LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Nevada taxpayers are going to be on the hook for nearly $1 million after the state Board of Examiners agreed to settle three separate lawsuits filed by inmates.
On Tuesday, the board, which consists of Gov. Joe Lombardo, Attorney General Aaron Ford, and Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar, approved the following:
- $200,000 for Delbert Greene
- $597,000 for Steven Scott
- $200,000 for Gregory Wolf
Here's a quick breakdown of what those lawsuits were about.
Delbert Greene
Nevada Department of Corrections records show Greene was originally given jail time on robbery and burglary charges. He was then charged with being a "habitual criminal."
According to his original complaint, Greene said he served one sentence twice, which is a violation of the Fifth Amendment's double jeopardy clause. He states he was held in prison for nearly three years after he was supposed to be released.
Attorneys for the NDOC have denied those claims.
Steven Scott
Scott's original complaint states that he suffered persistent constipation and hemorrhoids, which got progressively worse in 2019. It led to significant bleeding, and, according to records reviewed by Channel 13, an NDOC physician said the condition was "profoundly serious" and a colonoscopy should be ordered. That was on Jan. 20, 2020.
The complaint states that over a month went by, and the colonoscopy was canceled and replaced by stool sampling tests.
Scott's condition continued to get worse. In a doctor's note from Sept. 5, 2020, a prison medical staff member noted "Inmate was crying during assessment," and Scott was "barely able to sit during assessment."
On Sept. 17, 2020, Scott was out on a work-related firefighting training assignment when he collapsed. He was transported to Summerlin Hospital for further evaluation.
During that evaluation, doctors found a mass. After further testing, they diagnosed Scott with stage 3 colon cancer.
On Jan. 16, 2021, Scott had surgery, and he returned to prison "with a portion of his intestines in a plastic bag taped to his abdomen and now wearing a colostomy bag." Following surgery, Scott also underwent 12 cycles of chemotherapy treatments for rectal cancer.
Scott's complaint states that doctors told him he could have avoided the mass continuing to grow, and he could have been treated with oral medication rather than surgery, if he had been given proper medical treatment.
In December 2021, Scott was released from the NDOC. In the years since, he underwent more radiation treatment, a partial bowel resection, and a second surgery where his intestines were put back inside his body.
He states NDOC's neglect puts him at risk for future complications and early death.
Attorneys for the NDOC denied Scott's claims that any decisions regarding his treatment were medically unsound.
Gregory Wolf
Wolf is in his 70s, and his complaint states he has been diagnosed with severe cataracts since 2007.
During his incarceration, the complaint states Wolf continuously asked NDOC medical staff for surgery to correct the issue. However, his complaint states that those requests were repeatedly denied, and medical care was delayed.
"He has been seeking attention for this problem for over two years with no results," his sister Alyn wrote in September 2020, according to court records.
"From what I can tell, Greg has been following all the proper procedures required by the prison...He can not see where he is walking and is bumping into things and other inmates. He is afraid of falling and also afraid that fights might develop with other inmates that he accidentally bumps into."
The complaint states that when Wolf finally did have cataract surgery on his left eye, the doctor treating him said, "it was the worst case he had ever treated, which was due to the length of time it took to attend to his situation."
Wolf now has limited vision in his left eye and is blind in his right eye.
Attorneys for the NDOC have denied those allegations.
Continuing coverage
You may remember two other high-profile cases last year. The State of Nevada paid nearly $1 million to settle medical neglect lawsuits filed by inmate Charles Morris. His back issues progressed to the point where he has been paralyzed since 2022.
In September, the family of Christian Walker received $4.6 million from the State of Nevada — the largest wrongful death settlement in state history.
Walker's family alleged that correctional officers beat Walker and blocked nurses from providing emergency care. The Clark County Coroner's Office ruled his death natural due to hypertensive cardiovascular disease.
WATCH: Record settlement reached, but Alyssa Bethencourt shows you how the case is far from over
How much are these lawsuits costing taxpayers?
On July 14, 2025, I filed a public records request with the Attorney General's office asking for a list of the settled and pending lawsuits against the Nevada Department of Corrections for the past three years.
On Aug. 21, I received an update from the Attorney General's Office stating that they anticipate responding to the request by Nov. 21.
On Nov. 20, I received another email from the Attorney General's Office stating they would not be able to meet the Nov. 21 date and now anticipate responding to my request by Jan. 23, 2026, more than six months after my initial request.
What's being done to address the problem?
Over the past year, NDOC officials have repeatedly told state officials they are having issues finding enough people to work in the prison system.
In April, NDOC director James Dzurenda told lawmakers the prison system is facing a $53 million shortfall, mainly due to the amount of overtime current officers were accruing.
"When I first came to the agency, we were at a 36% vacancy rate statewide. When I look at that and tell agencies from other states, they're shocked we were able to do [operations] without any more lives getting taken because it is extremely dangerous," Dzurenda told committee members. "Our vacancies have decreased. We are at 16% with corrections officers, uniformed employees. We have a current academy class going on right now. We have 80 in our academy. After they graduate, and that's if we lose no employees to termination, retirement, or resigning, we'll be at 11% after they graduate."
On Tuesday, the Board of Examiners approved a critical labor shortage designation for senior physician and correctional officer positions at Ely State Prison and Lovelock Correctional Center.
"We have hired a company for the senior physician refills. They do extensive hiring across the country for traveling physicians, and they have none. We have no physicians able to work up there or wanting to work up at Lovelock or Ely," Dzurenda told the board. "We do have interest from locals that are retired from the state that are interested in possibly working as a critical rehire for the physician positions."
WATCH: Board of Examiners discusses inmate settlements, prison staffing issues
According to Dzurenda, those two facilities have physician assistants but no medical doctor who covers either facility.
"You look at the previous tort reform or the [lawsuit] awards, usually it is specific to medical care," Lombardo said. "I would request that you become more proactive in attempting to fill that position. I don't know if we have the ability to do a private contract with the local medical facilities there for a person to come in part-time or provide oversight, whatever the mechanism is, I think we need to be a little more proactive."
Dzurenda said prison physician positions generally pay less than hospital positions, and that's another thing that needs to be addressed.
"Psychiatry is another area where we have multiple lawsuits, and the comparable salaries are just not compatible to what they're paying out in the community," Dzurenda said.
When Ford asked what kind of pay raises would be needed, Dzurenda said he would look into the matter and provide more specifics.
The critical labor designation for Ely and Lovelock will remain in place through the end of June. This is the second time a critical labor designation was added to NDOC staffing. You may remember back in 2025, the entire prison system was struggling to fill correctional officer jobs, which Dzurenda said the agency has made progress on.
"Vacancy in the south part of the state is less than 5%. In the north, which would be the Carson City area, we're at 18%, which is still very good, but numbers are increasing because of potentials not interested in coming over to corrections at Ely and Lovelock," Dzurenda explained.
Staffing issues at Ely are what led to a prison swap with High Desert State Prison in September 2024.
WATCH: High Desert prison swap details released and why some are concerned
Some have claimed that the prison swap led to unsafe conditions within the prison system overall.
In June, Dzurenda stated NDOC staff were not ready for the swap.
"What happened is when we moved the staff, the offenders, and the staffing numbers down to High Desert from Ely, the staff who were at the facility were not aware of what procedures they needed to really do, even though they were trained in it," Dzurenda said. "We revamped all the training for the correctional officers at High Desert, and we're already seeing a reduction in incidents."
We also asked Gov. Joe Lombardo whether or not the swap was done too quickly and if it had contributed to more prison violence.
"One doesn't have anything to do with the other," Lombardo said, telling Channel 13 the swap was done to address a staffing issue at Ely State Prison. "We moved those inmates from Ely into High Desert here in Southern Nevada because we were able to apportion or provide the appropriate amount of staffing for that level of risk."
In 2025, 76 inmates died in NDOC custody, the highest number since the pandemic.
WATCH: Five inmate deaths in less than a month raise questions about prison safety
In June 2025, the NDOC was audited by Texas-based Corrections Consulting Services. They looked at staffing levels across the prison system.
According to the audit, the NDOC has the lowest number of full-time equivalent employees of any state with a comparable prison system.
"This critical staffing shortage across the agency is gravely damaging to the agency and causes extensive and unnecessary financial burdens to the State of Nevada and its taxpayers," the audit reads in part. "It is imperative the Nevada State Legislation considers the recommendations provided in this report to bring the Nevada Department of Corrections up to the industry's best practices and reduce costs for the State of Nevada and its taxpayers."
Some of those recommendations include:
- Adding 791 positions for two consecutive two-year budget cycles
- Audit classification, caseworkers, grievance process, offender disciplinary actions, and mailroom operations
- Add program officers to function as "grievance coordinators" to collect, organize, track, and process grievances
Due to the staffing shortages, the audit also found that inmate activities and privileges were being restricted, including:
- Showers
- Phone usage
- Kiosk orders
- Microwave to cook
- Recreational and social games at community tables
- Ability to attend class in the Education Room
- Access to the Library and Law Library
- Using exercise yards
- Re-Entry Program initiatives
- Truck Driving Accreditation
- Vocational programming
- Visitors during the week
"It is an accepted principle within the corrections community that idleness creates behavioral problems and in turn creates safety problems for both the staff and offenders," the audit states. "The lack of adequate staffing to ensure offender activities are provided creates an environment of continued lockdowns and idleness, thus making everyone, staff and offenders, within the institution less safe."
You can read the full audit below.