Internal school district police investigator facing more scrutiny after officer’s acquittal

The acquittal of a Clark County School District police officer on excessive force charges has focused new attention on the conduct of the embattled internal investigator who helped the FBI put together the case.

U.S. District Judge Jennifer Dorsey found the police officer, James Lescinsky, not guilty of all five felony counts on Friday. He was accused of assaulting a student and a staffer during a May 2015 confrontation at a North Las Vegas disciplinary school and then covering up his actions.

The role of the internal investigator, Christopher Klemp, in the federal case is now drawing more scrutiny.

“Normally, federal prosecutors would not take a case this bad to trial,” said Adam Levine, the lawyer for the Police Officers Association of the Clark County School District. “This leads the union to believe that Det. Klemp may have provided incomplete or inaccurate information to the FBI in order to induce them to pursue a case that otherwise would not have warranted any attention.”

An FBI spokeswoman could not be reached for comment Monday.

Reno lawyer Jack Campbell, who won Lescinsky’s acquittal, said Monday that he received confidential internal affairs documents from federal prosecutors before the trial that appeared to have been obtained without a subpoena or warrant.

“Clearly, this type of information should not be out of the possession of the school district without a court order,” Campbell said.

How the government obtained the documents did not come up during the trial because prosecutors did not present them as evidence, Campbell said.

But Campbell said he plans to talk to school district officials about the apparent unauthorized release of the documents.

In court papers before the trial, Campbell argued that Klemp improperly launched an internal investigation of Lescinsky after school police higher-ups found that Lescinsky had followed proper excessive force procedures.

Klemp has also been accused of misconduct in another excessive force case he put together that fell apart.

Levine and several current and former school police officers have alleged that Klemp was dishonest and suppressed evidence favorable to Officer Jason Martin during arbitration proceedings involving a written reprimand.

The arbitrator eventually tossed out Martin’s reprimand.

School district officials have said that allegations of wrongdoing by Klemp in the Martin case were not substantiated, but Levine and the officers provided documentation of their claims to District Attorney Steve Wolfson.

A June 19 Las Vegas Review-Journal story brought to light allegations that Klemp threatened witnesses and suppressed evidence in still another internal investigation against a school district whistleblower.

That whistleblower, former school police Lt. Dan Burgess, said Monday he was not surprised by Lescinsky’s acquittal because “any investigation touched by Klemp would be flawed and lack any sort of investigatory integrity.”

Burgess described Lescinsky under his former command at the police department as a “great officer.”

Klemp, who has been temporarily reassigned, has refused to discuss the misconduct allegations against him with the Review-Journal. He could not be reached for comment Monday.

Capt. Ken Young, a spokesman for the school district police department, said an internal investigation of Klemp is ongoing, but he declined further comment.

Review-Journal writer Neal Morton contributed to this report. Contact Jeff German at jgerman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-8135. Follow @JGermanRJ on Twitter.