Bail reduced for unlicensed process server

Las Vegas Justice of the Peace Joe Bonaventure Tuesday reduced the bail of Maurice Carroll, an unlicensed process server charged with filing false legal affidavits, and gave him until Friday to surrender to authorities.

At a hearing, Carroll's lawyer, Craig Mueller, asked Bonaventure to allow Carroll, a 41-year-old former police officer, to be released on his own recognizance after he surrendered.

But Chief Deputy District Attorney Mike Staudaher opposed that , and Bonaventure said he felt bail was necessary.

"The impact of this type of conduct is far reaching," Bonaventure said. "There is a potential threat to the public."

Bonaventure reduced Carroll's bail from $105,000 to $35,000, but ordered him to surrender his passport and stay out of the process serving business while the criminal case is pending.

Carroll, a former Las Vegas police officer, faces 35 felony charges, including perjury and obtaining money under false pretenses. His company, On Scene Mediations, is alleged to have submitted false affidavits in justice courts, disrupting the lives and finances of potentially thousands of civil case defendants.

Police allege the company, run out of Carroll's North Las Vegas home, filed affidavits swearing that it served defendants with copies of lawsuits, but in many cases did not. That resulted in default judgments against some defendants who failed to respond to the lawsuits.

Most of the cases are in Las Vegas Justice Court; some also have been found in the North Las Vegas and Henderson justice courts, police said.

Staudaher told Bonaventure that Carroll committed fraud on the courts, and authorities still don't know the "extent of what he did."

Police have estimated that thousands of justice court cases could be affected.

But Mueller said in court that he was worried about a "rush to judgment," and said his client's finances have suffered a "Pearl Harbor-type hit" since news of the criminal charges broke last week.

Mueller also suggested he might challenge Bonaventure's involvement because two of his fellow justices of the peace, Melissa Saragosa and Diana Sullivan, are likely to be witnesses. Police have credited Saragosa and Sullivan with uncovering the alleged scheme.

Mueller described Carroll as a lifelong Las Vegas Valley resident who has no prior criminal convictions and is not a flight risk. In court papers he said Carroll suffers from scoliosis, a curvature of the spine that requires medication and physical therapy three times a week, and also cares for his ailing parents.

Carroll declined comment after the hearing, but Mueller said his client intends to plead not guilty.

The criminal complaint focuses on civil cases in which 17 people were sued by Richland Holdings, a debt collection agency that used On Scene Mediations to serve legal papers. In each case, the defendant was hit with a default judgment, authorities said. In some cases, defendants told police they were working when Carroll's employees claimed to have found them at home.

Several of the defendants said they didn't live at the addresses where they supposedly were served. Others said they were out of state when process servers claimed to have served them.

Staudaher told Bonaventure that Carroll admitted to detectives that he falsified the Richland Holdings affidavits.

Detectives said Carroll told them that he relied on his office manager, Vilisia Coleman, who had indicated that the documents were served while he was out of town. Coleman also has served papers for Carroll, detectives said.

In another case involving Coleman in Justice Court on Tuesday, a lawyer representing Rapid Cash, a payday loan company that also used On Scene Mediations, unexpectedly withdrew a $966 default judgment it had won in October against Las Vegan Michele Butkowski.

Rapid Cash lawyer Caleb Langsdale agreed to set aside the judgment after lawyers for the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada showed up to represent Butkowski. The center represents people who can't afford attorneys in civil cases.

Afterward, Langsdale said he agreed to the withdrawal because Coleman did not appear before Saragosa to be questioned under oath.

Butkowski contended she was not home on Aug. 19, 2009, the day Coleman swore that she had served the woman there.

Christine Miller, a Legal Aid Center lawyer, said her group took Butkowski's case because it wanted to "make sure she got her day in court."

Nevada Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley, who runs the center, said it will represent other people alleged to be victims of On Scene Mediations, as well.

"We are prepared to assist anyone who needs our help," Buckley said. "We have notified Judge Saragosa we'll be attending all of her hearings."

Saragosa plans to review 68 default cases linked to Carroll's company to determine the veracity of process server's claims.

Contact Jeff German at jgerman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-8135 or read more courts coverage at lvlegalnews.com.