Court Cases

In 1979, appellant Robert Ybarra Jr. was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death by a jury. Mr. Ybarra lives with serious mental illness, and the jury that sentenced him to death was not instructed that it needed to find beyond a reasonable doubt that aggravating circumstances outweigh mitigating ones, such as mental illness. Capital defendants who live with serious mental illness, like Mr. Ybarra, are more likely to be sentenced to death. This is because symptoms of their mental illness often impair trial and appellate proceedings, leading to unreliability in sentencing. The ACLU’s Capital Punishment Project and State Supreme Court Initiative, along with the ACLU of Nevada, filed an amicus curiae brief arguing that Article 1, section 6 of the Nevada Constitution—which prohibits cruel or unusual punishment—bars the execution of individuals with serious mental illness. As the brief argues, executing capital defendants with serious mental illness is cruel and lacks penological justification. It further argues that executing capital defendants is unusual given evolving standards of decency and increased protections for individuals with mental illness. Amici urge the Court to recognize that executing capital defendants with serious mental illness is unconstitutional and to categorically exempt this population from execution.

The ACLU of Nevada filed a lawsuit on behalf of Lance Downes-Covington, who was unlawfully stopped and detained by Las Vegas City Marshals. In April 2023, Las Vegas Marshal Sergio Guzman stopped Lance Downes-Covington, citing an alleged traffic code violation. Despite complying with the marshals’ instructions, Downes-Covington was threatened with a handgun and a taser, forcibly handcuffed, and violently slammed to the ground. He was taken to the Las Vegas city jail and then transferred to University Medical Center to be treated for injuries received during the arrest. The charges against Downes-Covington were eventually dismissed. General traffic enforcement falls outside the Las Vegas marshals' jurisdiction, and their actions violated our client’s rights under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and under Article 1 of the Nevada Constitution. The complaint also alleges civil rights violations for excessive force, prolonged detention, and false arrest and imprisonment. Guzman and the Las Vegas marshals were named as plaintiffs in a separate, unaffiliated civil rights case in March. The Nevada Legislature this year did not move forward a proposed bill to adjust the jurisdiction and authority of municipal agencies such as the Las Vegas marshals. We are seeking an order from the court declaring that the Las Vegas City Marshals office misinterpreted the scope of its authority, as well as monetary damages and attorney fees.

The ACLU of Nevada, in collaboration with ACLU and the UNLV Immigration Clinic, filed an emergency lawsuit on behalf of its client Viloria Aviles, a Venezuelan man facing imminent deportation under a Proclamation issued by President Trump. The Proclamation invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a wartime statute historically used only during declared wars with foreign governments, to justify the summary removal of Venezuelan nationals accused of alleged gang ties. Aviles was at risk of being removed without notice or the opportunity to contest his designation. In April 2025, we secured an emergency order from the federal court prohibiting the government from deporting Aviles while his asylum claim proceeds in immigration court. The case is currently stayed until either the U.S. Supreme Court rules on a related Alien Enemies Act case or his asylum proceedings conclude.

In NYT v. Second Judicial District Court, multiple national media organizations, including The New York Times, CNN, NPR, and others, challenged a Nevada district court’s decision to seal nearly all hearings and filings in a high-profile case related to Rupert Murdoch’s trust. The district court’s ruling directly contradicts the Nevada Supreme Court’s interpretation of the First Amendment right to access civil proceedings found in Falconi v. Eighth Judicial District Court. The ACLU of Nevada, in partnership with Holland and Hart, filed an amicus brief urging the Nevada Supreme Court to reverse the lower court’s decision and affirm the public’s constitutional right to access court proceedings.

The ACLU of Nevada and Nevada Attorneys for Criminal Justice filed an amicus brief in Song Spencer & James Spencer v. City of Henderson, urging the Nevada Supreme Court to allow people to recover attorney’s fees as special damages in successful challenges in civil asset forfeiture cases when the government wrongfully seizes their property. Our amicus brief argues that Nevada law already allows recovery of attorney’s fees in cases when warranted, even when there is no law directly on point, and that principle should apply here, when someone is forced to sue the government to get their own property back. This case is a challenge to the constitutionality of civil forfeiture laws.

ACLU of Nevada, alongside the Campaign Legal Center (CLC), filed an amicus brief asking the court to dismiss a case challenging Nevada's efforts to maintain its voter rolls. The case, Republican National Committee v. Aguilar, was filed against Nevada Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar by the Republican National Committee, the Nevada Republican Party, and a Nevada voter, claiming the state must be violating its obligations under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) because certain misleading metrics show more registered voters than eligible voters in some counties. The amicus brief explains that the lawsuit is based on deeply flawed and misleading metrics that have been pieced together by unreliable and inaccurate measures of voter registration rates and that have been repeatedly rebuked by federal courts. The voter registration numbers they rely on are taken from a single recent snapshot of the state's voter roll, but use an outdated census of the citizen voting age population for comparison. Unfortunately, this lawsuit is just one of several cases recently filed across the country with claims under the NVRA and is part of a years-long pattern to bully states into administering voter roll purges beyond what the law requires. Without proper guardrails, when states rush to purge voters, eligible voters, in many cases, are kicked off the rolls and disenfranchised. These lawsuits are based on false information and only erodes the public's trust and integrity in our elections.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada filed this case on behalf of eleven individuals whose constitutional rights were violated by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and the Rio Hotel. On August 19, 2018, our plaintiffs were having a birthday celebration at the Rio Hotel. Each of the 34 guests in attendance that evening is Black. LVMPD, aided by Rio staff, stormed in with no warrant and no reason to believe that any crime was being committed. Despite having no reasonable suspicion, LVMPD officers handcuffed and searched every single guest in attendance. Each guest was made to sit in the hallway of the Rio handcuffed with no access to food, water, or restroom facilities for up to 6 hours. LVMPD alleged that the birthday party was a “gang party,” but no guest was arrested for any criminal gang activity. We’re suing to end LVMPD’s racially discriminatory practice of indiscriminately and unlawfully detaining and searching individuals in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments.