Court Cases

A Clark County court is banning people from the “Resort Corridor,” an expansive geographical area defined by Clark County ordinances, as a condition of probation without explanation or analysis for why this condition was imposed. The probation condition infringes upon the First Amendment right to access a traditional public forum and the right to intrastate travel, protected in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Probation conditions that restrict fundamental rights activities are only justified if they are directly tied to a permissible objective for probation, and the restriction is no greater than reasonably necessary to meet that objective. In imposing this probation condition, a Clark County court failed to satisfy both obligations. Another concern raised in the amicus brief is that the streets and roadways throughout the "Resort Corridor" are public sidewalks and roadways that have historically been used for public assembly and debate. UPDATE: On December 9, 2025, the Court dismissed the case for procedural reasons and said it’s moot—meaning there’s nothing left to resolve. The court found that our client lacked standing to challenge the law itself because he had never been arrested, charged, or convicted under that specific ordinance. And since he's already done with probation, there’s no longer an active issue for the court to decide.

Nevada's "mailbox deadline" allows mail ballots received up to four business days after Election Day to be counted to account for the practical shortcomings of USPS policies and practices. For example, postmarks are not required on all mailings and are designed to prevent reuse of postage, and mail ballot postmarks may become smudged or illegible. To prevent arbitrary disenfranchisement of voters, mail ballots received by 5 p.m. on the third day after election day that are not clearly postmarked by Election Day are still counted. The Republican National Committee (RNC) claims that this deadline violates federal law because there is only one specific day recognized by federal law as the national election day. We filed an amicus brief asking the court to dismiss the case as Nevada's "mailbox deadline" is a valid exercise of the state's delegated authority over federal elections by the Electoral Count Reform Act, which does not prohibit state laws that allow for timely cast ballots to be received and counted in the days following the election. Furthermore, there are also no federal laws prohibiting or conflicting with Nevada's Mailbox Deadline Laws. On July 17, 2024, U.S. District Judge Miranda Du dismissed the plaintiffs’ complaint, finding that they lacked standing to sue. The court noted that existing Nevada law governed which ballots were counted in the 2024 election. UPDATE: The plaintiffs have appealed the July ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, where the case is still pending. States United is providing pro bono co-counsel for Secretary Aguilar.

In this joint filing by the ACLU of Nevada and Nevada Attorneys for Criminal Justice, we argue that the state can't make it harder for people working toward rehabilitation to reenter society by imposing excessive fines and fees if they are already meeting the requirements of their parole. The Nevada Division of Parole and Probation recommends early discharge from parole if a supervised person meets all the conditions in state law. One condition requires the person to be current with the supervision fees required by probation or parole. A Clark County Court found that the subject of this case, Valentine, fulfilled this condition and had proven he experienced economic hardship and was eligible for relief. On appeal, the state claims that Valentine was ineligible for early discharge because he had not paid off the entire balance of supervision fees. No one disputes that Valentine paid his fees on time, but the parole agency diverted those payments to cover his outstanding restitution balance instead. In the amicus brief, we pointed out that: State law only requires a person to be current with supervision fee payments, not that they are paid them off in full. The Division of Parole and Probation has no legal basis to transfer a person's supervision fees to restitution. There was no court order and no statute authorizing the agency to do it. UPDATE: On March 28, 2024, the Court dismissed the case on procedural grounds.

On Oct. 4, 2022, the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada filed a lawsuit against Nye County to prevent the county from moving forward with its proposed unlawful hand-counting scheme during this year’s elections. We are representing Nye County voters who risk having their freedom to vote suppressed by the county’s proposed procedures for this year’s election. The case is ACLU of Nevada v. Nye County, Case No. CV22-0503. We are asking the Fifth Judicial District court to prohibit the county from publicly announcing the selected candidates on each ballot prior to the close of polls on Election Day, from limiting the use of ADA touch screens to individuals with so-called “special needs,” from allowing election workers to ask about a voter’s disability or turn away otherwise eligible voters based on arbitrary decision making, and from using “stringent signature verifications” that violate state law. UPDATE: On November 15, 2022, the Supreme Court of Nevada denied to issue a ruling to stop Nye County from conducting a hand-count of ballots received in the 2022 midterm election.

On May 11, 2021, the ACLU of Nevada and the Policing and Protest Clinic at the UNLV Boyd School of Law filed an amicus brief in Cates v. Stroud, a case on petition for review before the United States Supreme Court. The case calls into question the qualified immunity doctrine and arises from an incident in which a Las Vegas woman was subjected to a humiliating strip search during a visit to Nevada’s High Desert State Prison in violation of her constitutional rights. The brief urges the Supreme Court to grant the petition and review the case. For Nevada, qualified immunity creates a serious problem: If there are no state-level mechanisms for addressing civil rights abuses, and the federal courts won’t do it, how does our community protect their constitutional rights?

The American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada Foundation filed this case to secure the release of two men who are being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Henderson Detention Center. Our plaintiffs are medically vulnerable and at risk of severe illness or even death because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The U.S. Constitution requires that detention facilities ensure the health and safety of the people in their care, but these facilities are unable to implement social distancing and other medical best practices to prevent exposure. The people housed at the Henderson Detention Center have already been exposed to COVID-19. Jail officials confirmed on March 28 that 13 individuals held in ICE detention there have been isolated in individual cells after they were transported by an ICE agent who later began to show symptoms of COVID-19. The only remedy to this constitutional issue is to release our plaintiffs. UPDATE: On April 2, 2020, the court dismissed the case.