Unease follows email revelation at District Court

Word that the top administrator for Clark County District Court can view the emails of about a dozen employees who report directly to him has created an uneasy feeling at the Regional Justice Center.

Steve Grierson, the court executive officer, acknowledges that he obtained the access from his information technologies manager about two years ago, weeks after he took the reins of the court.

He said he had authority to view the emails of his "direct reports" under Clark County administrative guidelines. Those employees included his assistant administrators, staff attorneys and security chief who regularly dealt with the elected judges and his public information officer who worked with members of the media.

The sweeping move does not sit well with the county officials and many at the courthouse, including Grierson's predecessor, Chuck Short, and Jeff Dunn, the former information technologies manager who brought it all to light last month at a closed-door meeting of Las Vegas justices of the peace. Several of Grierson's former "direct reports" also voiced concerns.

And questions have arisen about whether Grierson properly followed the county guidelines.

"If he were living by our policies, he couldn't unilaterally do that," county spokesman Erik Pappa said. "I'm not aware of a case where anybody has done anything even remotely similar to that at all."

To view an employee's email at the county, a supervisor must submit a detailed, four-page form with justification for the inquiry to the IT department and get the approval of the department head, the human resources director, county counsel or county manager and the chief information officer.

The county has no procedure that allows supervisors the broad authority Grierson got two years ago, Pappa said.

Short, who ran District Court for 15 years until his retirement in 2008, said most court employees understand the email system is part of the public domain.

But he added that he never took Grierson's broad approach to viewing emails and found what Grierson did to be "highly unusual.

"I trusted people who worked for me until there was evidence of the contrary," said Short, now a private court consultant, "Occasionally, we would turn over emails to police or the Nevada Judicial Discipline Commission, but this? I don't understand this. It's almost like big brother snooping on you."

Last month, Dunn stunned some justices of the peace when he revealed at the secret meeting that Grierson had gone to him two years ago seeking the email access.

At the time, District Court and Justice Court shared administrative services, including the same computer, under a joint operating agreement. The courts terminated the agreement last month and are working to get separate servers.

Dunn, who now runs computer services for Justice Court, told the justices of the peace that he viewed Grierson's request as "unprecedented" based upon his experiences in other IT departments, the minutes of the meeting show.

Dunn declined a request for comment.

Grierson defended his effort in an interview.

He said that rather than make a formal request every time he needed to look at an employee's email, he sought the broader access to avoid disclosing the identity of the employee to third parties. That preserved the employee's privacy, he said.

"I just thought it would be a better practice to do it this way," Grierson said. "I thought it was better that nobody knows."

Grierson said he has only viewed the emails of one employee under his supervision since he acquired the access, and he would not identify that person

"You just don't randomly go into an email for no reason," he said. "That's not what this is designed to do. It's designed to get to the bottom of abuses."

Contact Jeff German at jgerman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-8135.