Journalist Moves For Dismissal In MPD Chief Lawsuit

By VERNON ROBISON

The Progress

A prominent local journalist, named in a lawsuit filed by Mesquite Police Chief MaQuade Chesley, has filed a motion to dismiss all claims made against her in the suit.

On Friday, Dec. 17, Mesquite journalist Barbara Ellestad’s attorney Marc Randazza filed a motion to dismiss, citing a Nevada law that prevents Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPP).

This Anti-SLAPP law, as it is called, is meant to thwart lawsuits that would censor, intimidate and silence critics by needlessly burdening them with the high cost of legal defense. Ellestad’s motion claims that this is exactly what Chesley’s lawsuit has done to her.

“I believe that my inclusion in this mess was purely a revenge factor,” said Ellestad in an interview with The Progress on Saturday morning. “I have lost my business. I’ve lost my income. I’ve lost my voice in the community. And I now have close to $10,000 in legal bills – and it is going up every day.”

The lawsuit
Chesley’s lawsuit, filed with the United States District Court of Nevada on Oct. 21, is aimed against three parties: the City of Mesquite, former City Manager Aaron Baker, and Ellestad who was owner/editor of the Mesquite Citizen Journal (MCJ), an online local news site no longer in operation.

The complaint lists allegations, against all three parties, of discrimination based on religion and sex, retaliation due to religion and sex, deprivation of Constitutional rights, defamation, and infliction of emotional distress.

The lawsuit claims that, just after he became Police Chief in 2019, Chesley began to fall victim to a “systematic and continuous onslaught of personal attacks” by high ranking City officials.

According to the complaint, it began with false information and rumors allegedly being spread by the City Attorney at the time, Bob Sweetin. Sweetin was not named in the lawsuit.

These rumors reportedly alleged that Chesley had been involved in a number of sexual offenses with underage females in the community, according to the complaint. The alleged campaign of rumors had sullied the opinion of then-City Manager Aaron Baker against Chesley, the lawsuit claimed.

The complaint also chronicled events surrounding an article published by Ellestad in the MCJ on April 27, 2021. This article, which is cited in its entirety in the complaint document, reported that Chesley was, at the time, the subject of an investigation by the Nevada State Attorney General’s office. It also stated that multiple unnamed sources had confirmed being interviewed by investigators from the Attorney General’s office about alleged inappropriate misconduct by Chesley.

The complaint related that Chesley had received an email from Baker earlier in the day of April 27, stating that he had received a call from Ellestad just the day before informing him that an article was about to be published.

Baker’s email claimed that, several weeks before, a person had come forward alleging “first-hand knowledge” of the supposed incidents involving Chesley. This person had reportedly been referred by Baker over to the State Attorney General’s office to make a statement.

Of course, Chesley denied the truth of any of these allegations. And indeed, the Attorney General investigation came back with a letter finding no evidence of any criminal violation by Chesley. This letter was also cited in full as part of Chesley’s initial filing.

The complaint then concludes that Ellestad “knowingly published false and clearly injurious statements in her publication.”

The motion to dismiss
But Ellestad’s motion calls all of this into question, as well as Ellestad’s involvement in the case at all.
“There is no justification for including (Ellestad), a reporter, in this lawsuit,” the motion asserts. “(She) accurately reported that (the) Plaintiff was being investigated by the Nevada District Attorney’s office for alleged sexual misconduct involving female minors. His reasoning for suing (her) for truthfully reporting on this investigation is to punish her for informing Mesquite citizens about actual allegations of sexual misconduct by their chief of police. This suit is meritless…”

Ellestad’s motion goes on to establish that the Nevada’s Anti-SLAPP statute protects any communication made on a matter of public interest in an open public forum “which is truthful or is made without knowledge of its falsehood.”

In her April 27 article, Ellestad was “reporting on the existence and details of an official investigation by the (Attorney General) into the Plaintiff,” the motion states. “The Mesquite City Manager and the (Attorney General’s) office both confirmed the existence of this investigation.”

The investigation was related to rumors of sexual misconduct that, Chesley’s complaint acknowledges, had been circulating for two years prior to the publication of the article, the motion adds.
All of this meets the test of being an item of public interest, the motion claims.

“The sexual misconduct of public officials, particularly those tasked with maintaining public safety like a chief of police, is an issue of public interest,” the motion states. “Ms. Ellestad’s statements would thus be protected. (under Anti-SLAPP statute)…”

According to the motion, the article also meets the second standard set forth in the statute. It was published on the MCJ site, a generally recognized local news source. Thus Ellestad’s statements in the article were made in a public forum which satisfies the statute, the motion said.

Finally, to be protected under Anti-SLAPP, Ellestad’s statements would have to be “truthful or…made without knowledge of their falsehood.”

The motion asserts that the article met this test as well. In fact, the motion points out that Chesley’s original complaint actually supports this argument. The complaint cites Ellestad saying that she had received her information for the article directly from the City Manager and that she had believed his statements to be true at the time.

“(Ellestad) relied on sources she found to be trustworthy in publishing the article and did not believe any of the statements in the article to be false when she published it,” the motion states.

Because of all of this, the motion concludes that the April 27 article should be protected under the Anti-SLAPP statute and that the court should dismiss all claims against Ellestad.

The motion also requests that Ellestad be awarded court costs and attorney fees, in accordance with the Anti-SLAPP law. Finally, it requests that the court award Ellestad an additional $10,000, a customary sum specified in the Nevada Revised Statutes, which may be awarded in such situations.

Failed settlement and aftermath
In Saturday’s interview, Ellestad revealed that she had received a settlement offer from Chesley’s attorney on Wednesday of last week.
“He said that he would dismiss me from the lawsuit if I would take down the article off of the website,” Ellestad said.

After consulting with her attorney, Ellestad responded that she was willing to take down the article. But in return she asked for assurances that she not be brought in as a witness in the remaining lawsuit with the city.
“I asked for that provision to prevent me from incurring any more legal fees,” Ellestad said.

Ellestad pointed out that all of her notes, sources and documents pertaining to her occupation as a journalist are protected from legal discovery under the Nevada Media Shield Law. But she had learned from past litigation that this doesn’t preclude subpoenas being issued for those documents anyway.

“Then you have to go to court to get those kinds of subpoenas quashed,” she said. “That is what I did (in a separate case) back in 2013 and it cost me $27,000 to do it. So the reason I made that request that they not make me part of the discovery is simply because I didn’t want to have to go through all that again.”

According to Ellestad, the counter-offer expired on Thursday night without a response. The following day, her attorney filed the Anti-SLAPP motion.

“Chesley didn’t even respond to what I think was a very reasonable offer,” Ellestad said. “I gave him what he wanted the most: for the article to be taken off the website. All I wanted was for him to grant me the one thing I wanted most, and he didn’t do that.”

Finally, Ellestad wanted to address implications made in some of the court documents, and in the community, that allege that she somehow regrets ever writing the article.
“It was the right thing to do,” she insists. “The public had the right to know. And it was my job as a journalist.”

“If I have any regrets, it is not in context to Chesley,” Ellestad added. “My regret is in the aftermath that the community has gone through. This whole incident was why pressure was put on Aaron Baker to resign and I think that was the biggest tragedy of all. He was forced to resign because he was doing the right thing. He received complaints and he referred them to the right agency like he was supposed to do. And then he got killed for it.”