as a candidate for justice of the peace, now held by Robey Willis. He has since dropped out, but it was too late to have his name removed.

Glover said signature verification is tedious because it involves bringing up each name in the county's data bank, checking dates and legalities of voter registration, and matching signatures. If the signatures do not match, further steps need to be taken to contact the voter.