Las Vegas attorney Patricia Lee was appointed to the Nevada Supreme Court Monday by Gov. Steve Sisolak, filling the seat vacated in September by Justice Abbi Silver.

Nevada Supreme Court Justice Abbi Silver is resigning “due to unforeseen circumstances,” and to spend more time with her family, she said in a letter to Gov. Steve Sisolak. 

The Nevada Supreme Court ruled on three major election cases Tuesday that reshape the November ballot, allowing an initiative proposing open primaries and ranked-choice voting to proceed while voiding another measure proposing a voucher-style education program.

The Nevada Supreme Court issued a ruling in a major water case, an opinion that the court’s majority recognized “will significantly affect water management in Nevada.”

The state’s high court ruled Thursday that Nevada health officials do not have to release diabetes manufacturer records because of a federal trade secret law.

So far, the PAC has started a TV advertising campaign aimed at boosting the candidacy of state Supreme Court candidate Douglas Herndon, an Eighth Judicial District Court judge running against Democratic Assemblyman and attorney Ozzie Fumo for the open seat on the seven-member court. Herndon’s political affiliation is described as “Republican” by the Reno Gazette-Journal.

The Nevada Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the state cannot reshuffle existing water rights to prevent environmental damage, despite recognizing a legal principle that requires the government to preserve natural resources for future generations.

In a unanimous order issued in late November, the seven-member court ruled in favor of a Reno woman who appealed a lower court’s decision to not credit her more than three months of time served during sentencing, thus keeping in place a 23-year-old precedent to credit inmates for time served prior to sentencing.

The order issued Thursday by the Nevada Supreme Court reverses a Clark County District Court’s decision and ends the possibility that Tarkanian, the son of legendary UNLV basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, could again win damages from a political opponent over ads accusing him of setting up “13 fake charities that preyed on vulnerable seniors.”

According to the Nevada Judiciary’s 2019 annual report, which was released Thursday, the state’s two highest courts had 2,042 appealed cases pending at the end of the 2019 fiscal year — a slight decrease from last year’s record-high backlog of 2,201 pending cases.

Nine attorneys, including a handful of judges, have submitted applications to replace outgoing Justice Abbi Silver on the three-member state Court of Appeals.