Report questions deputy county manager’s actions in son’s discipline
Former Deputy Clark County Manager Jeff Wells repeatedly floated the idea of his son moving to the district attorney’s criminal division — a department whose budget he oversaw — in lieu of termination from the public defender’s office for misconduct, a heavily redacted investigative report shows.
The report redacts the accusation against Wells’ son, Thomas, who was hired by the public defender’s office when Jeff Wells oversaw it. But the report also said Jeff Wells told people his son’s punishment was too severe compared with other employees’ discipline for similar behavior.
“Jeff discussed two other situations (one involved a department of aviation employee and another involving a DFS employee) involving touching that resulted in written warnings,” the report by outside law firm Littler Mendelson P.C. said.
DFS is a reference to the county’s Department of Family Services.
State law and county ordinances prohibit a top government official from getting government jobs for relatives. The report noted that Jeff Wells talked with Lisa Logsdon, county counsel and lead of the district attorney’s civil division, but he did not have any communication with the criminal division.
County Manager Kevin Schiller said in an interview Thursday that the county did not look at Jeff Wells’ actions in terms of the state law.
“I hadn’t considered that until you brought it up,” he told a reporter.
Jeff Wells did not respond to requests for a phone interview but in an email said he never tried to get his son a job.
“I did not speak with the DA or any person in the DA’s criminal unit about a job for my son either before or since my conversation with the County Counsel,” he wrote. “Tom was disciplined on a Thursday and he was called by a DA in the criminal division the next day and asked if he now would take a transfer.”
The district attorney’s office did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Wells previously told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that he only contacted one employee about his son’s discipline and did not try to intervene.
“I asked the County Attorney if I could speak with her about the case, she agreed and we had a short conversation in her office,” Jeff Wells wrote in an email to the Review-Journal for a March story. “The next day she called me for a (one) minute conversation to follow-up on an issue she was checking on.”
But the report shows him talking to both Logsdon and Drew Christensen, director of the office of appointed counsel and office of diversity, who then reported directly to Jeff Wells.
The county hired an outside firm to investigate Thomas Wells’ actions, so Christensen told Jeff Wells and investigators he did not know anything about it, the report said. Both Logsdon and Christensen advised Jeff Wells to let his son’s attorney handle the case, but he apparently persisted in trying to keep Thomas Wells employed with the county, the report said.
Thomas Wells’ attorney, Adam Levine, said the termination is going to arbitration but that he could not comment because he had not seen the allegations.
“As for Tom’s case, the county hasn’t overturned the investigative report,” he said. “They are dragging their heels.”
Jeff Wells suspension
Jeff Wells was suspended Jan. 19, after Schiller found out about his actions in his son’s case. He retired in April, getting $250,000 in salary, sick and vacation leave, and other payouts while on administrative leave and after leaving the county.
Schiller was interviewed for the investigation and expressed concerns about Jeff Wells’ actions.
“Kevin indicated that Jeff trying to speak to Lisa was exactly what he was worried would happen (i.e. that Jeff would try to influence the outcome of what happened to his son),” the report said.
Investigators questioned whether Jeff Wells used confidential county information, like other similar discipline, to try to help his son.
“Kevin has concerns about Jeff misusing confidential information for the benefit of his son, including, if Jeff is reinstated that additional County information Jeff was exposed to could be misused for that purpose (for example, the outcome of other OOD investigations),” attorneys wrote.
OOD is a reference to the office of diversity.
Schiller said he initiated the investigation despite Jeff Wells’ pending retirement because the retirement was only in a discussion phase and there had to be due process for Jeff Wells in case there was litigation.
“I would reference evaluating the cost of litigation” compared with the cost of the report, he said in the interview.
Taxpayers have spent about $9,000 so far on the law firm to produce the report and an additional $27,000 to investigate Thomas Wells’ alleged misconduct, records show.
Schiller declined to say what would have happened to Jeff Wells if he had not retired, saying that the public could “infer” that from the report.
When investigators asked Jeff Wells about whether his position gave him undue influence in his son’s discipline, “Jeff skirted the question and indicated that Tom was devastated and Jeff was visiting him every day and that Jeff naively hoped he could help him by getting a prompt resolution of the discipline,” the report said.
Jeff Wells told investigators that he did not go directly to Schiller because Schiller might rule on the report about his son, and he did not want to influence him.
“In hindsight, he understands that he might have been incorrect to speak with Lisa,” attorneys wrote.
In an email to the Review-Journal on Thursday, Jeff Wells wrote: “Because the County attorney agreed to speak with me about the case it was my understanding that it was a permissible conversation.”
Jeff Wells has been the focus of several Review-Journal investigations that questioned his failure to properly oversee departments under his purview. Newspaper investigations found severe problems at the offices of the Clark County coroner, public defender, public administrator’s office and Henderson constable that were not quickly addressed.
Public Administrator Robert Telles faces murder charges in the slaying of Review-Journal investigative reporter Jeff German, who wrote about problems in that office. The employees complained to top staff, but Jeff Wells only put in a mediator after the stories ran.
Schiller said Thursday that he is instituting various reforms to make sure similar situations do not happen, including a tip line reviewed by independent parties, a no-tolerance process if there is retaliation after a complaint, and training on the ethics policies for staff.
Records requests delayed
The Review-Journal and its chief legal officer, Ben Lipman, repeatedly requested the personnel records and investigations of Jeff and Thomas Wells, citing court rulings and a statute to show that the records are public.
Cooper, in an email releasing the report Wednesday evening, wrote that the county still believes personnel records are private but that top managers and department heads “are held to a higher level of accountability.”
Lipman disputed the county’s interpretation.
“Under the Nevada Public Records Act, there is no categorical exemption that allows governments to keep personnel records of public employees secret from the public they are supposed to serve,” he said. “All of us are entitled to know about allegations of wrongdoing by those public employees.”
Review-Journal Executive Editor Glenn Cook said releasing the report is a good first step, but the county needs to be more transparent.
“There is no legal basis for completely withholding such records for any government employee, management or otherwise,” he said Thursday. “We’re glad the county provided this record, although we believe there were too many redactions.”
Clark County Commission Chairman Jim Gibson said in May that the county needs to be more transparent with public records and information about staff misconduct.
Schiller promised to speed up the records process but said the issue of personnel records probably would be settled by litigation, as the county does not agree with the newspaper’s interpretation.
The released report, which is dated May 3, appears to redact most of the information about Thomas Wells’ misconduct allegations and completely redacts the conclusion, calling it “Attorney-Client Privilege Analysis.”
Schiller said he is satisfied that the attorneys got to the bottom of what happened in the case.
“Based on the report, it substantiates the concerns I had, and it does substantiate the initial allegations that came to me,” he said.
Contact Arthur Kane at akane@reviewjournal.com and follow @ArthurMKane on Twitter. Kane is editor of the Review-Journal’s investigative team, focusing on reporting that holds leaders and agencies accountable and exposes wrongdoing.
