Say Anything Blog

Judge green-lights suit against Gibbons

Chief U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt is refusing to toss out Chrissy Mazzeo’s civil rights lawsuit.
In a 27-page decision this week, Hunt dismissed some of Mazzeo’s claims, but allowed her to move forward with the suit. The former cocktail waitress alleges that several people conspired with Jim Gibbons on a cover-up after his encounter with Mazzeo outside a Las Vegas restaurant less than a month before his gubernatorial election.

“The big thing is we’re still in federal court, where the case belongs,” said Robert Kossack, her attorney. “From my reading of the decision, we’re going to be able to pursue all of the discovery and all of the damages she suffered.”

Attorneys for Gibbons and the other defendants had asked Hunt to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing that it failed to back up the allegations with any facts.

But Hunt wasn’t ready to come to that conclusion.

He ruled that Young and Metro Police, another defendant in the suit, do not have “qualified immunity” for their actions.

“A reasonable officer would know that he was violating Mazzeo’s constitutional rights by using his investigation to cover up a crime,” Hunt wrote.